Dear Humies comittee and audience. Please find below the enumerated list of information requested for admission to the 2011 "humies" competition. (1) Papers We present two relevant papers to the "2011 humies" contest. Hereafter, we refer to them as paper (a) and paper(b): (a) Fast and optimal broad-band Stokes/Mueller polarimeter design by the use of a genetic algorithm (b) Genetic Invention of Fast and Optimal Broad-band Stokes/Mueller Polarimeter Designs (2) Authors Both papers share the same set of authors. Author 1 name: Paul Anton Letnes e-mail: paul.anton.letnes@gmail.com mobile phone: (+47) 986 20 826 work phone: (+47) 735 93 648 Author 2 name: Ingar Stian Nerbø e-mail: nerbo@ntnu.no work phone: (+47) 735 93 426 Author 3 name: Lars Martin Sandvik Aas e-mail: lars.martin.aas@gmail.com work phone: (+47) 735 93 455 Author 4 name: Pål Gunnar Ellingsen e-mail: paalge@gmail.com work phone: (+47) 735 93 367 Author 5 name: Morten Kildemo e-mail: morten.kildemo@phys.ntnu.no work phone: (+47) 735 93 211 Physical mail to all authors can be sent to the address: Institutt for fysikk Høgskoleringen 5 7491 Trondheim Norway (3) Name of corresponding author Paul Anton Letnes (4) Abstracts Paper (a): A fast multichannel Stokes/Mueller polarimeter with no mechanically moving parts has been designed to have close to optimal performance from 430−2000 nm by applying a genetic algorithm. Stokes (Mueller) polarimeters are characterized by their ability to analyze the full Stokes (Mueller) vector matrix) of the incident light (sample). This ability is characterized by the condition number, kappa, which directly influences the measurement noise in polarimetric measurements. Due to the spectral dependence of the retardance in birefringent materials, it is not trivial to design a polarimeter using dispersive components. We present here both a method to do this optimization using a genetic algorithm, as well as simulation results. Our results include fast, broad-band polarimeter designs for spectrographic use, based on 2 and 3 Ferroelectric Liquid Crystals, whose material properties are taken from measured values. The results promise to reduce the measurement noise significantly over previous designs, up to a factor of 4.5 for a Mueller polarimeter, in addition to extending the spectral range. Paper (b): We have applied a genetic algorithm to generate optimal polarimeter designs for a selected wavelength interval, assuming known dispersion relations of the components. Our results are improvements on previous patented designs based on ferroelectric liquid crystals. (5) and (6) Satisfaction of selection criteria The Stokes/Mueller polarimeter design described in Paper (a) and (b) was generated using a standard genetic algorithm. The performance of the polarimeter was evaluated by methods which are well known from the scientific literature, and the evaluation of a polarimeter design can be trusted independent of how one arrives at it. Design of optical components over a broad spectrum is in general considered a very difficult task, and this is also the case for polarimeters. Due to this fact, many papers have been published on the topic of polarimeter design, including e.g. polarimeters applied to astronomy, medical imaging and others. Our polarimeter design is an improvement on all polarimeter designs known to us at this time, in particular a design patented by Cattelan, Garcia-Caurel, De Martino, and Drevillon. On these grounds, we and the technology transfer office at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology believe that our invention is also patentable. Hence, we have applied for a US patent for our "genetic" polarimeter design. Previous polarimeter designs are typically arrived at by a process based partly on heuristics and partly on "direct search" type methods for evaluating various parameter combinations. (A) The result was patented as an invention in the past, is an improvement over a patented invention, or would qualify today as a patentable new invention. As explained in detail in paper (a), our design is an improvement on a design patented by D. Cattelan, E. Garcia-Caurel, A. De Martino, and B. Drevillon: "Device and method for taking spectroscopic polarimetric measurements in the visible and near-infrared ranges" Patent application 2937732, France. We also believe that our design is patentable, and have applied for a patent on it. (B) The result is equal to or better than a result that was accepted as a new scientific result at the time when it was published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal. As an example, consider the design described in this paper: Citation: Steven Tomczyk, Roberto Casini, Alfred G. de Wijn, and Peter G. Nelson, Applied Optics, Vol. 49, Issue 18, pp. 3580-3586 (2010) doi: 10.1364/AO.49.003580 Note that only the Ferroelectric Liquid Crystal (FLC) designs are directly comparable. The authors use a slightly different method of evaluating the performance of a polarimeter; the easiest way of seeing that our design is an improvement is by considering the spectral range (450 - 1200 nm, as opposed to our design at 430 - 2000 nm). (D) The result is publishable in its own right as a new scientific result independent of the fact that the result was mechanically created. (E) The result is equal to or better than the most recent human-created solution to a long-standing problem for which there has been a succession of increasingly better human-created solutions. This is the case if we allow for solutions combining human experience and some level of computerized brute force search. (F) The result is equal to or better than a result that was considered an achievement in its field at the time it was first discovered. As our result is an improvement on the patent by Cattelan et al. and on the polarimeter design published by Tomczyk et al., this is arguably the case. (G) The result solves a problem of indisputable difficulty in its field. This point is somewhat vague, but it is indisputable that it is difficult to design very broad-band polarimeters. (7) Citation of the papers Paper (a): Paul Anton Letnes, Ingar Stian Nerbø, Lars Martin S. Aas, Pål Gunnar Ellingsen, and Morten Kildemo, "Fast and optimal broad-band Stokes/Mueller polarimeter design by the use of a genetic algorithm," Opt. Express 18, 23095-23103 (2010) URL: http://www.opticsinfobase.org/abstract.cfm?uri=oe-18-22-23095 doi: 10.1364/OE.18.023095 Paper (b): Full citation not available, as it will be published at the GECCO 2011 conference. The title and authors are given above. The paper id is "pap102". (8) Prize money split Any prize money, if any, is to be divided equally among the co-authors. (9) Comparison with other "human-competitive" entries Our polarimeter design is human-competitive with both published scientific results as well as patented commercial devices. The design methodology benefits from the fact that the technique for simulating and evaluating a theoretical polarimeter design is well known from the literature, and as such, a genetic design can be trusted. Indeed, any design can be evaluated regardless of how one arrives at it. Also, the design of broad-band optical components is known to be a hard problem in general, due to both spectral dependence of important physical quantities combined with the phenomenon of dispersion. We have strong reason to believe that our methodology can be used to derive other polarimeter designs for other types of technology (e.g. nematic liquid crystals), as long as one possesses a reliable model of the material properties in question. Generation of good polarimeter designs is clearly of interest in the field - we received our first e-mail regarding our paper 18 hours after it was posted on ArXiv.org. Finally, we believe an entry which qualifies on 6 out of 8 possible criteria is a strong one, and worthy of consideration for the "2011 humies" contest.