The Fondazione Bruno Kessler Sensors and Devices Center (FBK-SD) brings together advanced research, device engineering, and interdisciplinary thinking across a diverse range of technologies, from high-performance biocomposites to single-photon systems and new approaches to scientific research.
Based in Italy, the Center combines expertise in silicon-based devices, advanced surface treatments, photonics circuits, MEMS techniques and hybridisation methods within a single research and innovation environment.
Its latest developments highlight how these capabilities are being applied across materials science, quantum technologies and interdisciplinary research.
FBK-SD research is also supported by an international network involving research institutions, universities, companies, end users and public agencies.
Turning Paulownia wood into a high-performance biocomposite
One recent development from the FBK Sensors and Devices Center is Supertimber, the result of a four-year collaboration with Xlam Dolomiti that has brought advanced materials research from laboratory-scale specimens towards industrial production.
Researchers from the Center’s SPIN Research Unit used their expertise in materials science to redesign and densify the cellular structure of Paulownia wood, transforming it into a high-performance biocomposite designed to compete with steel and carbon fibre.
The project demonstrates the potential of collaboration between scientific research and industry. The technology has been scaled from laboratory specimens to an industrial pilot plant through a collaborative co-design process between FBK-SD and Xlam Dolomiti.
Supported by the Autonomous Province of Trento, the project has also resulted in patented intellectual property and regional economic value, while creating potential applications for Supertimber in architecture, sports equipment, and the aerospace sector.
FBK advances single-photon technologies
The Center is also advancing research into single-photon technologies, with three researchers presenting original work at the international Single Photon Workshop (SPW 2026).
Their research covered three different applications of single-photon technology.
One project involves a microchip capable of generating truly random numbers for unbreakable quantum security. Another focuses on a smart photon-counting camera designed for faster medical diagnostics and autonomous driving sensors using LiDAR.
The third research project focuses on an efficient single-photon source intended for the quantum communication networks of the future.
The workshop provided an opportunity for FBK researchers to present their work to the international single-photon research community while gaining direct exposure to developments across the field.
Exploring non-dualism as an interdisciplinary research paradigm
The FBK Sensors and Devices Center has also recently contributed to research discussions extending beyond conventional technology disciplines.
At the annual conference of the European Academy of Religion in Rome, the Center joined FBK’s Institute for Religious Studies for a panel examining non-dualism as an interdisciplinary research paradigm.
The panel, titled “Unity and Differentiation. Inquiring Non-Dualism as Interdisciplinary Paradigm,” brought together Center Director Richard Hall-Wilton, physicist Rossana Dell’Anna, and anthropologist Sara Hejazi.
The researchers examined whether non-dualism, understood as the dissolution of classical distinctions between subject and object and between consciousness and matter, could provide a shared interpretive framework across quantum mechanics, biochemistry, morphogenesis and theories of consciousness.
The discussion brought physics and anthropology together, combining empirical insights from advanced physics with the cultural and symbolic dimensions studied by the social sciences.
The objective was to develop a shared conceptual vocabulary for addressing complexity across both natural and human systems.
From fundamental research to real-world applications
These latest developments reflect the breadth of research taking place at the FBK Sensors and Devices Center.
The Center brings together capabilities spanning the design and production of silicon-based devices, advanced surface treatments, photonics circuits, MEMS techniques and hybridisation methods for combining the performance of different technologies.
Its research has already produced devices used in some of the most demanding scientific experiments and missions.
Sensors developed by the Center are deployed in ALICE and ATLAS at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC), AMS on the International Space Station (ISS) and Limadou on the Chinese Seismo-Electromagnetic Satellite (CSES).
The Center has also developed microfluidics devices used in satellites involved in European Space Agency (ESA) missions, including GAIA, LISA Pathfinder and MICROSCOPE.
From transforming Paulownia wood into an advanced biocomposite to developing single-photon technologies and exploring new interdisciplinary approaches to complex systems, the latest work from the FBK Sensors and Devices Center shows the breadth of research and innovation across its facilities.
Its combination of diverse scientific expertise and advanced research infrastructure provides a foundation for developing technologies at the intersection of different fields, while translating research results into new applications and industrial opportunities.
