It cannot be overstated how glass permeates virtually all aspects of modern life in ways other materials or material families do not. This ubiquity is a result of the richness of glass compositions and forming methods that have enabled an equally diverse range of glasses and forms.

From the earliest medieval windows to the first telescopes and microscopes to today’s optical fibers that can carry light with intensities that exceed those on the surface of the sun, it is hard to separate the history of glass from the history of light-based technologies (see timeline: A brief history of glass and light). In honor of the International Year of Glass, this column celebrates this intertwined history by briefly discussing selected areas of the future impact of optical glasses.