On Thursday 12 April 2018 at the SUPSI Campus Trevano in Canobbio, Lugano, Federico Capasso, 2016 Balzan Prizewinner for Applied Photonics, held the Annual Balzan Lecture, entitled Cascade lasers and flat optics for the 21st century. The Annual Balzan Lecture 2018, organized through the joint agreement for collaborations between the Fondazione Balzan, the Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences, and the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, was part of the international symposium # digitale21 (The Effects of Digitalization on Training, Learning and Working in the 21st Century), organized by the Swiss Academy of Sciences at SUPSI Lugano.