The Kernfysisch Versneller Instituut (KVI, Groningen , the Netherlands) is a national institute for research in the fields of fundamental and applied atomic and subatomic physics. It is an interfaculty institute of the University of Groningen (RUG) and its staff members are employed partly by the university and partly by the NWO Foundation for Fundamental Research on Matter (FOM).
Recently the FOM-funded program “Broken Mirrors and Drifting Constants” has started. This is a joint program between our institute and the Laser centre of the VU Amsterdam. This research program will run until 2017, and in this context we are hiring PhD students at the KVI.
We are seeking to fill PhD student positions: “Broken Mirrors and Drifting Constants”
Within the research program a number of projects are defined, with the common goal to use the most precise tools of physics available today to test our current physical understanding of the universe as laid out in General Relativity (GR) and the Standard Model (SM). A special focus is the violation of fundamental symmetries (Broken Mirrors), and the variation of the fundamental constants (Drifting Constants). We have selected a number of target species, which, because of their fortuitous level structure, have an enhanced sensitivity to new physics.
These target species range from the He atom, to He+, Ra+ and H2+ ions, and H2, NH3 and SrF molecules; all systems at the atomic scale. We will bring these target species under full control and conduct measurements at extreme precision. Our measurements at the atomic scale will provide essential input for long sought-after grand unification theories, complementary to currently ongoing approaches at high energies with accelerators and cosmic particles. Concurrent research, focused on time-reversal violation, is done in the TRImP program at KVI using alkali and alkaline-earth atoms, for which there are also positions available.
PhD Position on Precision Measurements using trapped Ions, Atoms and Molecules
