Joint Max Born Institute - Amplitude Phd Program (JMAP)

Framework: FP7 — People
Programme: Marie-Curie Actions
Theme: Marie Skłodowska-Curie
Destination: Initial Training Networks
Action type: Support for training and career development of researchers (Marie Curie)
Countries involved: Germany,France
Call:  (FP7-PEOPLE-2012-ITN, 2012)
Start date: 2012-09-01
End date: 2016-08-31
Duration (months): 48.0
Total project cost (EUR): 890035.52
EU funding (EUR): 890035.52
Participants: 2
Project status: CLOSED

The Max Born Institute for Non-Linear Optics and Short-Pulse Spectroscopy (MBI) and Amplitude Technologies (AT) are an academic research institution and a company that operate at the forefront of ultrafast laser physics, and that have a long tradition of mutual collaboration. The JMAP network is the result of a joint observation by MBI and AT that many university students with a talent for science and engineering end up pursuing careers outside these fields, because they have difficulty obtaining a clear picture of their career possibilities, and of the choices that they have for developing a sustainable future career in science and engineering. Therefore, MBI and AT want to exploit the possibilities that Initial Training Networks offer in shaping the careers of early stage researchers, and seek to establish a European Industrial Doctorate (EID) program, where a number of Phd projects are jointly carried out, providing a unique training opportunity for early stage researchers who will have an opportunity to split their time between high-level research in one of the premier ultrafast laser institutes in Europe and one of the leading manufacturers of lasers for the scientific market. The combination of these two inter-sectorial experiences, embedded in training activities that base themselves on “tried-and-true” best practice training principles acquired during previous Initial Training Networks that the MBI and AT coordinated or participated in, will equip the early stage researchers with unique tools that allow them considerable freedom in the choice of their subsequent careers, be it in academia, in industry, in education or – quite possibly – as independent entrepreneurs cutting out new directions of their own. In addition, the program will strengthen and expand the existing collaborations between MBI and AT. The program will advance MBIs research program in attosecond science, by improving the CEP stability of available laser systems and by contributing to the development of novel OPCPA laser systems that allow performing these experiments at unprecedented repetition rates, as well as its research on mid-infrared strong-field ionization (of relevance to studies of molecular dynamics and of laser filamentation) and charge particle (electron, proton) acceleration in a relativistic laser fields. At the same time the project provides AT access to knowledge transfer with a high relevance towards new products, encompassing the delivery of (i) CEP-stable laser amplifiers, (ii) high repetition rate OPCPA laser systems, (iii) intense mid-infrared laser pulses and (iv) 100 TW lasers with unsurpassed pre-pulse contrast ratios.

Keywords: p109 lasers and laser physics