Skip to Content

PreDoc School on Atom-based quantum interfaces

Once again, we are organizing a pre-doctoral school to be held in Les Houches from October 8-19, 2012. The title of the school is "Atom-based quantum interfaces." It consists in a two week master course on the physics of cold atoms, as part of hybrid quantum systems. This PreDoc school will give an introduction to atom cooling techniques, to such atom-based quantum interfaces and to their applications in fundamental research as well as in quantum technologies.

The course is targeted at the advanced undergraduate level and emphasizes formal lectures building on textbook knowledge. This goal meets the requirements of the Les Houches pre-doctoral school program. The course is intended for PhD students in their first or second year. Undergraduates at the European Masters level who are planning a PhD study are also invited to apply. Young post-docs entering the field can also apply.

The lectures will be given (in English).
- Peter Zoller : Introduction
- Hélčne Perrin : Light-Matter Interaction / Laser Cooling and Trapping
- Jook Walraven : Evaporative cooling and BEC
- Jean-Michel Raimond : Single atom cavity QED
- Tilman Esslinger : collective interaction of a BEC with a cavity mode
- Philipp Treutlein : Ultracold Atoms Coupled to Micro- and Nanomechanical Oscillators
- Arno Rauschenbeutel : Trapping and Interfacing Cold Neutral Atoms Using Optical Nanofibers
- Andreas Wallraff (to be confirmed) : Superconducting resonators
- Eugene Polzik (to be confirmed) : storage and retrieval of quantum states of light in atomic ensembles

The course has been initiated several years ago by the International Cold Atom Network, InterCAN (http://www.intercan.org), which is promoting European collaboration of research and education in the field of dilute atomic and molecular quantum systems. INTERCAN is supported by the European funding agencies CORDIS (Community Research & Development Information Service), and ESF (European Science Foundation).

The school is also open to young Post-Docs who are entering the field (to maintain a coherent educational level of the participants, applications from experienced post-docs will be considered at the end of the selection process). The application is done on-line, and students will have to up-load a file with his/her curriculum vitae. The deadline for applications is June 30th. The selection of the appliants will be done during the first week of July.

The price for board and lodging in Les Houches is very low to facilitate the venue of young students (475 Euros for students in the first two years of PhD and 650 for the others). We have a few grants to pay the board and lodging (not for travel expenses). Applications arriving after June 30th can be considered, if the number of participants remains reasonable. But no grant can be attributed to those arriving late.