Optical cavities are useful tools to enhance the interaction between light and matter, which is important to make good quantum emitters. However, it turns out that the cavities themselves (without any quantum emitters) are already interesting objects to study.

Research groups in the Quantum Matter & Optics programme investigate electronic properties of matter and light-matter interactions with emphasis on quantum information.

The quantum nature of matter and light has grown into a broad and fruitful research field for theorists and experimentalists alike. It combines foundational research with toward applications, the most well known of which is the quantum computer.

Scattering of light in the presence of nano-structured materials, i.e. with features in the order of the wavelength of the light or smaller, reveals details of how light interacts with matter at the nanoscale.

The project ‘Food citizens? Collective food procurement in European cities: solidarity and diversity, skills and scale’ has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (Grant agreement No. 724151).

The field of exoplanet research is rapidly advancing through the development of new technology, observing techniques, and post-processing methods.

Promotor: Prof.dr. M.A.G.J. Orrit

The quantum nature of matter and light has grown into a broad and fruitful research field for theorists and experimentalists alike. It combines foundational research with toward applications, the most well known of which is the quantum computer.

Single-molecule spectroscopy has become a powerful method for using organic fluorescent molecules in numerous applications.

In this thesis, we develop a novel technique called Optical Near-field Electron Microscopy (ONEM), which aims to combine the advantages of both optical and electron microscopy: the high resolution of electron microscopy and the low sample damage of optical microscopy.

Since the early 1990s, one can isolate the optical signal of a single molecule and single-molecule spectroscopy has quickly grown into an important research field.

Optical projection tomography (OPT) is a tomographic 3D imaging technique used for specimens in the millimetre scale.

Promotores: Prof.dr. C.U. Keller, Prof.dr. H.C. Gerritsen

The master’s specialisation Research in Physics, Quantum Matter and Optics at Leiden University offers a thorough experience on the front line of physics research with a practical training of communicative and computer skills. The programme focuses on Condensed Matter problems, such as Molecular Electronics,…

This thesis examines silicon pore optics (SPO), a technology that exploits silicon wafers from the semiconductor industry to create extremely high quality X-ray optics, by studying its manufacturing process, applications, and prospects.

The research program of the QO group has three leading themes: Optical Physics, Quantum Optics, and Photon-Matter Interactions. We work mostly at the boundaries between these themes with entanglement as a bridging and binding agent.

Promotor: D. Bouwmeester, Co-promotor: D. Kraft

This thesis describes the development and validation of new high-contrast imaging techniques, with the ultimate goal of enabling the next generation of instruments for ELT-class telescopes to directly image Earth-like extra-solar planets orbiting around nearby stars.

Advancing the understanding of the interaction of light and matter on the single-quantum level is important for near-future quantum technologies but also to answer fundamental questions.

Research in the van Exter lab focuses on quantum aspects of light and light-matter interaction. One of our long-term goals is to develop a reliable quantum memory, based on a single emitter in an open micro cavity.

The Western Mediterranean is a key region to understand human dispersal events within and out of the African continent as well as for the eventual replacement of Neanderthals by anatomically modern humans during the Pleistocene. Central to any conclusive interpretation of archaeological and palaeoclimatic…

This year, two Leiden physicists have earned a prestigious ERC Starting Grant. With a budget of 1.5 million euros, this is one of the largest individual grants for scientists.

The European Research Council, better known as the ERC, turns ten this year, and researchers from Leiden celebrated this on 23 June. The ERC is an important provider of research funding, also to Leiden University. Over the past ten years researchers from the University have been awarded over 70 ERC…

Five Leiden researchers have been awarded a Consolidator Grant by the European Research Council (ERC). This grant of up to two million euros will enable them to continue and expand their scientific research.

Physicist Martin van Hecke receives a 2.5 million euro ERC research grant for research into information processing materials. Starting out with a piece of rubber that can count to ten.

Seven researchers from Leiden University have been awarded an ERC Starting Grant. This will enable them to start their own project, build their research team and put their best ideas into action.

Four Leiden researchers have each been awarded a consolidator grant of up to 2 million euros by the European Research Council (ERC). They carry out research on a diverse range of subjects, from gender stereotyping in the field of science to making sugar molecules.

Storm clouds are gathering for the European grants for ‘excellent’ research. Researchers therefore need to explain how important these grants are. This is what Jean-Pierre Bourguignon, President of the European Research Council (ERC), had to say during a visit to Leiden University on Thursday 24 Apr…

Archaeologist Frans Theuws, Buddhism specialist Jonathan Silk and mathematician Ronald Cramer have each been awarded an ERC Advanced Grant of 2.5 million euros.

This weeks marks the 10th anniversary of the European Research Council. For the past decade, the council has contributed to many scientific projects all over Europe, including Leiden University. It has funded almost 7,000 researchers, leading to just short of 100,000 scientific articles. A total of…

Four scientists from Leiden University have each been awarded a Starting Grant by the European Research Council (ERC). This grant, worth up to two million euros, gives researchers the opportunity to head up a research team for five years.

Anthropologist Erik Bähre has received a Consolidator Grant from the European Research Council (ERC) for research on the morality of life insurance.

Leiden physicist Alexey Boyarsky, together with his colleagues from Lausanne and Copenhagen, has been awarded an ERC Advanced Grant to research an extension of the standard model of particle physics. The leading house of the project is the Technical University of Lausanne. 580.000 euro goes directly…

At the center of this research project lies a practice-based, artistic exploration of the impact of digitalization on the lived reality of both physical and cognitive labor.

From the effects of hormone fluctuations in women via the interior structure of giant planets to the prehistory of the languages: six Leiden researchers have been awarded a Consolidator Grant by the European Research Council.

The Clinical Epidemiology department at the LUMC has set up a series of lectures for asylum seekers. The series has become a huge success.

Leiden University professor of Science-Based Business Simcha Jong Kon Chin has been awarded an ERC Consolidator Grant.

Professor Eveline Crone joined the Scientific Council of the European Research Council (ERC) on 13 January.

Cátia Antunes received the prestigious ERC Grant for her Research Project

Prof. Willem Adelaar has been awarded an ERC Advanced Grant to do research on Central and Southern American Indian languages.

Light can be used to apply forces on single cells. Focused lasers have been used by physicists to tweeze particles and to manipulate them. These so called “optical tweezers” can be used as mechanical phenotyping tools for characterising the mechanics of materials and living objects.

Leiden Professor of Molecular astrophysics Ewine van Dishoeck has been awarded an Advanced Grant by the European Research Council (ERC). She has been awarded 2.3 million euros in research funding for the MOLDISK programme. Within this programme, Van Dishoeck wants to connect chemistry and physics in…

Eveline Crone surmises that adolescence also has a positive effect on social development. She believes, for example, that it is in adolescence that young people learn the skills of cooperation, sharing and helpfulness. She will be researching this hypothesis in the coming period with an ERC Consolidator…

Arabist and papyrologist Petra Sijpesteijn has received a Consolidator Grant from the European Research Council for her research on the early Islamic Empire. The five-year ERC grant will fund the research project

From social inequalities in prehistory to placebo effects in medical treatments. Four researchers from Leiden University have been awarded a prestigious ERC Advanced Grant worth EUR 2.5 million to develop their research.

The European Research Council has awarded five Leiden researchers an ERC Consolidator Grant. These subsidies of up to a maximum of two million euros will enable the researchers to further expand their scientific research.

Six researchers from Leiden University have received an ERC starting grant. This grant of on average 1.5m euros will enable the researchers to launch their own project, form their own research team and develop their best ideas.

Assistant professor Political Philosophy Dorota Mokrosinska has received the ERC Starting Grant for her project Democratic Secrecy: A Philosophical Study of the Role of Secrecy in Democratic Governance. The project, running from 2015 to 2020 is funded by the European Research Council

Biological polymers, including proteins and the genome, undergo folding processes crucial for their proper functioning. Even slight changes in the folding structure of these biopolymers can have significant implications, leading to the development of various pathological conditions, such as neurodegenerative…