3.5 year PhD opportunity with Biomedical Engineering and the National Manufacturing Institute Scotland.

A three year PhD investigating the efficiency of transient non-thermal plasma discharges for different environmental applications is offered by the High Voltage Technologies (HVT) Research group within the Institute for Energy & Environment.

Active matter has developed into one of the most exciting interdisciplinary research areas. Following the spirit of R. Feynman ‘what I cannot create I do not understand’ our goal is to create smart artificial active matter and to broaden the material range and achieve novel (biomimetic) functionalities that pave the way to applications in the biomedical or environmental field.

Artificial intelligence and machine learning consume energy, and computing in general requires massive amounts of electricity. In order to meet sustainability goals and avoid energy shortages, new strategies for computation are being explored. In this project we want to explore the possibility of using artificial active matter to develop innovative hardware for non-digital computation and become the active agent in solving computational problems.

Modelling of laser light propagating in micro-ring resonators in collaboration with experiments performed at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light in Erlangen (Germany). Applications of these devices are in atomic clocks, quantum technologies, telecommunication, GPS and integrated photonic circuits.

A fully-funded position to undertake research in the ground-breaking field of quantum sensing and measurement, after the first year specialising in Magnetometry.

Titanium sapphire lasers are an enabling scientific and industrial tool across applications from biological imaging to quantum technologies. They are also a vital and growing part of Glasgow’s hi-tech economy. The studentship will build on recent Strathclyde work on novel Ti:sapphire crystal specifications to progress towards multi-Watt lasers that combine the low-cost per Watt and reliability of diode laser pumping with designs that are more suited to volume manufacture.

This project is focused on advanced modern image analysis and pattern recognition methods to study the microscopy and spectroscopy of semiconductor structures and devices. Developing automated and robust methods to look at images and video will revolutionise this area.

The development of quantum electronics in silicon carbide will be the main focus of this project. Through a balanced mix of academic and industrial research activities, the student will design, manufacture and test novel electronics relevant to the nascent fields of quantum computing and quantum sensing.

In this project we will investigate various approaches for on-demand engineering of trapped spin states in charged quantum dots through a series of coherent control experiments that will explore how the different approaches affect the performance of all optically operated universal single qubit gates.

In this PhD project we aim to develop next-generation neural interfaces that combine multi-wavelength control of neurons with electrophysiological recording. The student will join a well-resourced team of researchers, including physicists, engineers and neuroscientists with collaborations across the US and Europe.

This PhD offers the opportunity to develop an advanced optoelectronic neural implant capable of interfacing with populations of neurons across brain regions. The device will guide two wavelengths of light into deep regions of the brain to allow optogenetic excitation and inhibition of neural activity to enhance our understanding of brain function. Candidates would be expected to have a background in Physics or Engineering, with an interest in neurotechnologies.

Advances in microscopy allow imaging on scales ranging from single molecules to whole organism. This project involves developing a microscope that will allow images of whole invertebrates (likely C. Elegans nematode worms) be correlated with nanoscopic (super-resolution) images of sub-cellular regions within them.

This project will take advantage of the EPSRC strategic equipment Electron Probe MicroAnalyzer (EPMA) at the University of Strathclyde to investigate wide bandgap semiconductors (AlGaN, Ga2O3, and h-BN) materials and devices for far UV-C applications.

Plasma photonic structures provide new media for manipulating ultra-high intensity lasers. The PhD project will investigate these plasma structures experimentally and using numerical modelling methods. This challenging project will apply terawatt to petawatt laser beams at the University of Strathclyde and other national and international facilities to create time dependent structures and apply them as optical components and metamaterials for the next generation of exawatt to zettawatt lasers.

Gallium oxide is an emerging semiconductor offering promises for applications in ultraviolet optical devices. The project aims to improve our understanding of the material, elucidate the mechanisms leading to its optical properties, and exploit the findings to produce better devices.

A fully-funded position to undertake research on quantum fluids. You'll work closely with the supervisor to develop a state-of-the-art experimental apparatus to explore vortex dynamics in binary superfluids, with a particular emphasis on reduced dimensionality where quantum effects are enhanced.

This PhD project aims to develop a comprehensive suite of tools and techniques that will enable superresolution imaging of nanodiamonds in living tissue, with a particular emphasis on imaging neurons.

This PhD research project will involve the student in undertaking numerical simulations and experimental investigations into RF and microwave propagation in plasma. Plasma as a non-linear and dispersive media can have a dramatic impact on the propagation of EM signals. Such effects are well known in laser-plasma interactions, in the injection of powerful microwave heating and current drive microwave signals in magnetically confined fusion plasma and in RF waves interacting in the ionosphere.

We focus on new nonlinear regimes with input powers so low that they enable all-optical processing and the exploitation of the fundamental advantages of quantum technologies at the nanoscale.

Free-Electron Lasers (FELs) use electron beams produced by particle accelerators to generate intense electromagnetic radiation from microwaves into the hard X-ray, which is of particular interest to a wide range of users. This project will look at developing new types of FEL output further enhancing their applications.

A fully-funded position to undertake research in the ground-breaking field of quantum sensing and measurement, after the first year specialising in Atomic Clocks.

A fully-funded position to undertake research in the ground-breaking field of quantum sensing and measurement, after the first year specialising in Atom Interferometry.

PhDs are available in an exciting and challenging research area, with a vibrant group of experimentalists and theoreticians developing and applying ultra-compact accelerators and x-ray sources based on laser-plasma interactions.

This PhD project will investigate new neuromorphic functionalities in photonic integrated circuits. The programme will hybridize state-of-the-art semiconductor integrated devices with photo-chemical switches, targeting tunability and all-optical information storage. Those devices will be used to build hardware-based photonic neural networks demonstrating synaptic plasticity and self-learning. This project is part of a funded, international collaboration with groups in Germany and Italy.

Photonic supraparticles are closed-packed assemblies a few tens to thousands of nanometres in size made of photonic nanoparticles, the latter acting as the building blocks or ‘nano-bricks’ for the SP. Our team has established self-assembly processes to fabricate SPs from the bottom-up; we have shown we can make microscopic lasers this way and are engineering their performance and applications. This PhD project will push the development of SP photonics and explore aspects of this technology.

Structural imperfections in the crystalline materials used to make electronic and optoelectronic devices, can limit device performance and can lead to device failure. In this project the student will push the limits of electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD), a scanning electron microscopy technique, to investigate the structural properties of new materials such as AlGaN nanostructures in development for UV LEDs, or halide perovskites for next generation solar cells.

You will be part of a new research area for the UK, namely making absolute and traceable measurements of temperature using optical measurements of the Doppler broadening of an atomic transition. The aim is to scale to practical (~mm sized) sensors using miniature optical cells filled with appropriate atomic/molecular species. This project is in conjunction with external collaborative partner Graham Machin at the National Physical Laboratory (NPL).

This project is focused on exploring scalability of atomic quantum hardware by overcoming barriers to achieving high fidelity coherent control and entanglement using both trapped ions and neutral atoms. Working in close collaboration between experimental teams at NPL and Strathclyde, we are seeking to recruit a PhD student to address the shared challenges in performing coherent control and state readout in a trapped-ion hardware platform at NPL.

This PhD research project will involve the student in undertaking numerical simulations and benchmarking these against experimental measurements either in industry facilities or at the University to investigate novel schemes to suppress undesired sidebands in the output of slot mode antenna. The student will also explore alternative antenna designs to realise the same benefits. These antenna can be used in beaming microwave energy for application in energy transfer. 

The project aims to optimise and stabilise laser-driven particle and radiation beams produced in intense laser-solid interactions, through the development and demonstration of a new machine learning platform. This new platform will be based on particle in cell simulations of the laser-plasma interaction physics and will be implemented on experiments at several state-of-the-art high power laser facilities.

A project to develop and use a new super-resolution optical microscope to obtain very high spatial resolution images of fluorescently labelled live cells.

This project will focus on the investigation of a hybrid system involving exciton-polaritons and quantum dots in monolithic semiconductor microcavities at the Experimental Quantum Nanoscience Lab. Based on the interaction between the exciton polaritons and electron spins trapped in quantum dots, this system will be investigated towards the creation of scalable quantum hardware.

One of the most important areas of research to make quantum computers useful is developing practical quantum algorithms. In this project, you will tackle some of the many open problems that stand in the way of using quantum computers to speed up scientific computing. You will use both analytical and computational methods to carry out your research, including running algorithms on test bed quantum computers.

This project is focused on developing and applying next generation detectors for the scanning electron microscopy techniques of electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) and electron channelling contrast imaging (ECCI).

The project will develop advanced spatial modulation techniques leveraging the 2D array of optical transmitters and receivers to enable scalable high-capacity MIMO optical wireless communication. The goal is to develop optical frontends to enable massive parallelism and effective spatial decoding algorithms to enable high spectral efficiency and efficient communication.

PhD position available to undertake frontier research in nanotechnology of noble metal nanoparticles.

An EPSRC funded studentship in theoretical quantum information, specifically the relationship between decoherence, non-classicality, and the efficacy of quantum information tasks.

This project will develop new numerical techniques for studying many-body quantum systems far from equilibrium, exploring the possible phase transitions which can be realised.

A fully-funded PhD studentship is available in high power laser-plasma physics, working within a vibrant team of experimentalists and theoreticians, to investigate the onset of a new regime of high-field relativistic plasmas.

The project will investigate self-organized phases in cold atoms with light-mediated coupling. We are looking at laser cooled thermal atoms or quantum degenerate gases driven by a detuned laser beam with feedback from a single mirror or a cavity leading to the spontaneous emergence of intriguing spatial structures, typically hexagonal in 2D [1,2]. Depending on the interest of the student, it can have a theoretical or experimental focus.

Electromagnetic scattering is key to perceiving the world through light but also limits information transmission via light beams. This project has two goals: first, using electromagnetic theory, we will identify light beam combinations that minimize scattering and optimize information transfer, exploring both classical intense beams and quantum cases with few photons. Second, we'll apply machine learning to design nanoparticle distributions that generate beams with minimal scattering.

The project will investigate self-organized phases in cold atoms with light-mediated coupling. We are looking at laser cooled thermal atoms or quantum degenerate gases driven by a detuned laser beam with feedback from a single mirror or a cavity leading to the spontaneous emergence of intriguing spatial structures, typically hexagonal in 2D [1,2]. Depending on the interest of the student, it can have a theoretical or experimental focus.

John Anderson Research Studentship Scheme (JARSS) doctoral studentships are available annually for excellent students and excellent research projects.

There are two main sources of funding:

• Central University funding
• Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council - Doctoral Landscape Award (EPSRC - DLA) funding.

The JARSS 2025/26 competition will open in October 2024 and students successful in this competition will commence studies in October 2025. Faculties will set their own internal deadlines for the competition.

Academics/Supervisors make the applications for this scheme and there are various deadlines across Departments and Faculties, therefore, in the first instance, all interested students should contact the Department where they would like to carry out their research.