Category Archives: People

Michael Morrissey

09/2009 – 08/2011 Postdoc on BEC2

Before coming to Crete I graduated from Cork Insitutute of Technology (CIT) with a B.Sc. in “Applied Physics and Instrumentation” in 2004. As part of completeing the B.Sc. a five month project was undertaken. This project, entitled “Quality Surveillance Algorithms for Erbium Doped Fibre Amplifiers”, was carried out in the Information and Communication Network (ICN) Department at Siemens AG research facility in Munich. The project entailed research into how the aging of components with the EDFA can be monitored using algorithms. From a mathematical model, the key parameters needed to detect the degradation/aging of the EDFA were determined. In addition to theoretical work, optical experiments were carried out to determine a technique to measure the required parapeters. A procedure was developed to test the feasibility and accuracy of the EDFA model.

From my experience in Siemens AG, I developed an interest in optics and decided to pursue this interest. I started my PhD in September 2004 with the Quantum Optics Group under the supervision of Dr. Síle Nic Chormaic, in the area of “Control of cold rubidium atoms“.

I built the first cold atom experiment in South-Africa at the University of KwaZulu-Natal and then moved on to work at Extreme Light Infrastructure in Prague

Gustav Wikström

05/2009-10/2009 Master Student

Gustav joined the Cretan Matter-Waves Group in May 2009 to do his thesis work for his master at Umeå University, Sweden. He was born in the northern part of Sweden in a town called Umeå. He did his master thesis with us at the Cretan Matterwave group in collaboration with the departement of physics at Umeå University. His topic was dark-ground imaging of atoms from a MOT.

Jules Grucker

11/2008 to 08/2009 Postdoc on BEC 2

Jules joined the Cretan Matter Waves group in Novembe 2008. He started in Sptember 2009 in the the LKB solid helium group led by Ph. Jacquier. He is a Maître de Conférences at the Université Pierre et Marie Curie and is a researcher at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris. He passed his Thèse d’État in 2018. He did his undergraduate degree in physics at University Strasbourg 1. He then went with an Erasmus scholarship to do his first Master degree at the Niels Bohr Institute, Copenhagen, Denmark. After this he returned to France to do a second Master degree, this time at the the Université Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris under the supervision of Paul Indelicato (currently director of Laboratoire Kastler Brossel, Ecole Normale Supérieure). For his PhD he went to the Institute Galilée of the Laboratoire de Physique des Lasers (University Paris 13). There he joined the IOA (Interferometry and Optics with Atoms) team of Martial Ducloy. He stayed on for one more year as a post-doc before coming to Crete.

Jules is now a lecturer at the Laboratoire Kastler Brossel at Ecole Normale Superieur in Paris, where he studies the properties of solid Helium with the aim of demonstrating a super solid.

11/2008 to 08/2009 Postdoc at the Cretan Matter Waves group
05/2006 to 05/2008 PhD Student at the Institute Galilée of the Laboratoire de Physique
05/2001 to 05/2006 Undergraduate degree in physics at University Strasbourg 1

Alexandros Tzimis

07/2008 to 11/2009 Undergraduate Student

Alexandros joined the Cretan Matter-Waves Group in July 2008 as an undergraduate student. He was born in Marousi, Athens and grew up in Chania. He started his studies as an undergraduate at the Physics Departement of the University of Crete in 2003. His main interests are technology/computers/movies. He is now pursuing a PhD in the group of Prof Savvidis at the University of Crete.

Anastasios Mavris

07/2008 to 08/2009 Undergraduate Student

Anastasios was born and grew up in Rhodes. He started his studies at the physics department of the University of Crete in 2003. He joined the Cretan Matter-Waves Group in July 2008 as an undergraduate student.

Grigoris Konstantinidis

09/2007 to 01/2012 PhD Student on BEC1
11/2006 to 08/2007 Master Student on BEC1

Grigoris joined the Cretan Matter-Waves Group in November 2006 as a Master student. He graduated from Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering. October 2005 he came to the Physics Departement of the University of Crete to do a Master in General Physics with a specialization in Condensed Matter Physics.

Gregory succesfully defended his thesis (link to pdf) on the 25. January 2012.

Olivier Morizot

03/2007 – 04/2009 Postdoc on BEC 1 working on dark-gound imaging

Olivier did his PhD in the COMETA group at the Laboratoire de Physique des Lasers in Paris, where he is studying BEC’s in RF-traps. After this he went to India to join for three months the Fundamental Interactions Lab of Dr. Unnikrishnan in Mumbai where he has managed to take part in the first BEC of India.

After leaving our group in April 2009, Olivier spend the summer in Brasil, working in the team of Vanderlei Bagnato on a project of photonic molecules in a MOT and exploring the new world.

Olivier stayed with us from March 2007 – April 2009 working on dark-gound imaging.

Olivier is now a Maître de Conférences (lecturer) at the Université de Provence in Marseille, where he works in the team of Martina Knoop and Françoise Vedel on the development of cold ions experiments. He is setting up a miniture atom clock using a single Ca+ ion.

05/2011 to 05/2016 Lecturer at the Université de Provence in Marseille
05/2009 to 08/2009 Postdoc with the Cretan Matter Waves
05/2007 to 04/2009 Marie Curie Postdoc
06/2006 to 09/2006 PostDoc researcher in the Fundamental Interactions Lab of Dr. Unnikrishnan in Mumbai
09/2003 to 05/2006 PhD student in the group of Hélène PERRIN and Vincent LORENT at the Laboratoire de Physique des Lasers (Villetaneuse, France).
09/2000 to 05/2003 Undergraduate student at the Institut d’Optique Graduated School (Orsay, France).

Mark Baker

11/2006 to 12/2009 Post-Doc on BEC 1 and 2

Mark was instrumental in setting up BEC 1 and 2 during his postdoc 2006-2009.

Before joining us at the Cretan Matter-Waves Mark did his undergraduate studies in Brisbane, Australia, at the University of Queensland (1996-1998). This was followed by an 18 month stint or work and study in Perth at the University of Western Australia (UWA).
In 2000 he returned to Brisbane, and from 2001-2006 he undertook his PhD studies in metastable atomic beam lithography at the Centre for Quantum Dynamics, Griffith University, under the supervision Dr. Robert Sang and Prof. W. MacGillivra.

Mark is currently a researcher in Quantum Technologie s with Defence, Science and Technology Group, Australia, and a Senior Research Fellow (Hon.) at the University of Queensland, where he leads research with optically trapped ultra-cold atoms for precision sensing.

11/2006 to 12/2009 Post-Doc on BEC 1 and 2
09/2001 to 07/2006 PhD studies at the Centre for Quantum Dynamics, Griffith University
09/1996 to 06/1998 Undergraduate at the University of Queensland

Antonis Protopapadakis

11/2006 to 08/2007 Undergraduate student

Antonis did his undergraduate degree at the University of Crete, in the course of which he a project on a new type of grating stabilised diode laser.

Melina Pappa

10/2006 to 06/2011 Phd Student on BEC 1

Melina was born in Larisa, Greece. She joined the Cretan Matter-Waves Group as a Ph.D. student in October 2006. In November 2004 she graduated from the Physics Department of the University of Crete . From the same University she received her Master’s Degree in General Physics in September 2006.

She graduated from her PhD in June 2011. Her PhD thesis can eb found here.

10/2006 to 06/2011 Phd Studies in Physics
09/2004 to 09/2006 Master studies
10/1999 to 10/2004 Undergraduate Studies