New ICFOnians

One visiting scientist, Dr. Stefano Pironio , six Postdoctorals researchers, Dr. Nitin Mohan, Dr. David Paredes, Dr. Christian Gogolin, Dr. Fabien Vialla, Dr. Claude Renaut, and Dr. Andrea Marini; four PhD Students, Mr. Boris Bourdoncle, Mr. Alessandro Seri, Mr. Nicolas Morell, and Mr. Renwen Yu; one student, Mr. Lisa Christin Saemisch ; and one member of the KTT team, Dr. Soledad Royo; joined ICFO.

Dr. Stefano Pironio joins ICFO as a visiting scientist to work with the Quantum Information Theory research group led by ICREA Professor at ICFO Antonio Acín. Currently working at the Physics Theory Division of the Faculty of Sciences, Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB), he is visiting ICFO to work with device-independent protocols. Dr. Pironio is a former ICFOnian, who worked as a postdoctoral researcher in Dr. Acin’s group from 2005 until early 2009.

Dr. Nitin Mohan joins ICFO as a postdoctoral researcher in the Advanced Flourescence Imaging and Biophysics research group led by Professor at ICFO Melike Lakadamyali. Having obtained his doctoral thesis in Nano Science and Technology from the Taiwan International Graduate Program (TIGP) of the Academia Sinica, Taiwan, he is now joining the group to work in the area of super-resolution and single particle studies of motors.

Dr. David Paredes joins ICFO as a postdoctoral researcher in the group led by ICREA Prof at ICFO Hugues de Riedmatten. David first came to ICFO as a Summer Fellow in 2010 in the group led by Prof. Morgan Mitchell. Now, having completed his PhD in Atomic and Molecular Physics at the Durham University (UK), he will work on projects related to Quantum Optics with single collective Rydberg excitations in cold atoms in the Quantum photonics with solids and atoms group.

Dr. Christian Gogolin joins ICFO as a postdoctoral researcher working in theoretical quantum optics with the groups led by ICREA Professors at ICFO Antonio Acín and Maciej Lewenstein. Having completed his PhD in Physics from the Freie Universitaet Berlin (Germany), he will be part of a strategic collaboration between the Max Planck Institute for Quantum Optics (MPQ) in Garching (Germany) and ICFO, in particular with the theory group led by Prof. Ignacio Cirac.

Dr. Fabien Vialla now joins the institute as a Postdoctoral researcher in the research group led by Nest Fellows, Prof. Frank Koppens. Having recently completed his PhD in Physics from the Laboratoire Pierre Aigrain, École Normale Supérieure in Paris (France), he will be working in the area of opto-electronics with 2d materials.

Dr. Claude Renaut joins ICFO as a postdoctoral researcher working in the Single Molecule Biophotonics research group led by ICREA Professor at ICFO María García-Parajo. Having recently completed his PhD in Physics through a joint collaboration program between CEA-Grenoble and the University of Burgundy (France), he will be working in the development of photonic antennas for biological applications.

Dr. Andrea Marini also joins the institute as a postdoctoral researcher in the Nanophotonics Theory research group led by ICREA Professor at ICFO Javier García de Abajo. Having completed his PhD degree in Photonics at the University of Bath (UK), he joins the group to work in nanophotonics using atomic-scale structures, in the scope of an ICFOnest+ COFUND Fellowship, an award he has received to carry out research for a period of 24 months.

Mr. Boris Bourdoncle joins the Quantum Information Theory research group, led by ICREA Professor at ICFO Antonio Acín, as a PhD student. As completing his Master Degree from the Télécom Paristech, Paris (France), he joins the group to center his doctoral thesis on device-independent quantum information protocols.

Mr. Alessandro Seri joins the Quantum photonics with Solids and Atoms research group led by ICREA Professor at ICFO Hugues de Riedmatten as a PhD student. After completing his Master in Physics from the University of Camerino (Italy), he joins the group to work in a doctoral thesis centered on solid state quantum memories based on rare-earth doped crystals.

Mr. Nicolas Morell joins the NanoOptoMechanics research group, led by Professor at ICFO Adrian Bachtold, as a PhD student. After completing his Master degree in Photonics from the joint program coordinated by the University of Barcelona, the Autonomous University of Barcelona and the Technical University of Catalonia, he joins the group to carry out his doctoral studies focused on nanotube mechanical resonators and excitons.

Mr. Renwen Yu joins the Nanophotonics Theory research group, led by ICREA Professor at ICFO Javier García de Abajo, as a PhD Student. After completing his Master degree in Photonics at Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena (Germany), he joins the group to carry out his doctoral thesis centered on nanophotonic aspects of atomic-scale systems, and in particular, on the validity of the local density approximation compared with many-body RPA response in metallic clusters and nanostructures.

Mr. Lisa Christin Saemisch joins the Ultracold Quantum Gases research group, led by ICFO Professor Dr. Leticia Taurell, as a visiting student from the Master of Physics program at the University of Bonn, Germany. During her visit, she will be working on the design and construction of an imaging system for a quantum gas experiment.

Dr. Soledad Royo, holds a PhD in chemistry from the University of Zaragoza and was a postdoctoral researcher at Bielefeld University (Germany) and IRB Barcelona. More recently, she has worked as Head of Medicinal Chemistry and IP manager at Iproteos, an IRB spin-off company. She joins the KTT unit as Project Manager.