Title Promoter Affiliations Abstract "Optically Addressable Trityl-Radical-based Molecular Qubits (OPTRIBITS)" "Sofie Cambré" "Theory and Spectroscopy of Molecules and Materials (TSM²), Stuttgart University, Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), Nanostructured and organic optical and electronic materials (NANOrOPT)" "Quantum technologies are widely believed to fundamentally change society in the near future, and extraordinary effort is being expended towards this goal. However potentially insurmountable challenges may loom on the horizon, e.g., lack of scalability, lack of tailorability and lack of qubit positionability. In OPTRIBITS, we will exploit the fundamental advantages of paramagnetic molecules for application as spin-based qubits in quantum technologies. Molecules have been shown to possess long ensemble coherence times up to the millisecond regime, with figures of merit exceeding 10,000. Molecules are nanoscopic in size, allowing for integration into devices at high densities enabling miniturization of quantum devices. Molecules are highly tailorable in terms of spin values, spin level structures, and excited state properties, enabling their adaptation to specific quantum technological objectives. Interqubit interactions can be exquisitely controlled, due to the high degree of qubit positionability in few-qubit or ordered arrangements, leading to well-defined and potentially switchable interactions. The main issue preventing the widespread use of molecular qubits has been the lack of convenient single-entity readout. As a result, the vast majority of results on molecular qubits have been obtained by ensemble measurements featuring large numbers of identical qubit copies. This proposal aims to remove this drawback by developing optically addressable molecular qubits. Optical addressing has been amply demonstrated to allow single entity readout because of the single photon sensitivity of optical detectors. To this end, we will design, prepare and study robust molecular qubits, which have spin states that allow for inducing spin polarization by optical pumping and are highly luminescent to allow for optical readout. In a second step, we will work towards device integration by immobilizing the qubit architectures on surfaces or by creating hybrid structures with carbon nanomaterials." "On the local and global properties of the space of Dirac structures" "Marco Zambon" Geometry "Dirac geometry encompasses presymplectic, symplectic and Poisson structures and offers a more general framework with applications in mechanics and of great interest in geometry and topology. In this project, we intend to explore fundamental local and global questions about the space of Dirac structures through a new way of describing them: the choice of a generalized metric exhibits them as sections of a group bundle.With the tools we find, we will also tackle a standing open question in the literature: which Dirac structures admit a complementary Dirac structure? We will use analytic, geometric and cohomological techniques, and also analyze the consequences the answer to this question has on the deformation theory of Dirac structures.Finally, we will move to complex Dirac structures, which include the very important class of generalized complex structures. We will use our analysis to look at singular real Dirac structures, which very recently have been proved to arise from complex Dirac structures in a surprising natural way." "Sabbatical Hideaki Mizuno: Serial femtosecond crystallography to reveal structural dynamics of proteins" "Hideaki Mizuno" "Biochemistry, Molecular and Structural Biology" "The aim of the sabbatical is to master the cutting-edge technology of time resolved X-ray crystallography (TR-SFX) with X-ray free electron laser (XFEL). XFEL is the next generation X-ray technology that generates extremely short (10 fs), strong, and coherent pulses. Thanks to these properties, XFEL is a breakthrough in structural biology, especially exploring structural dynamics of proteins in fs to ps time resolution. TR-SFX requires additional expertise on top of the knowledge for traditional synchrotron X-ray crystallography. For example, since the illumination of intense XFEL pulse destructs a crystal, the crystal should be replaced with a fresh one for a subsequent pulse illumination (typically 60Hz), and it requires a huge number (minimum 107 crystals for one time point) of microcrystals (a few µm – a few tens of µm). Therefore, essential factors for the TR-SFX experiments are efficient production of microcrystals, controlling the quality of microcrystals, and crystal supplying system to the X-ray beam spot. In terms of the data analyses, huge number of diffraction patterns are recorded from randomly oriented crystals by TR-SFX, which is different from the conventional synchrotron crystallography where series of diffraction patterns are acquired by rotating crystals. Furthermore, TR-SFX provides only a density-difference map upon evoking a reaction, but not an electron density map at a transition state, since only a fraction of protein molecules in the crystal follows the reaction to be observed. Therefore, not only acquiring proficiency in operating the XFEL system, but also learning techniques and knowledges on sample preparation/handling and data analyses are indispensable for successful TR-SFX experiments. Though hands-on experiences during the sabbatical stay at the world-leading laboratories in this field, I would like to learn all essential skills and knowledges for TR-SFX experiments" "Sabbatical Dirk Nuyens: Discovering future goals of lattice based cubature." "Dirk Nuyens" "Numerical Analysis and Applied Mathematics (NUMA)" "The aim of the sabbatical is to make large progress on a joint project and to start defining future goals based on early results from the scope of the project. The project is developing new theory and analyzes new algorithms for calculating expected values, and otheer miments of quantities of interest, obtained form complicated mathematical models." "Spin-Photon Interface for Quantum Networks" "Petr SIYUSHEV" "Materials Physics" "The goal of the EU is to become a leader in the development of quantum technologies to strengthen the economics. The quantum communication is one of the pillars of this important goal and comprises fundamentally secure communication with distributed quantum computation and sensing. The most promising platform to achieve this goal is color centers in diamond. For example, it has been already shown that nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center coupled to nuclear spins can constitute small quantum register and even can transmit quantum information over kilometer range. NV has very bad optical properties making it extremely hard to use beyond proof-ofprinciple demonstration. Alternative color centers (group-IV defects) offer very good optical properties, however, to fully access their potential, they have to be embedded into nanophotonic cavities. Only then the communication rate can reach the value acceptable for practical use. This proposal aims to develop nanophotonic cavities with deterministically incorporated group-IV defects, thus overcoming current bottleneck for further development of quantum communication networks. The intended approach use advantage of possibility to generate photonic cluster states, which mitigates transmission loss combined with enhance communication rates. This work aim for a hardware for quantum communication infrastructure" "FWO sabbatical bench fee professor Ruyssen" "Ilse Ruyssen" "Department of Economics" "This project investigates the role of access to irrigation as a mitigating factor for migration aspirations following drought. Climate change, marked by increased precipitation variability and severe droughts, adversely impacts agricultural yields, affecting the livelihoods of 700-800 million impoverished individuals reliant on agriculture globally. Migration is viewed as an adaptation strategy, but its large-scale occurrence poses challenges. Smallholder farms, contributing 50% to global food production, are vital for addressing food security concerns. Existing literature on climate change and migration yields inconclusive findings, partly due to the oversight of alternative adaptation strategies. This study focuses on irrigation as a potential adaptation strategy that might reduce migration aspirations through its capacity to reduce local temperatures, alleviate heat stress, and diversify livelihood options. To fill the gap in the literature, we will combine data on droughts and irrigation coverage at a relatively detailed level of time and spatial granularity with individual survey data documenting migration aspirations at specific dates and spatial units. Specifically, we will exploit regional variation in drought exposure and irrigation use at the subnational level across Western African countries over the period 2008-2023. The ultimate goal of the project is to enhance our understanding of the factors shaping (im)mobility patterns in the context of climate change. " "Moral Realism as a Normative Doctrine: Rethinking Politicized Realism." "Michiel Meijer" "Center for European Philosophy" "In metaethics, normative questions have been largely avoided on methodological grounds. Metaethics is said to involve a step back from substantive normative debates and to offer a crucial neutral background against which normative issues need to be understood. However, moral philosophers outside metaethics have been defending views that explicitly invoke normative questions in developing novel approaches to moral realism. This PhD project will study how authors such as John McDowell, David Wiggins, Ronald Dworkin, Alan Thomas, and Matthew Kramer take the realist debate outside value-neutral metaphysics into the normative domain of politics. Questions the PhD could address include: How has the normative ethics/metaethics distinction been challenged in ethical theory? How to renew moral realism after dispelling its alleged neutrality? Is ""politicizing"" moral realism enough? What is the role of political theorizing for understanding moral metaphysics?" "Sabbatical Sofie Pollin: Spectrum sustainability" "Sofie Pollin" "Waves: Core Research and Engineering (WaveCore)" "The electromagnetic spectrum is a crucial but finite resource for modern society. On the one hand, the radio spectrum is used for the ubiquitous wireless communications that we know in the form of cellular (4G and 5G) or Wi-Fi networks, radar applications for our security or weather forecasts, to give a number of examples. In addition, the electromagnetic spectrum is a way to potentially uncover new scientific discoveries. As radio technology has developed at a rapid pace and is increasingly used, the spectrum is highly saturated in many parts of the world. On the other hand, there are also parts of the world where there is a great need for more radio communication. Large parts of the world and a large part of the world's population today do not have access to the internet. In order to use the spectrum better (both in saturated regions or regions without good internet coverage), constant research is needed into better forms of spectrum use, regulation and management. Only in this way can we guarantee that radio innovation remains possible and fair (digital divide). With emerging networks such as Starlink and Low Earth Orbit networks using a lot of spectrum in an inefficient manner, it is also crucial to ensure that sufficient spectrum is safeguarded for scientific breakthroughs, or possible future uses of spectrum. It is necessary to proactively think about the value of spectrum and how we want to use it in the future for various possible applications. The aim of this period is to:-be able to more actively monitor existing projects and initiatives around spectrum monitoring and resource use in which I am involved;-free up time to better monitor initiatives such as the NSF Spectrum Innovation Center in the USA (Spectrum visits to some of the partners involved in this initiative;-make time, in the context of VLIR initiatives in which I am involved, to better map out how communication and spectrum can help to reduce the ""digital divide"";-exploring new applications of radio spectrum use, which go beyond the usual applications within my current research (telecom and radar)." "Sabbatical Tom Holvoet: Study and verification of vulnerabilities in smart contracts for decentralized software systems in a blockchain environment" "Tom Holvoet" "Distributed and Secure Software (DistriNet)" "During this sabbatical I will take time to thoroughly study the emerging and exciting field of ‘Smart contracts in blockchain environments’ in order to build a solid base for further research. Themes in this research may include: - Permissioned & permissionless blockchain architectures / Web3 application architectures - Smart contract programming paradigms and languages (Solidity and Vyper) - Vulnerabilities in smart contracts (Solidity and Vyper) - Design level vulnerabilities - Source code level vulnerabilities - Byte code level vulnerabilities - Concepts, techniques and support for vulnerability analysis (Mythrill, Slither, Securify2, etc.) - Cryptoeconomics – game theory in decentralized consensus protocols - Proof-of-stake vs Proof-of-work – analysis of long-term effects Further, I will continue to follow-up the PhD-students, master thesis students and projects under my supervision." "Sabbatical Steven Bouillon: Biogeochemistry of tropical wetlands" "Steven Bouillon" "Soil and Water Management" "The main goal of this sabbatical is to strengthen and revigorated our key research niche, i.e. studying the biogeochemistry of tropical aquatic systems using state-of-the-art analytical techniques. My research combines a focus on tropical aquatic ecosystems, and the use of stable isotope proxies to study element cycles across a range of ecosystems – from highland streams to rivers, lakes and reservoirs, floodplains, down to the coastal zone. Students spend a considerable amount of time doing fieldwork under challenging conditions; the success very often depends critically on having good support in the field in order to learn how to adapt sampling or experiments which inevitably do not go as planned on paper, how to resolve daily technical issues with equipment. The discipline of biogeochemistry is by definition touches on very diverse domains in which the amount of published work proliferates and analytical developments are fast. I particularly wish to focus on developing new ideas to study the role of tropical peatlands (lowland as well as high-altitude peatlands and Papyrus swamps which have received very little attention) and their role in the greenhouse gas balance, on future applications of hydrogen stable isotopes, and on valorizing data on the use of freshwater bivalve shells to reconstruct aquatic geochemistry and hydrology."