The doctoral fellowship programme INPhINIT ”la Caixa” is devoted to attracting talented Early-Stage Researchers—of any nationality—who wish to pursue doctoral studies in Spanish or Portuguese territory. Sponsored by ”la Caixa” Foundation, it is aimed at supporting the best scientific talent and fostering innovative and high-quality research in Spain and Portugal by recruiting outstanding international students and offering them an attractive and competitive environment for conducting research of excellence.
The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona is a research centre accredited with the Spanish Seal of Excellence María de Maeztu in 2020, the perfect place to carry out your PhD project through an INPhINIT Incoming fellowship.
Research Project:
The project is framed within the area of theoretical high-energy physics. The student will seek to unveil new fundamental properties of quantum field theory (QFT) by using the entanglement structure of quantum fields as the guiding principle.
In the usual approach to QFT, the fundamental objects are local quantum fields. The natural quantities one associates to them are their vacuum expectation values, whose knowledge fully characterises a given QFT. Alternatively, QFT can be formulated in terms of operator algebras attached to extended spacetime regions. The analogous quantities associated to them are entanglement measures, such as the mutual information (MI). Hence, it is natural to wonder whether it is possible to universally describe a QFT in terms of MIs of spacetime regions. This leads to two questions:
- if such a description exists, what are the axioms?,
- given all the vacuum MIs, how do we reconstruct the theory? Answering these two questions is one of the goals of the present proposal.
On a more applied front, this “entanglement-based” approach has proven successful in giving rise to new fundamental results in QFT. A recent example is the identification of new entanglement-motivated universal bounds on the space of physically allowed 3d QFTs [Phys.Rev.-Lett. 131 (2023) 17, 171601]. The candidate will pursue additional evidence in favour of the bounds, studying the possibility that more stringent constraints exist for supersymmetric theories and exploring possible routes towards a general proof, formulating an analogous conjecture in the case of 5d QFTs and exploring its validity for various theories and on general grounds.
The student will also study the entanglement structure of QFT on its own right. This involves studying general properties of various entanglement measures, seeking universal patterns satisfied by general theories, connections between different measures or understanding the kind of universal information captured by them.
Job position description:
The student will use standard methods in high-energy theoretical physics such as: the study of the relevant previous literature; a combination of analytic and numerical computational techniques; regular meetings to discuss the status of the different projects and the challenges faced and their possible ways out. As for the explicit computational techniques involved, they will make use of free-field real-time methods both analytically and in the lattice; holographic techniques; Euclidean path-integral methods; extrinsic geometry of manifolds; TomitaTakesaki modular theory; general aspects of algebraic QFT, of conformal field theories as well as of supersymmetric QFTs; the formulation and characterisation of global symmetries in QFT.
The candidate will be integrated within the theoretical high-energy physics group at the Institute of Cosmos Sciences at the University of Barcelona and will be supervised by Prof. Pablo Bueno. They will also have the opportunity to collaborate with other ICC experts in the areas of holography, QFT, black holes, condensed matter and quantum computation. The candidate will participate in the various colloquia, seminars, journal clubs and other activities regularly organised.
The student will present the results obtained during the course of the project at international conferences such as the: Iberian Strings, the Encuentros Relativistas Españoles y Portugueses meetings as well as the conferences regularly organised by the Siembra-HoLAGrav network aimed at young scientists within the Spanish American community. They will also participate in several international conferences and workshops annually. They will regularly attend scientific international schools related to the topics of interest for the project, such as the Spring School on String Theory and Related Topics, organised at the ICTP (Trieste), or the CERN winter school (Geneva). The student will also benefit from the the ICC Schools yearly organised at the ICC.
More information:
Employment conditions
The ”la Caixa” Foundation will sign an agreement with the host institution, which will receive the fellowship payments directly:
- An annual payment of €35,800 to the institution to cover the Fellow’s contract, who will receive a minimum annual gross salary of €25.000. This amount might vary if there are modifications in the legal framework.
- €3,500 per year, as an additional amount for conferences, courses, research stays, consumables, equipment, charges for the use of intellectual property, etc.
- The tuition fees to the official doctoral programme
In addition to financial support, the fellowship includes a training programme on transversal skills, which has been specially designed by leading international institutions in the sector.
For more information on the employment conditions, please refer to this document.
Working at the Institute of Cosmos Sciences
The Institute of Cosmos Sciences is a research institute of the University of Barcelona. It is an interdisciplinary centre dedicated to fundamental research in the fields of cosmology, astrophysics, and particle physics. In addition, the institute has a strong technology program through its participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.
Moreover, the ICCUB participates in many key international scientific consortia and projects, such as the Large Hadron Collider, the Gaia astrometric space mission, the MAGIC / CTA high-energy astrophysics telescopes, and the Virgo gravitational wave detector, among others. Additional information about the Institute and the University of Barcelona can be found here.
You will be encouraged to contribute and interact with other researchers in the vibrant and international research environment as well as to participate in our outreach initiatives, more information at serviAstro and serviParticules.
As part of the University of Barcelona, the ICCUB is a recipient of the European Commission’s HR Excellence in Research (HRS4R) Award, which recognises, among other achievements, respect for equal opportunities and the capacity to attract talent in a positive working environment that promotes the pursuit of successful research careers. The ICCUB respects the principles of open, transparent, merit-based selection. We strongly encourage women and underrepresented minorities in physical sciences to apply. For additional information please see the Diversity, equity and inclusion Commission.
The ICCUB is located in Barcelona, considered the 8th World's Best Cities 2021: one with near-perfect weather year-round, miles and miles of beaches, iconic parks, striking architecture and colourful neighbourhoods that march to their own beat—artistic, sophisticated, bohemian. Moreover, it is a pole of attraction for the technology sector, a top choice to establish a company in this sector, and it hosts some of the world's major technological events, such as the Mobile World Congress and the Smart City Expo. In addition, Barcelona and its metropolitan area is a leading destination on the map of global technological ecosystems and has infrastructures such as science parks, universities and the 22@ district.
Requirements
In order to be accepted, candidates must meet the following eligibility requirements:
- Experience: candidates must not have carried out more than four years of research activity before the closing date of the call.
- Studies pursued: Applicants must hold a higher education degree that makes them eligible to enroll in a doctoral programme before starting at their host institutions.
The host university will verify, upon starting the admission process to the doctoral programme, that the studies taken up by the selected candidates make them eligible to enroll in an official doctoral programme in accordance with the regulations in force in Spain or Portugal. Should they be found not eligible after verification, the fellowship will be withdrawn.
Under no circumstances may candidates have previously enrolled in the same doctoral studies for which they are applying for the fellowship.
- Geographic mobility: Candidates must not have resided or have carried out their main activity (work, studies, etc.) in Spain for more than 12 months in the 3 years immediately prior to the call deadline. Short stays, such as holidays, done in a country other than their country of usual residence (where they carried out their main activity), will be considered as time spent in their country of usual residence.
- Level of English: Candidates must have a demonstrable level of English (B2 or higher).
For more information on the candidates requirements, please refer to this document.
Application Procedure
All applications must be submitted online through the following link in English. For more information on the application procedure, please refer to this document.
Deadline: Please submit your applications by January 24th 2024 at 2 pm.
Selection process:
The process is comprised of three phases:
- Eligibility screening: all applications received are reviewed to check the accomplishment of the eligibility criteria published in the rules for participation
- Remote evaluation (shortlisting): an evaluation panel will review the applications and those that receive the highest scores will pass to the next stage.
- Personal interviews: shortlisted candidates are invited to a remotely interview before a multidisciplinary committee on May 27, 28 and 29 2024.
The rating criteria that govern the selection process can be found in the Selection process guidelines section of the ”la Caixa” Fellowship Programme website.
For more information on the selection process, please refer to this document.
Funding: This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No713673.
The co-funded part of the programme runs from 01/10/2016 to 30/09/2021 and finances the researchers recruited under Call 2017 and 2018.