Erasmus Mundus - JMD - Nuclear Physics

Consortium

Partners

French part of the consortium

University of Caen Normandie (UNICAEN), founded in the XVth century, hosts nowadays 26000 students in different branches. Its key feature in the context of the present project is twofold. First, its close links with GANIL. GANIL, including the high-intensity rare ion facility SPIRAL2 under construction, is one of the four largest laboratories in the world dedicated to research using ion beams. SPIRAL2 is complemented by two equipment of excellence (EQUIPEX), the next-generation spectrometer S3 and the experimental room for physics at low energy DESIR, both selected and financed by the National Agency of Research (ANR), led by the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research. Since the very beginning, GANIL has actively participated in European projects in which it cooperates with many laboratories from the European Union and beyond. In addition, Caen University is also strongly linked to the project ARCHADE (resource and research center in hadrontherapy) launched in 2014. This center will have two independent superconductor cyclotrons: a proton therapy cyclotron for treatment starting operation in 2018, and a C400 cyclotron for ion acceleration up to Carbon for research purposes in hadrontherapy (physics, radiobiology, and clinic aspects), with first beams available in 2021. The physicists implied in the Consortium are responsible for the research programs in physics at ARCHADE as well as in the interdisciplinary programs for radiotherapy treatments.

Italian part of the consortium

The University of Padova has a long and well-established history in Nuclear Physics research which is strongly related to the Laboratori Nazionali di Legnaro (LNL) that is one of the four national labs of the Italian Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN). The mission is to perform basic research in nuclear physics and nuclear-astrophysics, together with applications of nuclear technologies. More than 800 scientists from all over the world are involved in the ongoing research programs. Every day about 250 people work at LNL, half of them being INFN employees (physicists, engineers, technicians....) the remaining half coming from universities and research institutions in Italy and abroad. Strength points are the development of particle accelerators and of nuclear radiation detectors. LNL has been recognized at European level as a Research Infrastructure with Transnational Access. In addition, the Nuclear Research groups of Padova University have expertise on the nuclear structure at the limits of spin and isospin, nuclear reaction dynamics at low, intermediate and ultra-relativistic energies, nuclear astrophysics and civil security applications of nuclear physics. Padova is an 800-year-old institution with a long-standing tradition of scientific excellence and a commitment to freedom and diversity.

The University of Catania is one of the first Universities in Italy, founded in 1433. It is closely related to the INFN unit in Catania and to the Laboratori Nazionali del Sud (LNS). LNS is one of the four national laboratories of INFN. Founded in 1976 it currently employs about 130 people (researcher and technicians) and associates about 130 people among professors, researcher, Ph.D. and Diploma students from the University. It is an advanced development center for technology and instrumentation. The research activity is mainly devoted to the study of structure and reaction of atomic nuclei by means of both a Tandem and a Superconducting Cyclotron, in collaboration with more than 700 hundreds researchers coming from Italy as well as several European and non-European countries. A Tandem accelerator allows an intense activity in Nuclear Astrophysics measuring the cross section of interest for fusion nuclear energy and stellar nucleosynthesis (ASFIN2 project). Among the new projects in fundamental research, it is also worth mentioning a submarine laboratory installed at 2000m depth offshore from Catania, to be used for R&D related inside the KM3NET project. UniCT and INFN at CT and LNS, beyond the experiments at the frontier of the Nuclear Physics, are strongly active in several aspects of Applied Nuclear Physics such as accelerators technology, cultural heritage and Archaeometry with non –destructive techniques (LANDIS and PH3DRA labs), monitoring of Nuclear Waste, Laser Physics for Nuclear Fusion plasma and above all in Nuclear Medicine with a centre for eye-melanoma therapy and the projects CATANA, ELIMED, SCENT (see Form A.1.4). The students of EMJMD will be allowed to profit also from an on-going agreement between LNS and Azienda Ospedaliero Universitaria Policlinico di Catania to have a direct experience of applied nuclear medicine.

Spanish part of the consortium

The University of Seville was founded in the late 1460´s. Today is one of the largest Spanish Universities with a number of students around 70000. it currently employs about 4000 people (including teaching staff, researchers, and technicians). Concerning Nuclear Physics it has expert scholars on theoretical nuclear reactions, applications Nuclear Physics to Environment, Medicine, Art and Archeometry, and analysis and characterization of Materials. It is strongly linked to the facility Centro Nacional de Aceleradores (CNA) which has three ion accelerators: Tandem Van de Graaff 3MV, Cyclotron with protons up to 18 MeV and deuterons up to 9 MeV and a Tandem Cockcroft-Walton of 1 MV used as a mass spectrometer. In addition, there is a scanner PET/CT for humans, a dedicated accelerator for 14C dating MiCaDaS, and a 60Co irradiator.

The Autonomous University of Madrid was founded in 1968. It has around 30000 students and 2000 people in the teaching staff. Concerning Nuclear Physics, it has expert scholars on theoretical nuclear structure, applications Nuclear Physics to analysis and characterization of Materials. It is strongly linked to The Center for Micro Analysis of Materials (CMAM) with an accelerator, built by HVEE, is of the Tandem type and the acceleration system is of the Cockroft-Walton type. It is provided with two sources: a plasma source for gaseous substances and a sputtering source for obtaining practically any element of the periodic table from a solid target.

The University of Barcelona was founded in 1450. Presently it has more than 80000 students and around 5000 people in the teaching staff. Concerning Nuclear Physics, it has expert scholars on many-body problems, theoretical astrophysics, and hadronic physics. It is linked to the accelerator ALBA which is a facility co-financed by the Spanish government and the Catalan government. It is a new generation of the synchrotron. ALBA is a circular-shaped machine, called a synchrotron, that uses arrays of magnets, called insertion devices to generate bright beams of synchrotron light. There are research lines on Accelerator Computing, Engineering, Experiments on material science mainly.

University Complutense of Madrid (UCM) was founded in 1822. It is a large University with around 80000 students and 6000 people in the teaching staff. In 2009 the Ministry of Education awarded the highest mention "International Campus of Excellence (IEC)" to UCM. Concerning Nuclear Physics, it has expert scholars on theoretical nuclear structure, experimental nuclear physics, applications of nuclear physics to medicine and energy sources, and they are very actively engaged in experimental physics programs at ISOLDE@CERN (link sends e-mail), GSI (Germany) and ILL (France). UCM has close connections to CIEMAT (Centro de Investigaciones Energéticas, Medioambientales y Tecnológicas) which is a public research body assigned to the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness focusing on energy and environment and the technologies related to them. Of particular interest for our EMJMD is the Thermonuclear Fusion Device TJ-II which is a heliac-type stellarator, which produces magnetically-confined fusion plasmas.

The University of Salamanca was founded in 1218. It has around 35000 students and 2500 people in the teaching staff. Concerning Nuclear Physics, it has expert scholars on theoretical weak interactions and hadronic physics, experimental nuclear physics and lasers. It has close links with the Center for Ultrashort Ultraintense Pulsed Lasers (Centro de Láseres Pulsados Ultracortos Ultraintensos, CLPU) which is the national facility specialized in femtosecond laser pulses with peaks powers at Gigawatt, Terawatt and Petawatt levels. Applications in photonuclear physics, plasma physics, and proton therapy, among others.

The EMJMD project will fully benefit from the complementary specializations of the partners.

Committees

Financial tasks will be mainly managed by the University of Seville as coordinating partner. For the rest of the tasks, four committees will be created in order to resolve the different issues related to the EMJMD. The committees are:

Academic Committee: it is responsible for the correct implementation of the EMJMD and the general manager. It will be formed by one local academic of each full partner (universities), two persons from the associated partners, and one student from the coordinating institution. In addition, it is in charge of examination methods and the organization of the Master Thesis work. It is also responsible for the contents of the NuPhys EMJMD. This committee will have 3 sub-committees (one at each country). Each sub-committee will be presided by the academic that is part of the Academic committee plus two academics that belong to their own universities. The aim of the sub-committees will be to solve all the academic issues within their own university.

The Academic Committee will also be in charge of obtaining the necessary number of internships for the training period in a company for all the students participating in the NuPhys EMJMD. The academic committee will also be responsible for the final assignment the internships among all the students according to the grading obtained by the students in the lecturing period, their preferences and the advice of the local coordinator in contact with students. Another important aim of this committee is to develop a joint and well-structured curriculum for the EMJMD that takes into account the best expertise of every full partner and the present needs of companies related to Nuclear Physics.

NuPhys Secretariat: it is the executive board, in charge of executive management, communication with EACEA, administrative and financial management. It is located at the coordinating institution and is composed by the Consortium coordinator, one administrative assistant and supported by Contact Point EMUS. It is in contact with local administrative staff at partner institutions and supervises the exchange of students documents among partners. The Secretariat ensures update of the website and application system.

Selection Committee: it is in charge of the issues related to the admission criteria, selection procedure and awarding of Erasmus + scholarships to the best students. It will be formed by one academic from each full partner (universities) as well as one person representing the associated partners. This committee will have regular meetings before the beginning of each EMJMD edition to manage all applications received and to apply the admission criteria for the student selection process as well as for the award of the JMD scholarships, according to Erasmus + rules.

Quality committee: it is needed to ensure the internal EMJMD quality and to design improvement strategies. This committee is formed by one academic of each full partner (universities), two representatives of the associated partners, and two students of the present NuPhys EMJMD edition. This committee will implement all the internal evaluation strategies and mechanisms. It will also be in charge of coordinating with the external organisms/institutions/agencies responsible for the external quality assurance of the NuPhys EMJMD.