Nantes Université MSCA-PF 2023 - hosting offer at the SUBAtomic and TECHnologies

Frédéric YERMIA associate professor from the SUBAtomic and TECHnologies (SUBATECH) at Nantes Université is looking for postdoctoral candidates interested in applying for a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellowships (MSCA-PF) in 2023.

• Key words
  Neutrino oscillation, Precise Measurement , Mass Ordering, JUNO experiment, synergy with other neutrino experiments
   
• What is a MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowship?
  MSCA Postdoctoral fellowships support the career development of researchers for enhancing their individual competence diversification in terms of skills at multidisciplinary level and intersectoral experience. The MSCA-PF grant provides a competitive salary plus mobility and family allowances if applicable, as well as research, training and networking costs. This call to interest concerns the European Postdoctoral Fellowships (12 to 24 months of duration in Europe + optional placement in private sector in Europe of 6 months). For more information: MSCA-PF
   
• Team description
  SUBATECH's research activities revolve around the fields of nuclear physics, hadronics, particles and astroparticles, and radiochemistry. SUBATECH staff carry out fundamental and applied research in the fields of energy, environment and health. Subatech's research activities are mainly structured in the form of projects.
   

• Profile of the supervisor
  Frederic Yermia, Maitre de Conférences at the University of Nantes is the head of the neutrino team (7 permanent staff) at the SUBATECH laboratory. His field of activity is the leptonic sector study through mainly reactor antineutrino experiments  such as Double Chooz, SoLid, JUNO or the development of the LiquidO detection technology (one of the funding members). He is a member of the JUNO Europe Analysis board and is the JUNO France Science Coordinator. He is involved in innovation projects too. He is coordinator deputy of the AM-OTech Consortium with EDF for the non-academic part (EIC-PATHFINDER 2021) and Partner PI of the L-PET-OTECH ANR project (ANR 2021). He is also a member of the scientific council of the IN2P3.
   
• Research project
  The next decade will witness one of the largest investment in history in neutrino fundamental physics with three leading flagship experiments: DUNE (USA), HyperKamiokande (Japan) and JUNO (China). Those experiments together will significantly enhance the world precision within the standard framework of the neutrino oscillation phenomenon. They are also expected to provide the first observations of remaining unknowns; i.e. the so called “Mass Ordering” and the leptonic “CP-Violation”. The proposal is to articulate a bold neutrino fundamental research strategy within that framework exploring the imminent JUNO first data to play a leading role a) in the first per mille precision neutrino oscillation experiments, by JUNO, including the improvement of precision and the most careful scrutiny of systematics using a novel experiment techniques pioneered by the proponent, b) in the first observation of Mass Order, and c) in the exploration of synergies among experiments, so that JUNO’s stand-alone precision is boosted and maximise the possible scenario for possible discoveries, should discrepancies be found. The Neutrino team leader at Subatech, along with his scientific teams, has performed studies – most published by now – addressing and demonstrating the feasibility of this unprecedented physics exploration potential. Many of those capabilities derived from the JUNO detector novel designed, called Dual Calorimetry, as proposed by the team and enabling a new dimension of detector systematics control and exploration to be fully exploited in the future. Hence, our project embodies a bold European led contribution in the state of the art of neutrino fundamental research expected to deliver several historical world leading measurements in the field as well as the active exploration with direct discovery potential caused by this new dimension of precision.
   
• What are the eligibility criteria?
  Candidates must hold a PhD at the call deadline (13 Sept. 2023) and have 8 years maximum of full-time research experience after the PhD.
  “Mobility rule”: candidates must NOT have resided or carried out their main activity (work, studies, etc.) in France for more than 12 months in the 36 months immediately before the call deadline.Candidates can be from any nationality.
  Although not an eligibility criterion, a good track record is recommended.
   
• What’s in it for me?
  1. Selected candidate will have access to online training programme and one-to-one proposal preparation sessions with our experienced European Officers.
  2. Selected candidate will have the opportunity to come to Nantes for two days in the beginning of July to meet his supervisor and to start working on the writing of the project. The grant awarded for this stay will cover travel, hotel and subsistence expenses for 2 days and 2 nights (up to 1000€ for the EU countries and up to 2000€ for the non-EU countries). Nantes Université does not cover the visa fees.
   
• I’m interested. What should I do?
  If you are interested and have the required background, apply by sending the application formto Frédéric YERMIA (yermia@subatech.in2p3.fr) and the European office (europe.drpi@univ-nantes.fr)

More information on the dedicated webpage.

• Registration for this scheme does not imply automatic funding. Applications will be examined in the light of the MSCA PF evaluation criteria, both by your potential supervisor and by the experienced European Officers. No application will be considered after April 14th but we encourage you to apply as soon as possible as they will be evaluated as they arise.The short-stay grant will be distributed among the selected candidate within the limits of the available budget.
   
• You should expect feedback for your application by 15th May.

Brief description of Nantes Université
Nantes Université is a higher education and research institution created in 2022. This new institution has adopted a new University model unprecedented in France by bringing together a university, a university hospital (CHU de Nantes), a technology research centre (IRT Jules Verne), a public scientific and technological institute (Inserm) and higher education establishments (Centrale Nantes, École des Beaux-Arts Nantes Saint-Nazaire, École d’Architecture de Nantes).