Research opportunities
Based on the REF 2014 GPA Scores, Times Higher Education ranked Strathclyde as number one in the UK for physics research.
You can study an MPhil or an MRes over the course of one year or a PhD over the course of three to four years.
You also have the option of an EngD over four or five years, depending on your research area.
MPhil, MRes & PhD
You can study either option in any of our four research groups:
EngD
Our EngD degree is specific to:
- Photonics
- Applied Photonics
- Optics & Photonics Technologies
Postgraduate Certificate in Researcher Professional Development (PG Cert RPD) programme
As part of your PhD degree, you'll be enrolled on the Postgraduate Certificate in Researcher Professional Development (PG Cert RPD).
This certificate is designed to support you with your research and rewards you for things you'll do as a research student here.
It'll help you improve skills which are important to professional development and employability:
- the knowledge and intellectual abilities to conduct your research
- the personal qualities to succeed in your research and chosen career
- the standards, requirements and conduct of a professional researcher in your discipline
- working with others and communicating the impact of your research to a wide range of audiences
All you have to do is plan these activities alongside your doctorate, documenting and reflecting your journey to success along the way.
Find out more about the PG Cert RPD programme.
PhD Design and development of novel, gas-filled plasma closing switches for pulsed power applications
A three-year PhD project offered by the High Voltage Technologies (HVT) Research Group based within the Institute of Energy & Environment.
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unfundedPhD Fine and ultra-fine particles in air: electromagnetic and low temperature plasma decontamination
A three year PhD project offered by the High Voltage Technologies (HVT) Research Group, focused on the development of advanced impulsive non-thermal plasma systems for air cleaning and aerosol decontamination operations.
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unfundedPhD Non-thermal transient plasma discharges for environmental applications
A three year PhD investigating the efficiency of transient non-thermal plasma discharges for different environmental applications is offered by the High Voltage Technologies (HVT) Research group within the Institute for Energy & Environment.
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unfundedExpanding Measurement Limits of Fibre-Optic Voltage and Current Sensors for Smart Grid Applications
A 36-month full-time, fully funded Strathclyde/NPL/Synaptec PhD Studentship with the aim to investigate a range of electrical, mechanical, photonic and materials science aspects of hybrid fibre-optic voltage and current sensors in order to drive the limits of their measurement performance in smart grid applications.
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fundedFormation of Hydraulic and Chemical Ground Barriers to Inhibit Contaminant Migration on Radioactively Contaminated Sites
This 4-year PhD at the University of Strathclyde will explore the use of colloidal silica hydrogel as a barrier to migration of radioactive contaminants in soils during decommissioning operations on nuclear facilities.
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31 December 2019Funding:
fundedMathematical Modelling and Analysis of Thin-Film Flows
The proposed project will use a variety of analytical and numerical methods to bring new understanding into a range of real-world problems involving thin films of both simple and complex fluids.
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unfundedHow and Why of Matrix Balancing
Matrix balancing aims to transform a nonnegative matrix A by a diagonal scaling by matrices D and E so that P = DAE has prescribed row and column sums. Historical motivation for achieving the balance has included interpreting economic data, preconditioning sparse matrices and understanding traffic circulation.
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unfundedFlow of groundwater in soils with vegetation and variable surface influx
This project will use mathematical models of soil water and the growth of plants. Even for plants with complicated root densities we will look for analytical solutions of the models to help understand plant growth.
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unfunded3-D nanoscale structural analysis in the scanning electron microscope through application of direct electron detectors
This project is focused on developing and applying next generation detectors for the scanning electron microscopy techniques of electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) and electron channelling contrast imaging (ECCI).
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fundedA new super-resolution optical microscopy method for live cell imaging
A project to develop and use a new super-resolution optical microscope to obtain very high spatial resolution images of fluorescently labelled live cells.
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fundedBeam-driven plasma wakefield acceleration at Strathclyde/SLAC/UCLA/RadiaBeam
Motivated PhD candidates, ideally with a background in laser and/or beam driven plasma wakefield acceleration are required to help lay the foundations in the quest towards 5th generation light sources and ultra-compact electron accelerators - the time-resolved microscopes of the 21st century.
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fundedStructured Light Lasers
In this PhD project – funded by the Leverhulme Trust and in collaboration with Dr. Sonja Franke-Arnold at the University of Glasgow – you will demonstrate storage and processing of OAM information in a rubidium vapour.
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fundedYu Chen, Energy Transfer at the Nanoscale
PhD position available to undertake frontier research in nanotechnology of noble metal nanoparticles.
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unfundedQuantum Information Theory
An EPSRC funded studentship in theoretical quantum information, specifically the relationship between decoherence, non-classicality, and the efficacy of quantum information tasks.
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fundedSuper-resolution imaging of biological organisms: seeing below the classical limits
This PhD project aims to develop a comprehensive suite of tools and techniques that will enable superresolution imaging of nanodiamonds in living tissue, with a particular emphasis on imaging neurons.
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fundedTheory and simulation of generation of frequency combs in micro-resonators
The project develops, optimises, and strategically compares accurate mathematical models for the generation of frequency combs in micro-resonators in a close connection with the experiments performed at NPL in Dr Del'Haye's laboratory.
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fundedUltra-intense laser-plasma interactions: High field physics and ion acceleration in the radiation-dominated regime
A fully-funded PhD studentship is available in high power laser-plasma physics, working within a vibrant team of experimentalists and theoreticians, to investigate the onset of a new regime of high-field relativistic plasmas.
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fundedStudies of the interaction of intense laser pulses with plasma as ultra-compact accelerators, plasma-based laser amplifiers, and coherent and incoherent attosecond x-ray sources
PhDs are available in an exciting and challenging research area, with a vibrant group of experimentalists and theoreticians developing and applying ultra-compact accelerators and x-ray sources based on laser-plasma interactions.
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fundedUltrahigh Gain Thin Films
The project will study the properties of amplifying and nonlinear films both analytically and numerically. Collaboration with an experimental team at the University of Glasgow will also be exploited.
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fundedMicroscopic mapping and spectroscopy of III-nitride semiconductors and devices
This project involves different microscopic techniques to investigate semiconductor heterostructures and light-emitting diode devices, performed on our suite of scanning electron microscopes, providing information on material properties at length scales ranging from nanometres to centimetres.
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unfundedLaser cooling and Bose-Einstein condensation
This PhD will investigate novel ways to laser cool two-electron atoms all the way to Bose-Einstein condensation – to provide new insight into the formation of condensates, and potential applications in precision measurements.
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unfundedUltra-precise Atomic Magnetometry for Unshielded Measurements
A fully-funded position to undertake research in the ground-breaking field of quantum sensing and measurement, after the first year specialising in Magnetometry.
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fundedQuantum Technologies: Atomic Clocks
A fully-funded position to undertake research in the ground-breaking field of quantum sensing and measurement, after the first year specialising in Atomic Clocks.
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fundedQuantum Technologies: Atom Interferometry
A fully-funded position to undertake research in the ground-breaking field of quantum sensing and measurement, after the first year specialising in Atom Interferometry.
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fundedQuantum nonlinearities in dielectric nanoparticles
We focus on new nonlinear regimes with input powers so low that they enable all-optical processing and the exploitation of the fundamental advantages of quantum technologies at the nanoscale.
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unfundedNanoscale 3D transfer printing for hybrid photonic device fabrication
This project will develop chip scale optoelectronic systems through the 3-dimensional printing of nanoscale building block components such as nanolasers and thin film electronics.
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fundedDiamond for laser engineering: lasers for manufacturing and sensing
Diamond is an exciting and enabling material of laser engineering. This project will aim to exploit diamond directly as a laser gain material so as to fully exploit its excellent thermal and mechanical properties.
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fundedMultiscale neural imaging - from synapse to whole organism
Advances in microscopy allow imaging on scales ranging from single molecules to whole organism. This project involves developing a microscope that will allow images of whole invertebrates (likely C. Elegans nematode worms) be correlated with nanoscopic (super-reolution) images of sub-cellular regions within them.
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fundedUltracold fermions in a quantum gas microscope
We invite outstanding and motivated students to join our team, for research on ultracold atoms in optical lattices. We use a quantum-gas microscope to measure the dynamics of ultracold fermions at the single atom level.
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fundedAdvanced image analysis of semiconductor structures
This project is focussed on advanced modern image analysis and pattern recognition methods to study the microscopy and spectroscopy of semiconductor structures and devices. Developing automated and robust methods to look at images and video will revolutionise this area.
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fundedTheory and simulation of micro-resonator devices for quantum technologies
We explore nonlinear quantum regimes of the coupling between light and matter for ultra-low power micro and nano-lasers. These are promising candidates to achieve high efficiency, high speed, and a small footprint.
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fundedTheoretical and numerical studies of high intensity laser-plasma interaction and applications
Two PhD positions for UK and EU students are available funded by University of Strathclyde and collaboration partners to work on laser-plasma based particle accelerators and plasma photonics for high power lasers via theory and large scale of numerical simulation.
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fundedQuantum Dot Spin State Tailoring for Scalable On-Chip Quantum Information Processing
In this project we will investigate various approaches for on-demand engineering of trapped spin states in charged quantum dots through a series of coherent control experiments that will explore how the different approaches affect the performance of all optically operated universal single qubit gates.
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fundedJamming-free quantum lidar
This project in quantum optics will analyse practical quantum radar and lidar scenarios with realistic detectors in a jamming/spoofing environment.
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fundedPROBING QUANTUM STATES WITH SILICON CARBIDE NANOELECTRONICS
This project focuses on the realisation of quantum phenomena in commercially-compatible electronic devices, such as transistors and diodes in silicon carbide. The main goal is to couple electron spins to electromagnetic radiation, in order to manipulate and read quantum states.
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fundedScalable Qubit Arrays for Quantum Computation and Optimisation
This PhD project aims to develop a neutral atoms quantum computer based on scalable arrays of over 100 individually trapped atoms coupled via highly excited Rydberg states
