About the Project
Swansea University is a UK top 30 institution for research excellence (Research Excellence Framework 2014), and has been named Welsh University of the Year 2017 by The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide.
Swansea Science DTC is a community committed to undertaking world-class research that has a positive impact globally and we have a fully-funded PhD scholarship for 2017/2018 entry.
Our state-of-the-art facilities include: a low-energy positron beam with dedicated instrumentation for the study of positronium, a number of continuous-wave and pulsed laser systems, and scanning tunnelling, near-field optical and Raman microscopes. High-performance computing resources are available via clusters and dedicated supercomputers.
In the 2014 Research Excellence Framework (REF), over 80% of our Physics’ research outputs were judged to be worldleading or internationally excellent. Research is equally split between experimental and theoretical physics, and is funded via the UK Research Councils (STFC and EPSRC), the Royal Society, the Leverhulme Trust and the European Union.
In experimental physics, we lead the ALPHA collaboration, based at CERN, whose goal is to create, trap and manipulate anti-hydrogen. Results of the ALPHA collaboration are regularly published in Nature and featured on the BBC, CNN and other media. In 2011 the American Physical Society awarded the John Dawson Award for Excellence in Plasma Physics Research to this group. In the Atomic, Molecular and Quantum Physics Group, we also carry out research on ultra-cold atoms, optomechanical systems, ultra-fast lasers, nanotechnology, quantum control with applications in medical imaging, as well as theoretical quantum computation and simulation.
Research in the Theoretical Particle Physics group is focused on all aspects of particle physics, from collider physics phenomenology and the Higgs boson to string theory, black holes and theoretical cosmology. The Lattice QCD group studies the strong interaction under extreme conditions and physics beyond the Standard Model, for which it has ample access to high-performance computing resources in the UK and in Europe.
Description:
One of the most urgent open problems in particle physics is to explain why the mass of the Higgs boson is much lighter than the Planck scale, with the latter scale being the natural one according to straightforward quantum field theory arguments. Among proposed solutions to this hierarchy problem, an appealing one is the compositeness of the Higgs field, with the corresponding particle being a Nambu-Goldstone boson related to a continuous global symmetry breaking originated in a novel strong interaction. The project consists in performing for the first time a quantitative study of a class of very promising models of compositeness, Sp(2N) gauge theories, using Monte Carlo simulations on large supercomputers.
Funding Notes
This is a fully-funded scholarship, open to UK/EU candidates which include an annual stipend of £14,553 plus full UK/EU tuition fees.
Applications from overseas candidates are welcome, but candidates would be required to pay the difference between the UK/EU tuition fees and the overseas tuition fees.
Eligibility:
Candidates must have a First, Upper Second Class Honours (or equivalent) or a Master’s degree in a relevant discipline.
Informal enquiries before the deadline are welcome by emailing the project supervisor.
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