PhD opportunities for 2025-26 

We welcome applications from students wishing to undertake a PhD in the Centre for Light-Matter Interactions starting in September/October 2025. Please see further below for 'Application instructions'. 

To watch recent videos taken at one of the PhD research information sessions - please click here for recording 1 and here for recording 2. 

Current projects:

High-quality positron and x-ray sources for EuPRAXIA, Professor Gianluca Sarri

Femtosecond radiobiology with very high energy electron beams, Professor Gianluca Sarri

Synthesizing 3D Light Fields for Manipulating Chiral Matter, Dr Jason Greenwood

The Coherent Harmonic Focus - High Harmonic Generation in the Multi-Petawatt Regime, Professor Brendan Dromey

Carbon ion acceleration for radiotherapy applications, Professor Marco Borghesi

Relativistic attosecond sources from intense multi-colour laser pulses, Dr Mark Yeung

Radiation damage in the wide band gap semiconductor Ga₂O_3, Dr Lorenzo Stella

Probing dipole instabilities in the ultrafast ionization of molecules, Dr Daniel Dundas

Mapping the transition from photo-ionisation to strong-field ionisation, Dr Andrew Brown

Spatio-temporal coupling in high intensity lasers, Dr Matthew Streeter

Computational pump-probe spectroscopy involving X-ray laser fields, Professor Hugo Van der Hart

PhD in Theoretical many-body physics and quantum chemistry: Many-body theory and computation of low-energy antimatter interactions with matter and light, Dr Dermot Green

Line identifications for heavy elements of importance in kilonova modelling, Professor David Riley

Application instructions

• Applications for post-graduate studies must be made via the QUB applications portal.
• All applications received by Friday February 7th 2025 will receive full consideration for CLMI PhD positions. However, applications received later will continue to be considered where suitable projects are still available.
• You can apply for any number of the research projects advertised for 2025 within one application. Follow these guidelines:
• The projects you want to apply for should be added in preference order under the "Research Title" field. 
• In the online application, please provide an explanation for application in the research proposal box.  For example, this can include why you are particular interested in the topic(s) of your preferred project, any previous research experience that provides relevant skills etc.  It is not necessary to include a CV or personal statement as a separate document.  If you would like to, you can use the personal statement upload to provide a list of your preferred CLMI projects with an associated priority
• To add the Supervisor names, choose 'other' and then type in the Supervisor names in preference order of project. 
• There are funding options listed on the application procedure:
• 'I will fund the course with my own personal funds/personal loan': This would mean you are willing to pay everything yourself and is not advisable unless you have very significant personal funds you are willing to use during a 3-year PhD.
• 'I wish to be considered for funding administered by Queen's': Please confirm Yes.

If you have any queries about eligibility, please contact admissions@qub.ac.uk.

If you have problems with the applications portal, please click the 'Need Support?' button at the bottom of the page if you have started an application. That will open a quick form to gather information on what the problem is and send it to the Clerical Team in Admissions for them to offer advice.

If you have issues registering on the portal then email: pg.apply@qub.ac.uk.