The three awarded projects cover very diverse topics: electrical properties of materials, a deeper understanding of the Higgs particle, and a study of quantum collapse.

TOPCORE

The TOPCORE consortium is led by UvA-physicist Erik van Heumen and also involves Anne de Visser from the UvA-Institute of Physics. The program aims to investigate materials with which the researchers want to find novel ways to gain control over their electrical properties.

ATLAS

With the Atlas detector at CERN in Geneva, Dutch physicists want to zoom in deeper to discover the properties of the Higgs boson. The consortium that received an ENW-GROOT for is led by Wouter Verkerke (Nikhef and UvA) and moreover involves UvA-physicists Hella Snoek and Ivo van Vulpen.

Quantum collapse

A third consortium, led by Tjerk Oosterkamp from Leiden University also involves UvA physicist Jasper van Wezel. This consortium aims to study the so-called collapse of the wave-function, a property that all quantum mechanical systems have in common.