Department of Physics assistant professor selected for chair of excellence position at LANEF

Assistant Professor Antia Botana in Arizona State University's Department of Physics was recently selected for a chair of excellence position at Laboratoire d’Alliances Nanosciences-Energies du Futur.

Laboratoire d’Alliances Nanosciences-Energies du Futur, also known as LANEF, is an organization based in Grenoble, France, that works with international collaborators to offer new opportunities for students and high-level scientists.

Botana explained her excitement at her acceptance into the program, as it is very competitive.

“It's a great opportunity, of course, since these chair of excellence positions are very competitive.” Botana said. “They created them to attract what they consider ‘talented researchers’ from other countries, and I was lucky enough to be selected to develop a research project in one of their labs."

For the duration of the program, Botana will advise a student for three years, which is the length of a PhD in France.

“I will co-advise one student for those three years with a collaborator in Grenoble. And that's the way in which this basically came about, through this collaborator, Andres Cano. I will spend three months a year in Grenoble (nine months overall). The selected student will also be able to come to ASU because the award entails funding for him/her to come and spend periods in Arizona,” Botana said.

Botana is excited for the new experiences in this program.

“I always like new experiences," she said. "So the possibility of co-advising a student with another theorist and seeing what new things come out of that is very exciting.”

Botana is also excited to spend some time in Grenoble.

“It will be wonderful to develop new collaborations with theorists and experimentalists in Grenoble as well (other than those that I already have established), explore new ideas, experience a different system and spend time in a wonderful city like Grenoble,” Botana said.