Fachhochschule Dortmund is setting an important scientific course with a doctorate in the field of electronics for particle physics: Jeremias Kampkötter's doctoral thesis dealt with radiation-hard voltage converters for the supply of pixel detectors at an international research facility - the particle accelerator at CERN.
"Pixel detectors are the heart of the detector systems at CERN," says Jeremias Kampkötter. "They consist of sensitive sensor units that capture the finest traces of elementary particles." But powering these highly sensitive chips is tricky. Due to the extreme radiation in the CERN tube, the supply units are housed in a shielded area outside the experiment. The radiation is lower here, but the associated longer supply lines lead to a loss of efficiency.
"We have developed innovative solutions to minimize these losses," reports Jeremias Kampkötter. In his doctorate, which he completed in cooperation with the University of Duisburg-Essen, he describes the voltage converters that ensure a stable power supply for the detectors in high-energy physics experiments and at the same time withstand the extreme radiation conditions at CERN.
These voltage converters, which he developed together with other doctoral students in Prof. Dr. Michael Karagounis' team at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, are now being used in the particle accelerator.
The research results not only led to a successful doctorate, but also to the approval of a follow-up project by the German Research Foundation (DFG), in which Jeremias Kampkötter is now continuing his work as a postdoc at Fachhochschule Dortmund.
Milestone for the Faculty of Electrical Engineering
"This first doctorate at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering is a milestone for our university," says Prof. Karagounis, praising the result. "It shows that we are optimally networked and connected in top international research."
Fachhochschule Dortmund has officially been part of the renowned ATLAS-CERN collaboration since 2019. Under the leadership of Prof. Karagounis, special components for experiments at CERN are developed and basic research is carried out at the UAS. In addition to the power supply for the pixel detectors, doctoral students from the Dortmund team are working on AI chips, hardware security and software for the chip design. "It's really something special to see how research ideas from Dortmund are implemented directly at CERN," says Jeremias Kampkötter.