Physics research at the faculty Science and Technology can count on an excellent assessment from the visitation committee Applied Physics. S&T administrators conclude this from the preliminary findings presented orally by the committee end of last month.
According to S&T-dean Alfred Bliek the committee feels that the quality of physics research has risen considerably since the last visitation and has even found 'a steep road upwards'. The average quality is 'very good' and the research groups of the professors Detlef Lohse (physics of fluids), Ad Lagendijk (complex photonic systems) and Horst Rogalla (low temperatures) are even of 'international stature'.
The committee was also positive about the matrix structure of faculties and institutes introduced by the UT recently. A critical comment was reserved for the financial distribution model that, according to the committee, causes that starting groups do not get a full budget until very late. But according to Bliek this is a problem for all young research groups at the UT, and a solution should be found for this in consultation with the executive board.
The visitation committee subjected the applied physics research to a four-day inspection end of November. The team of international professors, from amongst others Stanford University, Princeton, and the Parisian Ecole Normale SupÚrieure, visited, in addition to administrators, scientists, and laboratories of applied physics, the research institutes MESA+, IMPACT and BMTI.
The final written report of the visitation committee will appear in the beginning of 2004. This will also include the citation analysis, which is not yet finished.
