Curriculum Vitae of Steven Knoop
Personal information
Date of birth
Place of birth
Nationality
Marital status
Degrees
Work address
February 27, 1979
Leeuwarden, The Netherlands
Dutch
married, father of a daughter
M. Sc. in experimental physics
Ph. D. in experimental physics
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
De Boelelaan 1081
NL-1081 HV AMSTERDAM
The Netherlands
phone: +31(0)20598 7933 / 7945
fax: +31(0) 205987992
email: s.knoop@vu.nl
website: http://www.few.vu.nl/~s.knoop/
Education
Sept. 1997 – Nov. 2001
Experimental physics at the University of Groningen,
The Netherlands. Master’s degree with highest honor
(cum laude).
Dec. 2000 – Nov. 2001
Master thesis: Recoil Ion Momentum Spectroscopy on
He2++Na collisions. Research performed at KVI
Groningen under supervision of Prof. Dr. R.
Morgenstern and Prof. Dr. Ir. R. Hoekstra.
Professional Experience
June 2011 – present
senior researcher (NWO VIDI laureate), Vrije
Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Dec. 2010 – May 2011
Postdoc (Dr. W. Vassen), Vrije Universiteit
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
March 2009 – Nov. 2010
Postdoc, Kirchhoff-Institut für Physik (Prof. Dr. M. K.
Oberthaler), Universität Heidelberg, Germany
April 2006 – Feb. 2009
Postdoc, Institut für Experimentalphysik (Prof. Dr. R.
Grimm, a.Univ.-Prof. Dr. H.-C. Nägerl), Universität
Innsbruck, Austria
Sept. 2003
Sept. 2004 – Oct. 2004
Visiting scientist, Max Planck Institut für Kernphysik
(Prof. Dr. J. Ullrich), Heidelberg, Germany
Dec. 2001 – March 2006
Ph. D. student at KVI, University of Groningen, The
Netherlands, under supervision of Prof. Dr. R.
Morgenstern and Prof. Dr. Ir. R. Hoekstra. Thesis:
Electron Dynamics in Ion-Atom Interactions. Defended
on March 16, 2006. Ph. D. degree with highest honor
(cum laude).
Publications in refereed journals
Number of publications: 31
h-index: 13 (Web of Science)
(1x Nature Physics, 5x Physical Review Letters, 16x first authorship;
2x publications with >100 citations)
Fellowships/Grants
Oct. 2011
FOM Projectruimte (4 years, 400k€)
Nov. 2010
NWO VIDI grant (5 years, 800k€)
Oct. 2006
Marie-Curie Intra-European Fellowship (2 years,
150k€)
Atomic collisions have been the main theme throughout my research career. My PhD
(Groningen) was dedicated to recoil-ion momentum spectroscopy (RIMS) of collisions at
keV energies between (highly charged) ions and ultracold Na atoms in a magneto-optical
trap (MOT). I have improved a MOTRIMS apparatus to resolve electron capture into
different n-shells and ionization processes, and obtain state-selective differential cross
sections, which served as benchmarks for state-of-the-art theoretical models.
Working with laser cooling of atoms motivated me to enter the world of ultracold atoms
and Bose-Einstein condensates. In Innsbruck I worked on an experiment involving
ultracold Cs atoms and Cs2 Feshbach molecules in optical dipole traps. Here I
encountered for the first time Feshbach resonances, which were used to tune the
interparticle interaction and associate ultracold molecules. Highlights were the first
observation of an atom-dimer Efimov resonance, first experimental evidence of universal
four-body states and the observation of ultracold controllable chemical reactions in atomdimer collisions.
After almost three years of research in Innsbruck, I went to Heidelberg to work on an
ultracold Li+Na mixture experiment, which broadened my experience with ultracold
atoms, in particular regarding experiments that contain multiple atomic species. I have
performed intra- and interspecies Feshbach spectroscopy, and did theoretical modelling
of the obtained spectra (leading to a reassignment of the first reported interspecies
Feshbach resonances that were measured by the Ketterle group at MIT). After one-anda-half year of research in Heidelberg I went back to the Netherlands to join the ultracold
He* experiment in Amsterdam. During a half year period I learned about the special
requirements and possibilities of ultracold He* and performed measurements of
magnetic-field-dependent loss of He* atoms in an optical dipole trap.
After receiving a five-year personal grant I stayed in Amsterdam and started as Principle
Investigator a new experiment on an ultracold mixture of He* and Rb, together with one
PhD student. For this experiment I received another grant for a second PhD student one
year later. We have realized BECs of He* and Rb in the same experimental apparatus.
Our interspecies thermalization measurements on a magnetically trapped He*+Rb
mixture triggered theoretical interest that resulted in ab initio calculations of the relevant
interaction potentials. Recently we have obtained the first ultracold alkali-metalmetastable-helium mixture in an optical dipole trap.