Professor Kai Bongs PhD, FInstP

Contact details

Telephone: +44 (0) 121 414 8278
Fax: +44 (0) 121 414 8277
Email: k.bongs@bham.ac.uk
Twitter: @KaiBongs

Address: School of Physics and Astronomy
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

Professor Kai Bongs was Director of the UK Quantum Technology Hub Sensors and Timing from 2014-2019 and Principal Investigator from 2019-2022. Professor Bongs helped to drive the translation of gravity sensors and ultra-precise clocks into technology and applications across a diverse number of sectors, including climate, communications, energy, transport and urban development.

Professor Bongs is now Director at the Institute for Quantum Technologies at the German Aerospace Centre.

His work has been disseminated through both invited and peer-reviewed presentations at international conferences and through high-impact publications (125 in total). His work has been cited over 12000 times and has a h-index of 52.

Professor Bongs contributed to the Quantum technologies: Blackett review, a Government report published in 2016, which explored how the UK could benefit from the research, development, and commercialisation of quantum technologies. He has built extensive links with key industry partners, working with over 40 companies in over 30 projects. These industry partners include companies such as Teledyne e2v, Network Rail and BAE Systems.

In 2017, Professor Bongs received the Josiah Mason award for Business Advancement in recognition of his leadership of the Quantum Technology Hub for Sensors and Metrology. In 2018, Professor Bongs was made Editor-in-Chief for the European Physical Journal (Quantum Technologies). He is also a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Fellow, as well as a Fellow of the Institute of Physics and the Institution of Engineering and Technology.

Professor Bongs was awarded the 2019 Institute of Physics Dennis Gabor Medal and Prize, for his contribution to the development of quantum sensors and translation to industrial applications, as well as the development of the UK Quantum Technology Sensors and Timing.

Professor Kai Bongs discusses the University of Birmingham's research into quantum clocks

Professor Kai Bongs introduces the Quantum Technology Hub for Sensors and Metrology and discusses some of the practical applications of its research

Staff details
Policy information

Qualifications

Habilitation in Physics, University of Hamburg, 2006
PhD in Physics, University of Hannover, 1999
Diploma in Physics, University of Hannover, 1995

Biography

Cold Atom Physics MUARC Summer School

Professor Bongs obtained his PhD from the University of Hannover in 1999 on creating a Bose-Einstein condensate and developing and testing atom optical techniques for its manipulation. He supplemented this work by realising the dark solitons in Bose-Einstein condensates during a one-year postdoctoral post. After this, he studied atom interferometry during a postdoctoral stay at Yale University in 2000, where he initiated a programme to develop a mobile gravity gradient sensor and an electron guide.

In 2007 he was appointed to Chair in Quantum Matter at the University of Birmingham.

In 2014, he was appointed Director of the newly formed UK Quantum Technology Hub for Sensors and Metrology, which is one of four Hubs making up the UK National Quantum Technologies Programme, funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).

Teaching

Modern Optics
MRes/PhD in translational quantum technology

Postgraduate supervision

Supervision of research PhDs in cold atom physics

Research

Atom interferometry
Optical clocks

Other activities

Editor-in-Chief for the European Physical Journal (Quantum Technologies)
Editor of Scientific Reports
Editor of Advances in Ultra Cold Atoms and Molecules, World Scientific
Member of Science Team for the Space-Time Explorer and Quantum Equivalence Principle Space Test (STE-QUEST) with the European Space Agency (ESA)
Scientific lead for session organised for Scientific Assembly of the Committee on Space Research (COSPAR) July 2012 in Mysore, India
Scientific organiser of the Quantum Interfaces symposium at the Condensed Matter and Materials conference, December 2011
Member of the EPSRC Peer Review College and referee for the Leverhulme Trust
Referee for the European Metrology Research Programme 2012
Referee for Research Councils in Australia (ARC), France (CNRS), the Netherlands (FOM), Germany (DFG) and Austria
Referee for Nature, Reviews of Modern Physics, Physical Review
Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Fellow, Fellow of the Institute of Physics and the Institution of Engineering and Technology.

Publications

N. Meyer, H. Proud, M. Perea-Ortiz, Ch. O’Neale, M. Baumert, M. Holynski, J. Kronjäger, G. Barontini, and K. Bongs; “Observation of Two-Dimensional Localized Jones-Roberts Solitons in Bose-Einstein Condensates”, Phys. Rev. Lett. 119, 150403 (2017), 2 citations.
K. Bongs, Y. Singh, L. Smith, W. He, O. Kock, D. Świerad, J. Hughes, S. Schiller, S. Alighanbari, S. Origlia, S. Vogt, U. Sterr, Ch. Lisdat, R. Le Targat, J. Lodewyck, D. Holleville, B. Venon, S. Bize, G.P. Barwood, P. Gill, I.R. Hill, Y.B. Ovchinnikov, N. Poli, G.M. Tino, J. Stuhler, W. Kaenders; “Development of a strontium optical lattice clock for the SOC mission on the ISS”; Comptes Rendus Physique, 2015. doi:10.1016/j.crhy.2015.03.009, 37 citations.
R.M. Godun, P.B.R. Nisbet-Jones, J.M. Jones, S.A. King, L.A.M. Johnson, H.S. Margolis, K. Szymaniec, S.N. Lea, K. Bongs, P. Gill; “Frequency Ratio of Two Optical Clock Transitions in Yb+ 171 and Constraints on the Time Variation of Fundamental Constants”’ Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 210801 (2014), 211 citations.
B. Olmos, D. Yu, Y. Singh, F. Schreck, K. Bongs, I. Lesanovsky; “Long-range interacting many-body systems with alkaline-earth-metal atoms”, Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 143602 (2013), 64 citations.
H. Müntinga, H. Ahlers, M. Krutzik, A. Wenzlawski, S. Arnold, D. Becker, K. Bongs, H. Dittus, H. Duncker, N. Gaaloul, C. Gherasim, E. Giese, C. Grzeschik, T. W. Hänsch, O. Hellmig, W. Herr, S. Herrmann, E. Kajari, S. Kleinert, C. Lämmerzahl, W. Lewoczko-Adamczyk, J. Malcolm, N. Meyer, R. Nolte, A. Peters, M. Popp, J. Reichel, A. Roura, J. Rudolph, M. Schiemangk, M. Schneider, S. T. Seidel, K. Sengstock, V. Tamma, T. Valenzuela, A. Vogel, R. Walser, T. Wendrich, P. Windpassinger, W. Zeller, T. van Zoest, W. Ertmer, W. P. Schleich, and E. M. Rasel, “Interferometry with Bose-Einstein Condensates in Microgravity”, Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 093602 (2013), 199 citations.
T. v. Zoest, N. Gaaloul, Y. Singh, H. Ahlers, W. Herr, S. T. Seidel, W. Ertmer, E. Rasel, M. Eckart, E. Kajari, S. Arnold, G. Nandi, W. P. Schleich, R. Walser, A. Vogel, K. Sengstock, K. Bongs, W. Lewoczko-Adamczyk, M. Schiemangk, T. Schuldt, A. Peters, T. Könemann, H. Müntinga, C. Lämmerzahl, H. Dittus, T. Steinmetz, T. W. Hänsch, J. Reichel; “Bose-Einstein Condensation in Microgravity”, Science, 328, 5985 (2010), 186 citations.

View all publications in research portal

Expertise

Professor Kai Bongs is Director of the UK Quantum Technology Hub for Sensors and Metrology, where he drives the translation of gravity sensors and ultra-precise clocks into technology and applications across a diverse number of sectors, including climate, communications, energy, transport and urban development.

He also leads the Midlands Ultracold Atom Research Centre at the University of Birmingham. His work has been disseminated through both invited and peer-reviewed presentations at international conferences and through high-impact publications (125 in total). His work has been cited over 7000 times and has a h-index of 39.

Policy experience

Professor Bongs contributed to the Quantum technologies: Blackett review, a Government report published in 2016, which explored how the UK could benefit from the research, development, and commercialisation of quantum technologies. He has built extensive links with key industry partners, working with over 40 companies in over 30 projects. These industry partners include companies such as Teledyne e2v, Network Rail and BAE Systems.

In 2017, Professor Bongs received the Josiah Mason award for Business Advancement in recognition of his leadership of the Quantum Technology Hub for Sensors and Metrology. At the beginning of this year, Professor Bongs was made Editor-in-Chief for the European Physical Journal (Quantum Technologies). He is also a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Fellow, as well as a Fellow of the Institute of Physics and the Institution of Engineering and Technology.