Thursday, 04 December 2025

On the trail of the Big Bang: University of Graz receives 1.5 million euros for doctoral programmes

Illustration of the Big Bang

Young researchers are set to take a step closer to understanding the origins of the world in a new doctoral programme at the University of Graz. The Austrian Science Fund is funding the project with €1.5 million. Illustration: Flashmovie/Adobe Stock

The Austrian Science Fund FWF has selected the Doctoral Programme in Theoretical Particle Physics at the University of Graz for funding from the Doc.funds. Six young scientists will be funded for 3.5 years. They will gain fundamentally new insights into the origins of the world.

The entire universe - from atomic nuclei to black holes - is made up of elementary particles. However, it is not yet clear exactly how these particles hold the world together. Again and again, researchers make unexpected observations during collisions of black holes or in large experiments at the European Nuclear Research Centre CERN. As part of the doctoral programme "Conceptual Aspects of Composite States", young scientists are to solve some of these puzzles.

The programme is expected to start in mid-2026. Job ads will be published at https://inspirehep.net/jobs. The PhD students will be supervised by spokesperson Axel Maas as well as Gernot Eichmann, Alessia Platania, Simon Plätzer and Denés Sexty.

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