Kalle-Antti Suominen profile picture
Kalle-Antti
Suominen
Professor, Laboratory of Quantum Optics
Professor, vice-rector for research

Contact

+358 29 450 2774
+358 40 537 3263
Vesilinnantie 5
20500
Turku

Areas of expertise

quantum optics
cold atoms
quantum dynamics
quantum information

Biography

I have been a Professor of Physics at University of Turku since 2000. I studied theoretical physics in University of Helsinki (HU) for 1984-1992. For 1989-1993 I worked at the Research Institute for Theoretical Physics at (HU) and obtained my PhD in 1992. For 1993-1995 I worked at the University of Oxford as a postdoctoral researcher, and returned to the University of Helsinki in 1995 as an Academy of Finland researcher, continuing in 1997 as a project leader and Academy researcher at the newly established Helsinki Institute of Physics. I am the director of the Laboratory of Quantum Optics at the Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Turku. Since 2012 I have been the vice-rector for research at the University of Turku.

Teaching

Due to being the vice-rector I have currently no teaching duties except supervision of graduate students and examination of master theses. In the past I have lectured a basic course in optics, and special courses in quantum mechanics and quantum information. I have co-authored the textbook "Quantum Approach to Informatics", with Stig Stenholm, published by John Wiley & Sons in 2005.

Research

My research consists currently studies of time-dependent quantums systems, especially the control of two-level systems that can represent qubits in quantum computation. I also collaborate with the experimental atomic hydrogen group, directed by Doc. Sergey Vasiliev, exploring the spin wave dynamics and magnon condensates at very low temperatues in spin-polarised hydrogen gas. In the past I have also studied excitation of molecules with femtosecond pulses, laser cooling of atomic gases and cold atomic collisions, decoherence effects related to atomic systems and quantum information, and dynamics of solitons and vortices in atomic Bose-Einstein condensates. My work is and has been theoretical and computational, but in close interaction with experimental developments and experimental research groups.

Publications

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Bose-Einstein Condensation of Magnons in Atomic Hydrogen Gas (2015)

Physical Review Letters
O. Vainio, J. Ahokas, J. Järvinen, L. Lehtonen, S. Novotny, S. Sheludiakov, K.-A. Suominen, S. Vasiliev, D. Zvezdov, V. V. Khmelenko, D. M. Lee
(Vertaisarvioitu alkuperäisartikkeli tai data-artikkeli tieteellisessä aikakauslehdessä (A1))