Standpoint: European Commission should continue funding networked, international low-temperature infrastructure

The European Microkelvin Platform’s funding is over for now. Aalto University Professor Pertti Hakonen underscores how these types of concerted efforts are crucial for European low-temperature research.

The European Microkelvin Platform (EMP) was a 5-year grant from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme. While the funding for the EMP ended on 31.12.2023, the aftermath of its impact indicates the vital importance of such projects for science.

Aalto University was one of eight access-giving EMP research institutions, alongside Heidelberg University, CNRS Grenoble, Slovak Academy, Basel University, Royal Holloway UL, Lancaster University and TU Vienna.

The project represented approximatively €10 million in funding from the European Commission, of which €1.2 million was designated to Aalto University. VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland and cryogenics company Bluefors were also partners of the EMP.

The 16 technology, industry and research partners comprising the EMP have provided researchers with access to important cross-institutional infrastructure for their experimental, cutting-edge work in low-temperature physics. The pooled infrastructures included 15 nuclear demagnetization fridges, 30 dilution fridges, a rotating sub-milliKelvin cryostat, clean rooms and an abundance of other resources shared among the partner organizations.

“Finland’s longstanding expertise in low-temperature research is enabling important innovations in quantum sensing, computation, and materials research. At the European scale, these innovations have massive implications for technological competitiveness, in particular in quantum technology,” says Aalto University Physics Professor Pertti Hakonen.

The outcomes of the EMP’s success can be seen recently and locally at Aalto University. Hakonen, along with teams of international collaborators, published in October 2024 a paper in Nature Communications and another in Physical Review Letters at the end of 2024. The experiments conducted in these studies heavily relied on the Aalto node in the EMP network, and they were made possible by the EMP funding. Further examples of successful projects and their results can be found on the EMP website.

“The European Microkelvin Platform was a remarkable success, as seen in the high output of research articles and innovations it enabled in its 5-year lifetime,” Hakonen says. “It is a misstep that the funding scheme for networked EU infrastructures has been discontinued and the EMP is not able to continue its successful operation. I implore the European Commission to keenly evaluate the need of such networked research facilities in the future. I am sure that all my fellow EMP users agree with me in stating that reinvestment to EMP activities would be well worth the commission’s money.”

The EMP project was also important in training future generations of specialists in low temperature physics and cryogenics. With the EU funding and the voluntary work of the several principal investigators, the EMP organized altogether four advanced cryocourses targeted to graduate students and post-doctoral researchers. These courses, in which the participation of students was financially fully covered, gave a top-level modern training to participants who all regarded the course extremely valuable for their career. At present, the European low temperature community is searching for new funding option to continue this worthwhile tradition.

During the project’s life cycle, the EMP offered the most comprehensive portfolio of cryogenic facilities worldwide. Importantly, the platform also funded researchers’ travel expenses to enable cross-institutional collaboration and utilization of equipment otherwise unavailable in their home countries.

Most of Aalto’s infrastructural contributions to the EMP come from OtaNano’s Low Temperature Laboratory. OtaNano is Finland’s national research infrastructure for micro-, nano-, and quantum technologies, and it is jointly run by Aalto University and VTT.

Learn more about OtaNano

OtaNano is Finland’s national research infrastructure for micro-, nano-, and quantum technologies