Carrie Weidner's GECKO group develops experimental quantum sensing and simulation with cold atoms and hot atomic vapours. Key directions: (1) robust atom interferometry for 6-axis inertial sensing using optical lattice potentials (EPSRC-funded, Infleqtion partnership); (2) magnetic field imaging with squeezed light in hot atom vapour cells (wide-field OPM-type sensing using Faraday rotation); (3) quantum optimal control theory for atom interferometric sensors. The group is establishing a full ultracold atom apparatus for quantum simulation and sensing. Active postdoc positions.

Christoph Westbrook co-heads the Quantum Gases group at LCF/IOGS. Research: (1) metastable helium (He*) BEC and ultracold atomic gases — atom optics, Bose-Hubbard physics, Anderson localization; (2) correlated atom pair production via four-wave mixing for quantum atom optics sensing; (3) atom laser and matter-wave interferometry. The group pioneered the He* BEC and uses correlated atom pairs for quantum sensing analogous to two-photon quantum optics.

Windpassinger's group works on cold neutral atoms as both a platform for fundamental light-matter physics and a deployable sensing technology. The fundamental line uses dysprosium -- the most magnetic element -- to study light propagation in dense dipolar media, where interatomic spacings fall below the optical wavelength and light-induced plus magnetic dipole-dipole interactions produce cooperative effects (superradiance, subradiance); controlled transport in optical dipole traps and microfocusing let them tune from single-atom to collective behaviour. The applied line builds ultracold-atom quantum sensors that survive outside the lab: atom interferometers and BEC sources flown in the Bremen drop tower, on sounding rockets, and on the ISS, aimed at inertial sensing, gravimetry and tests of fundamental constants under microgravity. Relative to the established NV-ensemble quantum-sensing playbook (DEER, nanoscale NMR, T1 relaxometry at pT/sqrt(Hz) ensemble sensitivity), this is the complementary 'cold and fragile but absolutely calibrated' end of the sensing spectrum; the group's real distinguishing asset for a postdoc is the space/microgravity engineering pipeline, which is rare. The group states it is continuously looking for motivated researchers and lists open positions via the PI.

Yan built the first quantum gas microscope for ultracold molecules and uses programmable tweezer arrays of fermionic atoms and dipolar molecules to realize custom quantum many-body Hamiltonians (Hubbard and spin models) with single-site resolution. This is primarily a quantum-simulation platform rather than a sensing one, so it is kept as an unpreferred/borderline entry; the same site-resolved tweezer/microscope toolkit underlies emerging proposals for distributed tweezer-array quantum sensors, which is the basis for inclusion.

Tarik Yefsah's group at LKB studies strongly interacting ultracold Fermi gases. Research: (1) Fermi gas mixtures — quantum simulation of condensed matter phenomena (BCS-BEC crossover, Fermi polaron); (2) quantum gas microscope experiments imaging individual atoms in optical lattices; (3) novel quantum phases in Fermi-Hubbard systems ('fermionic waltz' publication 2026). Relevant to quantum simulation and quantum gas-based sensing.