A laser research center was built in Szeged as part of an European Union project. The completed facility represents one of the peak achievements of European innovation, laying the groundwork for globally significant discoveries in various fields of science. Thanks to the project, Szeged – and Hungary – is now more prominently featured on the map of Europe as a center for international scientific activity.
The realization of the ELI laser research center (ELI-ALPS) Phase 2 project was funded through a partnership between the European Union and the Hungarian government in Szeged. The goal was to establish research infrastructure that enables cutting-edge basic research using high-intensity lasers and associated secondary light and particle sources, not only in physics but also in other fields of natural sciences.
Construction work on the research center began in the spring of 2014, with the installation of the first lasers taking place in 2017. The design, construction, and commissioning of various high-power, pulsed, and high-intensity large-scale devices, i.e., lasers, secondary sources, and experimental stations, were carried out by ELI ALPS staff in collaboration with domestic and international partners. Initially, cooperation agreements were made with invited research groups to provide beam time and user support. Since 2019, researchers from around the world have been able to apply for experiments on the institute’s equipment through user calls. During the implementation phase of the GINOP project, 79 operational user experiments and collaborative research programs were carried out.
Since the completion of the project, the institution has grown into one of the focal points of not only the country’s but also Europe’s scientific life.
The development was implemented from EU funding in the project GINOP-2.3.6-15-2015-00001 under the Economic Development and Innovation Operational Programme.
Find out more about the project in the Project Finder:Details
