We welcome Dr. Pierre Koleják in our group as a postdoctoral researcher, affiliated with the RPTU in Kaiserslautern.
Pierre specializes in terahertz photonics, focusing on the synergy between experimental development and simulations. He completed an international double-degree PhD at the University of Lille in France and the Technical University of Ostrava in the Czech Republic. His dissertation, “Terahertz Time-Domain Ellipsometry Based on Spintronic Phenomena,” explored novel uses of spintronic emitters for advanced polarization-sensitive terahertz spectroscopy.
During his PhD work, Pierre has developed experimental setups for time-resolved spectroscopy, complete ellipsometry, and photomixing. He contributed to the development of terahertz spintronic emitters, addressing key challenges in efficiency and polarization control. These advancements enabled their application in polarization-sensitive spectroscopy. Pierre also demonstrated innovative approaches to field-resolved ellipsometry, enhancing material characterization and the analysis of complete polarization responses.
Pierre spent several years at the National Supercomputing Center IT4Innovations in the Czech Republic, focusing on multi-variable, global, and black-box optimizations. His work involved extracting material properties from spectroscopic and ellipsometric data and developing calibration procedures to minimize the influence of instrumentation on material analysis. In addition, he developed a custom simulation framework to model ultrafast electromagnetic processes, enabling the detailed analysis of excitation and emission mechanisms in terahertz sources. These simulations were utilized by several research teams to support the development and optimization of next-generation spintronic emitters, with the goal of achieving maximum efficiency.
Accompanying his own research, Pierre has also gained experience in leading small teams, supervising undergraduate thesis projects, organizing workshops, and engaging in science popularization. In his free time, he enjoys cooking, exploring nature, and spending time with friends.
At the Laboratory of Lightwave Metrology, Pierre will be exploring new frontiers of fied-resolved infrared spectroscopy, with the main focus of developing new technologies for applications to biology and medicine. In particular, he will develop fast, super-resolution and chemically specific approaches for microscopy of living systems.