ESR1’s first secondment at Corning Incorporated

At the beginning of July, Iliyan Karadzhov, early stage researcher (ESR 1) of the Nano-Glass project, arrived at Corning Incorporated’s Sullivan Park Research and Development facility located in Erwin, NY to start his first secondment. Secondments are research training periods spent by the recruited ESRs at the premises of a partner of the consortium to not only enrich the training experience of the ESRs but to develop new skills that may be useful for their future career. Iliyan will be living in New York and working at Corning until the end of December 2022.

During his stay at Corning, Iliyan is having the opportunity to work on industrially relevant processes to structure glass surfaces. “The main goal of my secondment is to become familiar with the current state-of-the-art technologies that Corning develops and to be involved in some of the research problems that need solutions,” explained Iliyan. This is key to the development of his individual research project (IRP) because, “Corning not only has powerful technical resources, but also has very bright and knowledgeable scientists that are pleasure to work with.”

Iliyan Karadzhov: “It is my first time being exposed to a true world leader in glass technology. I am fascinated by the existing opportunities at Corning for doing both fundamental and applied photonics research.”

During these last few months, Prantik Mazumder, Principle Research Scientist, Wageesha Senaratne, Senior Research Associate, and Todd St. Clair, Senior Research Manager, all from the Surfaces Research group at Corning, are supervising Iliyan’s work. He also has the support of Corning’s senior scientists, Robert Bellman, Senior Research Associate, and Karl Koch, Research Fellow, as well as all the technicians working in the clean room facility.

“The experience at Corning has been extremely helpful and delightful for my particular research project,” Iliyan said.  “It is my first time being exposed to a true world leader in glass technology. I am fascinated by the existing opportunities at Corning for doing both fundamental and applied photonics research.”

Once Iliyan completes his first secondment, he will come back to the ICFO and will continue working on his IRP with the practical experience gained during these last months at Corning.

Apart from demanding scientific work, Iliyan is also enjoying the New York region. “I’ve explored the rural region of upstate New York by doing lots of bike rides as well as several hikes in the local natural parks,” he said. “I also enjoyed a trip to New York City where I visited famous places such as Central Park, The Museum of Natural History, and One World Observatory.”