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The main idea behind the 60 million Euro ESIF project O-ZIP is that by supporting the research infrastructure at RBI, in line with the Croatian Smart Specialization strategy, a gap is bridged towards the European research area, the economy, the scientific and academic communities as well as the society as a whole. The targeted activities will significantly enhance the impact of RBI by enabling it to: (i) reach new heights in the excellence of its scientific endeavours, (ii) more effectively tackle the challenges faced by modern society, and (iii) make a lasting contribution to the development of a competitive industrial sector.
O-ZIP will serve to encourage and enhance excellence through focusing the reinforcement measures upon applications with the highest demonstrated potential, as the most effective manner in which to climb the stairway to equality with the Europe’s top research institutions. The principle societal challenges to be addressed along the way are those related to improvements in the areas of health, food, and the environment, as those in which the RBI is best positioned to make a significant contribution. The impact on developing a competitive industrial sector will derive from addressing, employing and enhancing key enabling technologies (KET), fostering an unheralded interaction between research and industry, an active engagement in the emerging Croatian competitiveness clusters, and a stimulatory redefinition of the implementation of knowledge transfer activities.
The objectives of O-ZIP are fully compliant with the strategic goals of Croatia and EU (environmental protection, health, new materials, biotehnology) and the project’s implementation strategy is based on the generally accepted and internationally recognized comparative advantages of RBI scientists, who have demonstrated their capabilities through scientific excellence within an interdisciplinary culture. In accordance with the open-access policy, the O-ZIP project proposal also envisages close cooperation and interaction with academic centers of excellence in the immediate environment.
Based on the identification of research units with related expertise in research, development and applications of novel materials and devices. The primary and shared objective of the Center will be synthesis of advanced materials and structures, particularly those that can be applied in other domains of basic and applied science, thus catalyzing innovation, transfer of technologies and enhancing capabilities in instrumentation and human resources. The center will assemble the efforts, integrate expertise and promote interdisciplinary research by four key research units: a) photonics and quantum optics, b) graphene and related 2D structures, c) new functional materials, d) ion beam physics and technology. The envisaged research programme is based on the past successful research within the groups of Ruđer Bošković Institute, Institute of physics and their partner institutions.
Largest experimental complex in Croatia. This is the only research facility in Croatia providing trans-national access to international users through the FP7 research infrastructure project SPIRIT and H2020 AIDA2. It is also the only experimental complex in Croatia that is part of the Central European Research Infrastructure Consortium (CERIC-ERIC). It is also part of the CEMS.
GSI and MAMI Germany, GANIL and IPN Orsay France, KVI Netherlands, INFN-LNL and INFN-LNS Italy, ORNL USA, ANU Australia, PSI Switzerland, as well as the largest European project in nuclear physics Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR)
The CERN, Geneva based the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS – main detector for recent Higgs boson discovery), and the SPS Heavy Ion and Neutrino Experiment (NA61/SHINE)
The MAGIC Observatory in the Canary Islands, the CERN Axion Solar Telescope (CAST), and the Oscillation Project with Emulsion-tRacking Apparatus (OPERA), Italy.
Possibilities exist for future involvement of CDSE in activities related to the development and testing of various diagnostic elements for future fusion reactors (ITER, DEMO).
In addition to this, RBI applied to several Horizon2020 projects that, if accepted, will interact closely with the ERA Chair. Already accepted and running is the Advanced European Infrastructures for Detectors at Accelerators - AIDA 2 project dedicated to development of detectors for accelerator based research in particle physics.