Jasper's day – ‘Everything comes together in Leiden’
17 November is all about high tech. From consultations with ASML and a component for the world's largest telescope to our high-tech education. Oh right, and a conversation with the new rector magnificus.
Jasper Knoester is the dean of the Faculty of Science. How is he doing, what exactly does he do and what does his day look like? In each newsletter, Jasper gives an insight into his life.
‘The week starts off relaxed. My first meeting isn't until half past nine, heralding a relatively quiet day. I have three meetings this morning. That gives me time to talk more calmly than is often the case and to check my emails in between.
Technology in our education
One of the meetings is with Victor van der Horst (our Beethoven programme manager) and Marco Beijersbergen (professor at LION). We are talking about making technology-focused elements of our programmes more visible and expanding them. This presents an opportunity for the faculty and for our students. We are not going to compete with TU Delft on engineering programmes, but if students can take more technology-focused courses in our programmes, this could be beneficial for their careers. As a faculty, it is important to make our research with technological components more visible. This is an opportunity to enter new collaborations outside the academy. And the great thing is that this type of research can be found in all our institutes.
At the end of the morning, I attend a one-hour visit by a delegation from ASML to the faculty. I welcome the guests. Victor van der Horst gives a nice introduction to our HTI (High-Tech Innovation) master's specialisation, which we are launching as part of Beethoven. This is followed by presentations from staff members from our institutes who are already collaborating with ASML or who see interesting opportunities for collaboration.
Leiden's contribution to a global effort
Afterwards, I have the pleasure of a private tour of the METIS assembly hall in the Oort Building. METIS is the “eyepiece” that detects infrared light from stars and other sources in the universe and turns it into images. It is the first instrument of the ELT (Extremely Large Telescope), which is currently being built in Chile. NOVA, the Netherlands Research School for Astronomy, of which we are the lead partner in Leiden, is the proud leader of the METIS consortium.
This is the third time today that we have discussed high tech within our faculty! Parts of METIS have been built all over the world and will be arriving at our assembly hall in the coming period. The first large parts will arrive on Monday 24 November, and from that moment on, you will only be allowed to walk around in this room wearing cleanroom suits. Today, jeans and a jacket are still acceptable. I am amazed by what I see. There are enormous hoisting installations and large barrels for liquid nitrogen that will soon be used to cool the instrument. This is a global effort, and I am proud that it will all come together in Leiden and that the world is entrusting us with this!
After dealing with a few more emails, I head to the academy building, where we, as deans, will meet the person whom the Supervisory Board intends to appoint as our new rector. The deans are asked for their advice on this appointment. Naturally, this is an interesting discussion. By the time you read this column, you will already know who it is. It's good that our Executive Board will be back at full strength for the coming years.
Reviving old friendships
After concluding the meeting day with a final consultation in the Old University Library, I cycle quickly to a restaurant on Papengracht, where I meet three friends from my student days. The initiator is Peter Denteneer from LION, with whom I occasionally reminisce about old times since my arrival in Leiden. Before the summer, we invited a third friend, Jan, to join us, and today Bert is also there. The ambitious plan is to invite an additional fellow student to each subsequent dinner. It turns out to be a wonderful evening, proving once again that the good feeling of old friendships – even after years of not seeing each other – returns almost instantly. In addition to reliving memories, the list of names of fellow students that Peter carefully keeps is being expanded further. Whether we will eventually find all 180 names of the 1977 cohort of Physics students at Utrecht remains to be seen, but for now we are having a lot of fun. We part ways with the agreement to see each other again soon and the name for the next addition.
At home, I catch up with the family, help Kamiel with physics and Jasmijn with an email she must write in German for her ski instructor course. Around midnight, I go to bed. It felt like a quiet day, with some nice highlights. Tomorrow is Tuesday, which is always a very busy day, with back-to-back meetings until the evening. But first, it's time for the night, hopefully filled with undisturbed sleep.