On June 17, 2026, Carlota Pereira Carlos successfully defended her PhD thesis entitled “Nb Thin-Film-Coated Cu Cavities for the Future Circular Collider”. Her doctoral research was carried out under the joint supervision of Prof. Carmine Senatore and Dr. Guillaume Rosaz (CERN). The thesis committee included Dr. Anne-Marie Valente-Feliciano (Jefferson Lab, USA) and Dr. Stefano Gariglio (University of Geneva).
Carlota’s work addresses one of the key technological challenges of the proposed Future Circular Collider (FCC-ee) at CERN: the development of highly efficient superconducting radiofrequency (SRF) cavities capable of accelerating electron and positron beams while minimizing energy consumption. Her research focused on the optimization of niobium thin-film-coated copper (Nb/Cu) cavities, a promising alternative to conventional bulk niobium technology for large-scale accelerator infrastructures.
During her PhD, Carlota established important links between thin-film deposition parameters, microstructure, superconducting properties, and RF cavity performance. She played a leading role in the development and optimization of High-Power Impulse Magnetron Sputtering (HiPIMS) processes, identifying deposition conditions that significantly improve the quality of Nb films and their RF performance.
Among the major achievements of the project was the successful coating and testing of a 400 MHz Nb/Cu cavity, which exceeded the performance of previous LHC-era cavities and reached the target specifications required for FCC-ee single-cell cavities. These results represent an important milestone toward the deployment of sustainable and energy-efficient SRF technology in future particle accelerators.
Congratulations to Dr. Pereira Carlos on this outstanding achievement, and we wish her every success in the next stage of her scientific career!