Interview with Michaƚ Jarosz
Michał Jarosz, was born in 1987 in Warsaw, Poland (the birth-place of this EU action patron, Marie Skłodowska-Curie). He studied electronics and informatics in medicine at the Warsaw University of Technology where he obtained his bachelor’s and master’s degree. During his undergraduate studies, he joined the Polish-Swedish cooperation program for the future European Spallation Source (ESS) and he got involved in the Linac4 project at CERN.
Michał spent two summers at ESS helping in the design of the proton accelerator’s tunnel layout, and in March 2012 he successfully defended a master’s thesis based on this research. In addition, he worked at the National Centre for Nuclear Studies in Świerk, Poland, where he took part in smaller accelerator projects for medicine and industry.
Michał joined the oPAC network at ESS in August 2012.
What did attract you to the oPAC network?
What attracted me to the oPAC network was, very generally, the opportunities. First of all, the opportunities of working in the accelerator environment – the real accelerator world – then, the opportunities for personal development, the funding for the schools, workshops, trips… Usually it is quite difficult to get that much funding. Then I learned even more, but these two things were what attracted me in the first place.
Why did you choose to go to the European Spallation Source?
Mostly because of my previous experience with them, I had already worked with them before and whenever there was an opportunity of staying I just applied. The ESS was a green field at that moment so it was very exciting to see how the accelerator facility started from scratch, so that was something most exciting, and then of course, Sweden as a place to live is quite tempting.
Did you find it difficult to live in a foreign
country and work in a different language?
Not really, as in Sweden everybody speaks English so I had absolutely no problems communicating. I think it would be much more difficult if I had to learn Swedish from scratch. That would make things much worse. In the beginning I didn’t expect any downsides on moving abroad, then I found it a little bit more difficult being away from family and friends, in a different environment… but the idea of moving abroad was quite clear for me.
Can you explain in a few words what your project was about and what have you achieved?
My project revolves around the wide area of beam loss monitoring at ESS so I started with some general topics like radiation protection simulations, the loss simulations themselves, and then I switched more to the analysis of the simulation results. In the end the project should result in the final layout for the ESS beam loss monitors all along the cold part of the linac.
What has oPAC provided you apart from a three-year contract?
Again, the funding for all the schools and workshops I could ever imagine, but then also the events organized by oPAC itself were pretty precious for me. Starting from the one in Liverpool which really improved my skills… these were called secondary skills but apparently these secondary skills are sometimes primary if you really want to forward your ideas to other people. Also the last workshop in Liverpool, the technology transfer and the follow up to the career development training might be really useful in the future career.
Did it fulfill your expectations?
It has fulfilled them and even more. I’m very happy about oPAC in the end!