Asst. Prof. İbrahim Sarpkaya, a faculty member at Bilkent University’s National Nanotechnology Research Center (UNAM), was interviewed by Yeni Şafak for a special news report aimed at promoting successful scientists with high levels of expertise returning to Turkey through the TUBITAK-2232 International Fellowship for Outstanding Researchers Program. Asst. Prof. Sarpkaya received an undergraduate degree from Kayseri Erciyes University and a master’s degree in Physics from Boğaziçi University. He then completed his doctoral education at the Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey in the United States. Afterward, he worked as a post-doctoral researcher at Yale University and Los Alamos National Laboratory for four years in total.
In February 2019, Asst. Prof. Sarpkaya returned to Turkey from the United States as one of the 127 researchers selected under TUBITAK’s 2232 International Leading Researchers Program and began working with at Bilkent University’s UNAM with an aim towards high-impact R&D.
In his interview for Yeni Şafak‘s “Returnees” news report, Asst. Prof. Sarpkaya said, “I spent nine years in America, including five years of doctoral education. Four of these years were spent as a post-doctoral researcher. Then, in 2019, I returned to Turkey. Actually, when I went for my doctorate, I always had in my mind the intention to transfer the knowledge, experience, and expertise I gained abroad to young researchers in our country one day and to continue the work we did there in Turkey. TUBITAK initiated the 2232 International Leading Researchers Program. As the program’s aims and objectives were in line with mine, I was one of the 127 researchers who returned to Turkey under this program, and I formed my own research group here (at UNAM).”
Asst. Prof. Sarpkaya, the head researcher of the quantum photonics group at UNAM, continued, “Our research mainly focuses on investigating and understanding light-matter interactions in low-dimensional materials in detail, and how we can effectively use these materials in optoelectronic or quantum photonic devices. We aim to develop different methods and techniques. On the other hand, another area of work for our group is the single-photon sources that underlie all quantum technology applications today. The investigation of these single-photon sources in different materials is another important area of research for our group, both at room temperature and at low temperatures. When we say low temperature, we can say that we have gone down to -269 degrees Celsius. In other words, we can continue our work at the temperature of liquid helium.”
In the rest of the interview, Dr. Sarpkaya provided additional details about his career, research, and accomplishments. The interview can be viewed at https://youtu.be/0nUyAj-ChFw
