Dr. Svenja Knappe received her Ph.D. in physics from the University of Bonn, Germany in 2001 with a thesis on miniature atomic magnetometers and atomic clocks based on coherent-population trapping. For 16 years, she worked at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Boulder CO, developing chip-scale atomic sensors. They combine precision laser spectroscopy with MEMS methods to enable microfabricated high-performance atom-
based sensors. She pioneered the fabrication of MEMS-based atomic vapor cells and was instrumental in the first chip-scale atomic clock and chip-scale atomic magnetometer physics packages at NIST. After leaving NIST in 2016, she joined by QuSpin Inc. for a year. She is a co-founder of FieldLine Inc, a small company developing small optically-pumped magnetometers. She also holds an Adjunct Associate Professorship in the Department Neuroscience and
Psychology at the University of Colorado in Boulder. Her research interests include MEMS atomic clocks, laser spectroscopy and frequency control,
MEMS atomic magnetometers, and other atom-based miniature sensors. She has published 70 peer-reviewed scientific papers, 5 book chapters, 9 patent applications, and given numerous invited talks, and her work has been cited in more than 30 public press articles. She has been awarded the Department of Commerce Gold Metal, the Rank Prize for Optoelectronics, the Colorado Governor’s award for high-impact research, and the James Zimmerman Prize.