2 September 2026

Photo: UHH/Fuchs

Chayanit Asawatangtrakuldee being awarded the Beate Naroska Guest Professorship by Erika Garutti during the Award Ceremony 2026.

"I think female scientists nowadays have more opportunities and more platforms where they can show their talent and show the world what they can do", says Chayanit Asawatangtrakuldee, this year's Beate Naroska Junior Guest Professor. Recently, Quantum Universe sat down with her to talk about her journey in academia and more.

Can you start by introducing yourself?

My name is Chayanit Asawatangtrakuldee. I am an assistant professor at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok, Thailand, in the Department of Physics. Currently, I am the Beate Naroska Junior Guest Professor with the Quantum Universe Program at Universität Hamburg.

How would you describe your research in a few sentences?

My expertise is particle physics. I am searching for additional Higgs bosons beyond the Standard Model with the CMS experiment at CERN. More recently, I have also extended my interest to neutrino physics. In both cases, I think I am really trying to answer the same question: what are we still missing about the universe?

Can you tell us about your academic journey?

During high school, I received a scholarship from Her Royal Highness Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, which gave me the opportunity to study physics at Peking University in Beijing.

In total, I spent ten years in China. For my PhD, I went to CERN for three years to work with the CMS collaboration.

After that, I started as a Research Fellow at DESY in 2016. Three years later, I went back to Thailand and became an Assistant Professor at Chulalongkorn University, where I still am today.

What do you enjoy most about your work?

There are two things I really enjoy about my work: research and teaching.

For research, I think it is very exciting that we are looking at real data and trying to see if there is something in nature that we still do not understand. Sometimes it takes a very long time, but there is always the possibility that you might find something new.

I also really enjoy teaching. When I was a young researcher, I didn’t interact with students a lot. But when you start teaching, you have to think about the students and whether they really understand what you are talking about. I find that very interesting, because it also makes you think about how well you understand physics yourself.

You spent many years outside Thailand. How has that international experience shaped you as a scientist and a supervisor?

I was abroad for about 14 years. I met people from many different cultures, and I think it made me much more adaptable.

Working in big collaborations is a lot of fun. You meet people from many cultures, and you have to learn how to communicate and work with people. You build collaboration skills, and you also see that people can have very different ways of thinking and approaching the same problem.

I think this experience also helps me with my students because I can tell them what it looks like outside Thailand and teach them some of the skills I have learnt over the years while being abroad. It has also helped me build up my own research team in Thailand and guide younger students who are starting to work in international collaborations.

What do you feel are the benefits of being a Beate Naroska Guest Professor?

I think it is a very meaningful recognition for female physicists in this field. It gives you a kind of “push-forward” energy where you can say to yourself, “Okay, what you have done so far is great. Now just keep going.”

There are still not many programs like this that recognize female scientists and also create spaces where female scientists can connect with each other. I think this is a great program for both of these things.

For me personally, it also gives me the opportunity to spend more time on research, exchange ideas with people here, and reconnect with collaborators in Hamburg. Some of these discussions have already led to new research ideas and collaborations that can continue after I go back to Thailand.

Is there something you want to achieve while you are in Hamburg?

I would like to use my time here for both research and meeting people. It is a good opportunity to exchange ideas, discuss different research topics, and start some new collaborations that can continue after I go back to Thailand. I also hope that some of these connections can help strengthen the research team I am building in Thailand and create more opportunities for my students to work internationally.

I also enjoy learning from students from non-Thai backgrounds. I recently got the chance to talk with some summer school students, and it was very nice to see that students from around the world have so many things in common. They have passion, and they want to learn. It feels very meaningful knowing that the suggestions or advice you give them can be useful for them in the future.

Do you have any advice for young female early-career researchers in physics who are unsure about their next steps?

I would say to young female physicists that there are still so many opportunities to shine in this world. It was probably different in the past, but I think female scientists nowadays have more opportunities and more platforms where they can really show their talent and show the world what they can do.

Whatever I have been able to achieve is all thanks to the support I received from Her Royal Highness. She has given many opportunities to the younger generation and has devoted a lot of her time to supporting education in Thailand.

That is something I also want to do. I am someone who has received a lot of opportunities, and I would like to provide the same kind of opportunities to the next generation.

I like to tell my students: keep going, do what you love, and see where it takes you.