Services
The « support » services
At the CNRS, support functions assist scientific research, the core business of the institution. These include all the skills that provide services to laboratories: finance, purchasing, information systems, general services, communication, etc.
The LAPTh administrative department, comprised of three people, is dedicated to supporting researchers in their research activities by providing administrative, financial, and logistical assistance. It works closely with the various departments of the CNRS Alpine Delegation, the Université Savoie Mont Blanc, and the Institut de Physique (INP).
The administrative department performs four main functions:
Human Resources Management: This includes the administrative management of permanent and temporary staff, including researchers, lecturers, postdoctoral fellows, engineers, technicians, administrative staff, collaborators (French or international), and interns.
Onboarding of new staff (permanent, temporary, scientific collaborators, and interns): This includes assisting with their integration into the unit.
Management of scientific publications: This includes collecting, verifying, and registering scientific publications in national and international databases.
Support for research administration to the management team and staff, covering financial, technical, and logistical aspects.
The administrative department is responsible for managing the laboratory’s budget, funded by the CNRS, the USMB, and its own resources. It also manages all of LAPTh’s expenses in compliance with accounting and public procurement regulations.
It handles the necessary arrangements for staff travel related to their missions, addressing both practical aspects (hotels, tickets, visas, etc.) and financial aspects (payment of allowances).
It participates in the organization of seminars, thematic schools, national and international scientific conferences, and public events, handling both logistical and financial aspects.
It also collaborates with the LAPP administrative department and the Alpes delegation regarding the building’s infrastructure (which belongs to the CNRS).
The IT department and computing at LAPTh:
The two laboratories, LAPTh and LAPP, are housed in the same premises and share the network infrastructure. The IT services of both laboratories are shared; they are responsible for system administration, network management, and user support.
The computer has become an essential tool for LAPTh researchers to carry out their research. It is used for symbolic and formal computation. Among other things, it allows them to manipulate very large expressions that would be extremely tedious to handle manually. It is also used for numerical computation, enabling them to evaluate very complex formulas (a manual calculation would take hours and use thousands upon thousands of sheets of paper!). It also allows them to approximate solutions to equations too complicated to solve analytically.
LAPTH researchers have developed computer tools that have brought renown to the laboratory in the fields of collision physics, astrophysics, and cosmology.