Lancaster University in the UK received an award of €500,000 as part of a European program to provide young researchers with the opportunity to work in the field of photonics. The €4.8 million program, Postgraduate Research on Photonics as an Enabling Technology (PROPHET), is funded by the highly competitive European Union Marie Curie mechanism and consists of a consortium of academic, industrial and associated partners. The university is leading a work package on the development of diode lasers for environmental applications as well as contributing to research on quantum dot solar cells. Fourteen doctoral students and five postdoctoral researchers will be trained over four years in skills needed for a career in the photonics industry.