How to apply

Requirements

Applicants need to have completed at least three years of full-time studies at university level in areas related to the programme (typically physics, other natural sciences, engineering, or information technology). This means that the main audience for this programme are:

• bachelor students who will obtain their degree by summer 2026,
• students with a bachelor degree enrolled in a master degree programme.

Please mind that applicants who already obtained a Masters degree or will obtain one by summer 2026 are not accepted. Furthermore, applicants should not have been at PSI as a summer student before.

Please take note that all applicants should have a good working knowledge of English and some computing skills. The students are expected to participate during the full period of the 2026 core programme, from 3^rd July until 21^st August 2026. The actual duration (typically 8-12 weeks) and start of the internship depends on the supervising group's (and student's) availability.

Application procedure

PSI covers a broad range of research topics. Applications are therefore organised by center. More information on the six research and two service centers can be found at https://www.psi.ch/en/research/center-labs. Please only apply for one center. Applications to more than once center will be rejected. To apply, please follow the link to the respective job advertisement below. Please provide a tabular CV (max. 2 pages of A4) as well as a short letter of motivation (1 page of A4). The deadline for applications is 31^st January 2026.

Important: Each center has project descriptions linked below. When applying, please clearly state your preferred project and give reasons why you are interested in (and potentially suitable for) working on this project. Additional projects might be added later, please check back in case there are no suitable projects for you at the moment. Should you already have applied while a project that was added later is a better fit for you, please contact the person listed in the job opening to let them know.

Please mind that applications are only expected to open in December 2025 (only at that point, the list below will lead to the job advertisements with a possibility to submit applications and there will be a list of project descriptions).

A list of all currently available internship positions at PSI can be found here.

• PSI Center for Neutron and Muon Sciences: [project descriptions] [job opening]
• PSI Center for Nuclear Engineering and Sciences: [project descriptions] [job opening]
• PSI Center for Energy and Environmental Sciences: [project descriptions] [job opening]
• PSI Center for Photon Science: [project descriptions] [job opening]
• PSI Center for Scientific Computing, Theory and Data: [project descriptions] [job opening]
• PSI Center for Corporate Services: [project descriptions] [job opening]
• PSI Center for Life Sciences: no summer internships available
• PSI Center for Accelerator Science and Engineering (no summer student positions for 2026). Other internships are available already now (applications opened in November 2025):
  • Trainee for a load-lock system for the travelling-wave RF photogun
  • Trainee in transient effects on HTS magnets for energetically efficient accelerators
  • Trainee for the automation and containerization of service framework for the Swiss Light Source

After the deadline, the groups in the respective centers will review the applications. A final decision on acceptance is expected in April 2026.