Institute and Research News

The International Max Planck Research School for Ultrafast Imaging & Structural Dynamics (IMPRS-UFAST) has opened this year’s call for applicants. more

MPSD research group leader James McIver, who is also an Assistant Professor of Physics at Columbia University in New York, has been awarded the prestigious Early Career Award by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).  more

An MPSD theory team reports in Physical Review X that it has found no evidence of any universal topological signatures after performing the first ab initio investigation of high harmonic generation from topological insulators.  more

Plasmons promise a variety of applications if the processes triggered by optical excitation in the nanoparticles can be controlled. A research team from Hamburg and Berlin reports in Nano Letters experimental observations that cannot be explained by established models and describes a new theoretical model that explains the dynamics of excited gold nanoparticles observed in experiments. more

MPSD researchers report in PNAS how they observed liquid glycerol in a completely unexpected rubbery state. The rapidly expanding bubbles on the surface of the liquid in vacuum, created by a pulsed laser did not behave like a viscous liquid but like the elastic envelope of a rubber toy balloon. more

The MPSD has welcomed two new Humboldt Fellows to the Theory Department. Carlos Mauricio Bustamante and Hang Liu have each been awarded postdoctorate Humboldt Research Fellowships to carry out their own research at the Institute. more

Terahertz light pulses can stabilize ferromagnetism in YTiO₃ at temperatures more than three times its usual transition temperature. Researchers from the Cavalleri group report in Nature that the high-temperature ferromagnetic state persisted for many nanoseconds after the light exposure. more

Researchers in Hamburg have developed the Spitrobot - a device that greatly simplifies observing changes in proteins as they carry out their functions and makes time-resolved crystallography accessible for non-specialist research groups. more

13 school students took part in this year’s Girls’ and Boys’ Day at the MPSD. They got to try out experiments involving light refraction, magnet-battery motors, atomically thin graphene as well the transmission speeds of signals - and they had a lot of fun in the process.  more

The electronic properties of MoSe₂ are determined by the bonds of Mo and Se atoms, to which both elements contribute equally. But when exposed to ultraviolet light, the Mo signal clearly shows a signature dominated by collective processes while the Se signal suggests that the electrons act independently. more