WITec announces Paper Award 2022 winners

The prizes go to scientists from the US, Germany and China

10-Aug-2022 - The WITec Paper Awards 2022 have been given to scientists from the US, Germany and China, recognizing their work in cement chemistry, pharmacy and methane hydrate chemistry. Every year, the WITec Paper Award highlights three scientific publications that contain data acquired with a WITec ...

NanoCar Race II: Eight teams from three continents gather for the world's smallest race - the race of the molecules

24-Mar-2022 - When they hear the term "24-hour race," many people might think of Le Mans, Daytona, or even the Nürburgring. Images of colorful cars racing by at breakneck speed, accompanied by deafening noise and the smell of burning high-performance fuels may appear in the mind's eye. But at the NanoCar Race ...

Materials Testing: Detecting damages in non-magnetic steel through magnetism

24-Jul-2018 - Wear, corrosion, material fatigue - these signs of degradation are common to most materials. This makes it all the more important to detect damage early, preferably on the micro scale. Magnetic test methods are often used for this purpose, which was previously impossible with non-magnetic steel. ...

Handshake of atoms: lefties or righties?

25-Feb-2016 - A team of researchers from the Department of Physics at Hamburg University, together with col-leagues from the Radboud university in Nijmegen, the FZ Jülich and the MPI of Solid State Research in Stuttgart, explored the atomistic origin of magnetization handedness in a structure containing as few ...

Electrons catch a wave

Physicists use ultrashort laser pulses to drive and accelerate electrons out of nanotips

12-Mar-2012 - In 1905 Albert Einstein transformed physics with his explanation of the famous photoelectric effect. In his Nobel-Prize-winning work, Einstein abandoned classical principles and introduced the concept of light particles, known today as photons, to describe light-induced electron emission from ...

The smallest conceivable switch

Targeted proton transfer within a molecule

15-Dec-2011 - For a long time miniaturization has been the magic word in electronics. Dr. Willi Auwaerter and Professor Johannes Barth, together with their team of physicists at the Technische Universitaet Muenchen (TUM), have now presented a novel molecular switch in the journal Nature Nanotechnology. ...

Where electrons get stuck in traffic

17-Aug-2011 - The thinnest wire in the world, made from pure gold, is being examined by physicists from the universities of Würzburg and Kassel. Its exceptional electrical conductivity is causing quite a stir: the electrons do not move freely through the wire, but like cars in stop-and-go traffic. Normally, ...

Software for the discovery of new crystal structures

16-May-2011 - A new software called QED (Quantitative Electron Diffraction), which has been licensed by Max Planck Innovation, has now been released by HREM Research Inc., a Japan based company, which is developing products and services in the field of High-Resolution Electron Microscopy. QED allows ...

Mechanical engineering at the molecular level: Self-assembly of nano-rotors

29-Nov-2010 - Scientists from the Technische Universitaet Muenchen (TUM) have managed to direct the self-assembly of rod-shaped molecules into rotors only few nanometers in size. The tiny systems serve the study of forces that act on molecules on surfaces and in cagelike structures. Their findings are ...