Welcome to the research group of Patrick Huber at Hamburg University of Technology, Germany
We work in a subdiscipline of condensed matter physics which focuses on fundamental properties of solids and liquids upon spatial confinement, as encountered in meso- and nanopores or, in a semi-confined manner, at free surfaces of solids and liquids.
From a more general, philosophical perspective, we are interested in how complex collective behaviour, such as crystallization of water, self-organization of porous structures and cooperative transport and flow in molecular ensembles, can arise despite the simplicity of the interactions of the single players and their single-molecular motion. So we try to experimentally explore physical aspects of the emergent character of our universe, mainly with respect to the phenomenology on small length scales - between 1 and 100 nanometers, the mesoscopic scale.
Feel invited to read more about our research and teaching activities, to browse our publication list or to get an impression of our group life (group members & alumni and events).
At present our main efforts are directed at an understanding of:
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phase transitions in confined geometries (melting and freezing transitions, crystallization, capillary condensation and capillary sublimation in nanopores) - see also our research projects. |
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the fundamental structural and statistical properties of fluid interfaces , that is the relationship between the thermodynamics, the microscopic structure of these interfaces and their microscopic and macroscopic hydrodynamics - see also our research projects. |
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wetting phenomena in systems dominated by long-range and short-range interactions - see also our research projects. |
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transport phenomena in nano- and mesopores, in particular capillary rise and flow of simple and complex fluids in such geometries (Nanofluidics) - see also our research projects. |
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