Home - Institute for Materials and X-Ray Physics

Welcome to the Institute for Materials and X-Ray Physics at Technische Universität Hamburg - TUHH, Germany

Illustration of our research topics

We engage in fundamental research in condensed-matter physics and on novel functional materials. We explore experimentally the multiscale interplay of structure, dynamics and function of matter and profit thereby from the vivid and inspiring Natural, Materials and X-Ray Photon Science environment of the Hamburg metropolitan area, encompassing Hamburg University, the Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon, and the Deutsche Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY. Our Institute on Materials and X-Ray Physics (M-2) at Technische Universität Hamburg (TUHH) is linked via a joined research group on High-Resolution X-Ray Analytics of Materials with the Photon Sciences of Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY and with the Centre for Hybrid Nanostructures (CHyN) of Hamburg University. We are a member of the Center for Intergrated Multiscale Materials Systems CIMMS, the Centre for Advanced Materials (ZHM Hamburg), the Centre for Molecular Water Science CMWS and of the Collaborative Research Initiative SFB 986 “Tailor-Made Multi-Scale Materials Systems M³”. Our research projects focus on how condensed matter behaves in extreme spatial confinement, most prominently in nanoporous media, and on how to employ this fundamental knowledge for the design and fabrication of advanced materials.

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:

Self-assembly, phase transitions, and dynamics of soft molecular condensed matter in geometrical confinement.

Adsorption-induced deformation and elastocapillarity upon condensation of liquids in porous media, most prominently hierarchical porous silicon and silica.

Fluid transport and rheology of liquids in porous media, in particular in nanoporous solids (Nanofluidics).

Design principles for mechanical, fluidic and photonic metamaterials based on combinations of porous solids with functional soft molecular fillings (electrolytes, (bio-)polymers, liquid crystals).

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.

Liquid wetting and spreading at planar interfaces.

News

02.12.2021 During the DESY Science Day 2021, we were introduced as a new research group at DESY.

05.11.2021 Our publication Dynamic Kerr and Pockels electro-optics of liquid crystals in nanopores for active photonic metamaterials appeared in Nanoscale.

22.10.2021 Our article Wafer-Scale Electroactive Nanoporous Silicon: Large and Fully Reversible Electrochemo-Mechanical Actuation in Aqueous Electrolytes has been published in Advanced Materials.

26.07.21 Article on "How water wets and self-hydrophilizes nanopatterns of physisorbed hydrocarbons" published in the Journal of Colloids and Interface Science.

We present experiments and computer simulations on the wetting behaviour of water on molecularly thin, self-assembled alkane carpets of dotriacontane (n-C32H66 or C32) physisorbed on the hydrophilic native oxide layer of silicon surfaces during dip-coating from a binary alkane solution. By changing the dip-coating velocity we control the initial C32 surface coverage and achieve distinct film morphologies, encompassing homogeneous coatings with self-organised nanopatterns that range from dendritic nano-islands to stripes. These patterns exhibit a good water wettability even though the carpets are initially prepared with a high coverage of hydrophobic alkane molecules. Using in-liquid atomic force microscopy, along with molecular dynamics simulations, we trace this to a rearrangement of the alkane layers upon contact with water. Water molecules displace to a large extent the first adsorbed alkane monolayer and thereby reduce the hydrophobic C32 surface coverage. Thus, our experiments evidence that water molecules can very effectively hydrophilize initially hydrophobic surfaces that consist of weakly bound hydrocarbon carpets.

14.06.2021 Nanostructuring of materials leads to completely new, often surprising properties; this makes them highly interesting for new fields of application and technologies. However, whether these materials can be processed into robust components and thus find their way into applications depends very much on their mechanical properties. These are usually particularly difficult to determine without changing them through the measuring process or even destroying the materials. Within a German-French research team we have now developed a non-contact and non-destructive measurement method using laser ultrasound in such a way that the elastic properties of nanostructured materials can be characterised in detail. The results are reported in an article entitled "Laser-excited elastic guided waves reveal the complex mechanics of nanoporous silicon" in the journal Nature Communications (see also the DESY/TUHH press release: German/English).

11.05.2021 The article "Synergistic and Competitive Adsorption of Hydrophilic Nanoparticles and Oil-Soluble Surfactants at the Oil–Water Interface" has been published in Langmuir. An illustration from the article is featured on the cover of the current Langmuir issue.