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Dr. Anja Meier Receives the Excellence Prize for Advancing a Method Analysing Molecules

Forschungszentrum Jülich has awarded Dr Anja Meier its Excellence Prize. As part of her doctoral thesis, the chemist made a significant contribution to advancing photoemission orbital tomography (POT). This technology now allows the chemical properties of molecules to be analysed in much greater detail and is also more versatile than before.

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spinQuest Award for Young Scientists for Stefan Schulte

"Can a molecular quantum dot on the STM tip image surface polarizability?" Answering this question, Stefan Schulte, PhD candidate at PGI-3, was awarded the spinQUeST Award for Young Scientists at the spin based quantum science and technology (spinQueST) conference 2025, held in Ascona, Switzerland. In his poster, he shows how resonant transport through an STM tip functionalized with an organic molecule (NTCDA) reveals orbital structures and the tip geometry, and further, that the electron-phonon coupling increases the sensitivity of the molecule-functionalized STM, ultimately providing a polarizability map of NTCDA layers on the sample linking “dark” molecules to a higher charge density distribution.

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Science online talk by Dr. Taner Esat

Every Thursday, scientists present their work in a web conference. On 5. June 2025, Dr. Taner Esat from PGI-3 was invited to give a talk about "Lego with atoms and molecules". In this presentation, he explains his work in a way that is easy for non-experts to understand. A recording of the talk (in german language) can be found on the intranet.

Intranet Recording

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Quantum Science and Technology Highlight 2024

In the run-up to 2025 - the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology - the Jülich quantum sensor from PGI-3 has been named as one of the highlights of 2024 in the Quantum Blog of the journal physicsworld.

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Dr. Esat at Falling Walls Science Summit

Dr. Taner Esat was selected to take the stage at this year's Physical Sciences Symposium. This is a rare opportunity to showcase his research to an esteemed audience of experts, fostering new connections and collaborations. Esat will present his cutting-edge project on 8. November 2024 at the Next Generation Researcher Pitches in Berlin.

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ERC Starting Grants for Two Early-Career Scientists from Jülich

Dr. Jun Huang and Dr. Taner Esat from Forschungszentrum Jülich have each received an ERC Starting Grant worth up to € 1.5 million from the European Research Council (ERC) for their research in the fields of electrochemical energy conversion (Huang) as well as quantum information science and quantum sensor technology (Esat). With the ERC Starting Grants, the European Research Council supports outstanding scientists in an early phase of their career, providing funding for innovative projects in basic research. Applications are evaluated only on the basis of scientific excellence. Forschungszentrum Jülich has already received 26 ERC grants, including Starting, Consolidator, Advanced, and Synergy Grants.

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Novel Quantum Sensor

In a scientific breakthrough, an international research team from Germany's Forschungszentrum Jülich and Korea's IBS Center for Quantum Nanoscience (QNS) developed a quantum sensor capable of detecting minute magnetic fields at the atomic length scale. This pioneering work realizes a long-held dream of scientists: an MRI-like tool for quantum materials. Dr. Taner Esat from Jülich’s Peter Grünberg Institute (PGI-3) explains what it is all about.

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Felix Lüpke in the DFG funding programme

Dr. Felix Lüpke from the Peter Grünberg Institute at Forschungszentrum Jülich has been accepted into the Emmy Noether Programme by the German Research Foundation (DFG). The funding programme gives outstandingly qualified young scientists the opportunity to qualify for a university professorship by independently leading a junior research group over a period of six years.

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New NanoESCA MARIS

The next generation photoemission analyser NanoESCA MARIS allows to perform both, Momentum and Real Space Imaging Spectroscopy. The instrument has been delivered before Christmas and was finally installed at PGI-3 in February 2024 by an expert from Scienta Omicron. From now on, scientists from PGI-3 will carry out photoemission orbital tomography experiments for the „Orbital Cinema“ project funded by the European Research Council (ERC).

Watch the installation process

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Anja Haags Awarded ICSOS Young Scientist Prize

Anja Haags has received this year's Young Scientist Prize at the 13th International Conference on Surface Structures (ICSOS-13). The chemist, who is doing her doctorate under Prof. Stefan Tautz at the Peter Grünberg Institute (PGI-3) in Jülich, is working on the imaging of molecular orbitals using the so-called photoemission orbital tomography (POT) technique.

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Quantum Cinema: 11.3 Million Euros for Super Slow-Motion Microscopy of Electrons

Observing incredibly fast quantum processes and chemical reactions at the highest resolution: That is the goal of the "Orbital Cinema" project, for which physicists from the coordinating Forschungszentrum Jülich and the universities in Marburg, Regensburg and Graz today received one of the prestigious Synergy Grants from the European Research Council (ERC).

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"Gerhard Ertl Young Investigator Award 2022" for Dr. Taner Esat

Physicist Dr. Taner Esat from Forschungszentrum Jülich has been honoured with the "Gerhard Ertl Young Investigator Award 2022". The award, named after the German Nobel Prize winner and surface physicist, recognises young scientists for outstanding achievements in surface science and has been presented by the Surface Physics Association of the German Physical Society (DPG) since 2010.

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Last Modified: 09.10.2025