1.2 million euros to find new paths for the exploration of dark matter

DESY scientist Kai Schmidt-Hoberg will receive a 1.2 million euro funding grant from the European Research Council (ERC). With the ERC Starting Grant from the European Union research funding programme Horizon 2000, the theoretical physicist will be able to explore new research approaches to the so-called dark matter in the coming five years. According to scientific observations, the existence of the ominous dark matter in the universe must be five times higher than normal matter. But so far, there was no experimental evidence whatsoever.

Stopwatch for Ultra-short X-ray pulses

Ultra-short and extremely strong X-ray flashes, as produced by free-electron lasers, are opening the door to a hitherto unknown world. Scientists are using these flashes to take “snapshots” of the geometry of tiniest structures, for example the arrangement of atoms in molecules. To improve not only spatial but also temporal resolution further requires knowledge about the precise duration and intensity of the X-ray flashes. An international team of scientists has now tackled this challenge and reports its results in the scientific journal Nature Photonics.

Young scientists distinguished

The award of the Association of the Friends and Sponsors of DESY 2014 is shared in equal parts by Stephan Stern, DESY (CFEL) and University of Hamburg, and Tigran Kalaydzhyan, DESY (Theory) and University of Hamburg. Both are distinguished with the award including a sum of 3000 euros for their excellent PhD theses which they elaborated in the period of 1 April 2013 to 31 March 2014.

50 years of research with synchrotron light at DESY

Today, DESY celebrates the anniversary of a very special kind of light: For 50 years, scientists have been conducting research with synchrotron radiation at DESY – an extremely intensive and bundled X-ray light generated at particle accelerators. “DESY was one of the first places in the world specifically investigating the properties of this at that time very new light and recognising its potential for research,” says Professor Helmut Dosch, Chairman of the DESY Board of Directors. “In those days, the DESY pioneers did not only coin the development of our research centre but created the basis for the global success story of a whole research discipline.”

DESY launches photon science teacher training programme

Today, DESY launches its teacher training programme "Lehrerfortbildung@DESY” in the field of research with light. During the autumn vacations, nine teachers from the greater area of Hamburg take part in a one week training course. They will be directly integrated into current research projects, including among others the brilliant X-ray light generated at DESY’s particle accelerators. From now on, this teacher training course will be offered every year in the autumn vacations and will be developed programmatically, if the feedback is positive.    

Joint effort for new detector technologies

The Helmholtz Association will fund a joint research project of DESY and Chinese scientists on the next generation of particle detectors. A working group headed by DESY scientist Ingrid-Maria Gregor and Xinchou Lou from the Chinese Institute of High Energy Physics (IHEP) will develop and test new technologies for silicon strip detectors for the LHC experiment ATLAS. They are to be implemented from 2025 at the so-called high-luminosity LHC which has an increased collision rate. As of January 2015, the cooperation will be funded with 360 000 euros from the Initiative and Networking Fund of the Helmholtz Association. The two research partners contribute additional funds.

How ceramics get super-tough

Researchers have identified a previously unknown mechanism that makes a rare kind of ceramics super-tough. The findings may show a way to compose super-hard and super-tough ceramics for industrial application, as the team around DESY scientist Dr. Nori Nishiyama reports in the journal Scientific Reports.

Researchers Develop a New Type of X-ray Lens

Researchers have taken an important step towards developing a new X-ray lens made of diamond. A team of scientists from the Technische Universität (TU) Dresden and Technische Universität Chemnitz as well as from DESY have successfully tested a new lens design. The group working with DESY Leading Scientist, Professor Christian Schroer, presents the results in the scientific journal Applied Physics Letters.

Big in Japan

The European Commission funds two projects with DESY participation which promote cooperation with scientists in Japan: E-JADE and JENNIFER are so-called RISE proposals with the aim to further develop accelerator techniques and to collaborate in precision measurements of the Standard Model of particle physics. RISE is part of the EU Framework Programme Horizon 2020 for research and innovation, which supports the posting of EU scientists to non-European countries. These two projects are now funded by the EU with a total of 3.9 million euros.

Helmholtz funds two DESY spin-offs

Two start-up companies initiated by DESY scientists will be funded by the Helmholtz Association “Helmholtz Enterprise” support programme: The X-Spectrum company, entering the market with a high-technology X-ray detector, will receive 100 000 euros. The Class 5 Photonics company will build very flexible femtosecond-lasers generating short pulses with high performance. The joint spin-off of DESY and the Helmholtz Institute Jena will be financed with almost 130 000 euros.

FLASH2 generates first laser light

The FLASH II project – the extension of the free-electron laser FLASH – has reached an important milestone: On 20 August 2014, at 20:37 h, the accelerator team of the late shift was able to detect the first laser light at the new undulator line named FLASH2. Simultaneously, FLASH´s first undulator line FLASH1, which is provided with electron bunches from the same accelerator, could continue to operate without restrictions. The undulators are periodic structures of magnets with alternating North-South polarity in which the X-ray laser light is generated. “This makes FLASH the world’s first free-electron laser that serves two laser lines simultaneously and independently from each other,” says project leader Bart Faatz.

Particle physicists meet in Hamburg

Elementary particles as the Nobel Prize winning Higgs boson are in the focus of this week’s Particles and Nuclei International Conference PANIC 2014. About 300 scientists meet from 25 to 29 August at the University of Hamburg to exchange the newest findings on particle and nuclear physics and discuss future research programmes. The Particles and Nuclei International Conference takes place every three years and this year it is jointly organised by DESY and the Institute for Experimental Physics at the University of Hamburg. This Wednesday, a public talk (in German) will highlight 50 years of particle physics in Hamburg.

Minister-President of Brandenburg Dietmar Woidke visits DESY

Today, Dietmar Woidke, Minister-President of Brandenburg, visited the research centre DESY to inform himself about the current projects at the DESY institute in the federal state of Brandenburg. On a Zeuthen campus tour, he visited the accelerator test facility PITZ, the DESY school lab and the workshops. Moreover, he was briefed about the present research and development work at the institute.

Every Electron Counts!

Despite years of extensive research, many unconventional electrical, thermal and magnetic properties of modern materials remain a mystery. A recent study, conducted at DESY’s free-electron laser FLASH, has now concluded that a flaw in current theories of solids hinders further understanding of complex material behavior.

DESY welcomes a record high of summer students

This year, DESY welcomes a record of 117 summer students at both its locations in Hamburg and Zeuthen near Berlin. During eight weeks, the junior researchers from 28 nations will get a practical insight into research at Germany’s largest accelerator centre. In fact, DESY offers one of the largest and most international summer schools throughout Germany.

Leading scientists appointed for PETRA III and FLASH

Christian Schroer and Wilfried Wurth have joined the DESY team as new leading scientists. Christian Schroer assumes the leadership of the scientific programme of DESY’s synchrotron radiation source PETRA III, Wilfried Wurth becomes scientific head of the free-electron laser FLASH. Both scientists have been working as users at DESY’s light sources for a long time, and made important contributions in the field of instrumentation. “With Christian Schroer and Wilfried Wurth, we were able to win two highly competent synchrotron radiation research experts for DESY,” said DESY research director Edgar Weckert. “They will make our two light sources PETRA III and FLASH more attractive for the international user community and definitely strengthen our internal research programme.”

Helmholtz Fellow Hesheng Chen guest at DESY

Today, DESY welcomes Chinese scientist Professor Hesheng Chen who starts the first of two periods of research in Hamburg. The renowned particle physicist Chen, who among others was Director General of the Institute of High Energy Physics in Beijing, recently won a Helmholtz International Fellow Award by the Helmholtz Association, supporting the research stays at DESY. He participated in pioneering experiments, such as MARK-J, AMS and Daya Bay. “It is my pleasure to welcome Hesheng Chen once again, a particle physicist of international reputation and a good friend of DESY,” said DESY Research Director Joachim Mnich. “Hesheng is not only a driving force in the current Chinese particle physics initiative to join the world league, he is also a perfect ambassador of DESY’s good relations with our Chinese partners.”

IUPAP Young Scientist Prize in Particle Physics for Kerstin Tackmann

DESY physicist Kerstin Tackmann was awarded the Young Scientist Prize in Particle Physics 2014 by the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP). Today, at the International Conference on High Energy Physics ICHEP in Valencia, Spain, she received the prize consisting of a IUPAP medal and a cash award of 1000 euros. Professor Hiro Aihara, Chairman of the IUPAP Commission “Particles and Fields”, said: “It is a pleasure for us to honour Kerstin Tackmann for her outstanding contributions to current elementary particle physics, especially to the discovery of the Higgs boson through the analysis of its photon-photon decay in the ATLAS experiment.”

First H.E.S.S. II data reveal promising pulsar signal

Following the intensive commissioning phase of the largest Cherenkov telescope worldwide (H.E.S.S. CT5), the H.E.S.S. collaboration has announced the detection of cosmic gamma rays of 30 gigaelectronvolts (GeV). The High Energy Stereoscopic System, which is located in Namibia, measured pulsed gamma-rays in the southern sky for the first time from ground level, thus demonstrating spectacularly its performance. The radiation originates from the Vela pulsar, the first pulsar detected by H.E.S.S. and – after the Crab pulsar – the second pulsar ever detected by ground-based gamma ray telescopes.

Structure of matter and space-time

The German Research Foundation (DFG) has announced that it will fund the Collaborative Research Centre (Sonderforschungsbereich, SFB) 676 “Particles, strings and the early universe – structure of matter and space-time” for another four years. After eight years of funding the SFB the new funding period starts the third round of support by the DFG. The departments of physics and mathematics of the University of Hamburg and DESY are strongly involved in the SFB that from 1 July 2014 to 30 June 2018 it receives about two million euros per year. University and faculty will provide an additional 925 000 euros for the entire term.

Biology with free-electron X-ray lasers

The invention of X-ray free-electron lasers (XFEL) has unveiled new vistas into the world of molecules and atoms. This is of particular interest to biologists, striving to understand the workings of the molecular machinery within the organism. A special issue of the scientific journal Philosophical Transactions B, dedicated to "biology with free-electron X-ray lasers", now collects a remarkable set of articles that showcase, on a scientific level, the very recent innovations and results that are driving this new field, including several high profile results from the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science CFEL at DESY. CFEL is a cooperation of DESY, the University of Hamburg and the Max Planck Society.

Getting to Know the Higgs Boson

Researchers of the international CMS collaboration have found experimental evidence for the decay of the recently discovered Higgs boson into a pair of tau leptons. Leptons are a class of elementary particles whose most prominent member is the electron. The study, which used data from the world’s largest particle accelerator LHC (Large Hadron Collider, CERN, Switzerland), validates earlier theoretical predictions of the Higgs boson’s properties. The team, which also comprises DESY scientists, reported its results in the Journal of High Energy Physics.

High-speed snapshots of biomolecules

Using DESY's synchrotron light source PETRA III, scientists have pioneered a new way to analyse delicate biomolecules. The novel approach, borrowed from a new class of high-intensity X-ray sources called free-electron lasers (FELs), could reveal the atomic structure of proteins that were previously inaccessible to synchrotrons, as the team led by Prof. Henry Chapman from the Hamburg Center for Free-Electron Laser Science CFEL reports in the scientific journal of the International Union of Crystallography, IUCrJ. CFEL is a joint institution of DESY, the University of Hamburg and the Max Planck Society.

DESY school lab in Zeuthen celebrates 10th anniversary

On 21 May, the physik.begreifen school lab at DESY in Zeuthen celebrated its 10th anniversary. So far, more than 25 000 young people took the chance to work like a scientist for one day at the DESY lab, thus gaining a lively insight into the fascinating world of physics. Simultaneously, with the visit at DESY, pupils get the opportunity to experience day-to-day research in all its facets.

DESY intensifies cooperation with Swedish research institutions

DESY is expanding its cooperation with Swedish research institutions, agreed DESY Director Professor Helmut Dosch with Swedish science representatives during a visit to Stockholm. Dosch was part of a twelve-member scientific delegation to Sweden who accompanied Hamburg´s First Mayor Olaf Scholz, along with a business delegation. Other members of the scientific delegation included representatives of University Hospital Eppendorf, the University of Applied Sciences and the European Molecular Biology Laboratory.

DESY Golden Pin of Honour for Peter Stähelin

Today, former DESY research director Peter Stähelin was awarded the DESY Golden Pin of Honour. On the occasion of his 90th birthday today, Stähelin was honoured for his great service to the research centre, and in particular for his pioneering spirit in the exploration and use of synchrotron radiation at DESY.

International Summer School of Crystallography

This week, the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL) hosts 38 students attending the first International Summer School of Crystallography. The participants of 24 different nationalities will learn the basics of crystallography, one of the most important tools to explore the inner structure of materials. CFEL is a joint enterprise from DESY, the University of Hamburg and the Max Planck Society.

Delayed explosion due to cluster shell

Violent forces are at work during research with free-electron lasers: every single light flash brings the analysed sample to a fast explosion. In the investigation, every femtosecond (a millionth of a billionth of a second) counts when decoding the molecular structure of the sample before its destruction. At DESY’s X-ray laser FLASH, a team of scientists from SLAC, TU Berlin and DESY has now studied a method to delay the explosion of the sample for potentially decisive fractions of a second. In their experiments which have now been presented in the scientific journal Physical Review Letters, the scientists were able to observe the exact process that takes place in little clusters of atoms intensely irradiated by X-ray light.

Scientists capture X-ray flashes with record time resolution

Researchers from DESY and the U.S. SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have developed a new tool to measure individual pulses of X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) with unprecedented time resolution. At SLAC’s Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), the scientists achieved a resolution of one femtosecond, or one millionth of one billionth of a second. The previous record for single-shot measurements was ten femtoseconds.

Russian Ambassador visits DESY and European XFEL

On 29 April, the Ambassador of the Russian Federation to Germany, Vladimir M. Grinin, visited the research centre DESY and European XFEL. On a tour to the synchrotron radiation source PETRA III and the construction site of European XFEL, Ambassador Grinin was able to get a picture of the diverse collaborations of researchers based in Germany with Russian institutes.

The malaria parasite under a super microscope

An international team of scientists has decoded two key proteins of the malaria parasite Plasmodium, using DESY's bright X-ray source PETRA III and other facilities. The results shed light on the workings of Plasmodium's structural proteins actin I and actin II, without which the parasite cannot infect human cells. The project led by Prof. Inari Kursula from the new Centre for Structural Systems Biology (CSSB) on the DESY campus may contribute to the development of tailor-made drugs against malaria. The researchers present their work in the open access scientific journal "PLoS Pathogens".

Matthew Wing wins Humboldt Foundation's Bessel Research Award

Particle physicist Matthew Wing was awarded a Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Research Award by the German Humboldt Foundation. The 40-year-old professor at University College London (UCL) will use the award to stay at DESY for a year and intensify collaborative research in fields of data analysis as well as linear collider and plasma accelerator development together with DESY experts.

Start of negotiations for southern CTA site

The realisation of the Cherenkov Telescope Array moves a major step forward: At a meeting of the CTA Resource Board in Munich on Thursday representatives from twelve partner countries decided to start negotiations with Chile and Namibia, to define the location for the CTA experiment in the southern hemisphere. As a third option a location in Argentina is being considered.
 

Gay-Lussac Humboldt Research Award for Emilian Dudas

Professor Emilian Dudas from the École Polytechnique, Palaiseau, France is awarded the Gay-Lussac Humboldt Research Award. He will spend two extended research visits at DESY in Hamburg, the first one starting today.

European network GATIS now constituted

Under the leadership of the DESY theory group, eleven renowned academic institutions joined forces in the GATIS research and training network. Until the year 2016, this initiative will be funded by the European Commission with almost 4 million euros.

Young people become “particle physicists for a day”

It is a unique opportunity for high school students: within the framework of the International Masterclasses „Hands on Particle Physics“ they can hunt for evidence of particles in authentic data from experiments in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the most powerful particle accelerator in the world, located at CERN, near Geneva. DESY and numerous research institutes around the world open their doors for the 10^th time and invite young people to become particle physicists for one day. This year´s edition of International Masterclasses take place from 12 March to 12 April and will attract about 10 000 participants.

Helmut Dosch a Honorary Member of the Materials Research Society of India

DESY Director Helmut Dosch was appointed Honorary Member of the Materials Research Society of India (MRSI). The research society elected the solid state physicist at their annual meeting in February.

Happy Birthday, synchrotron!

The particle accelerator Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron celebrates its birthday. Exactly 50 years ago, electrons completely circled the newly built ring accelerator DESY for the first time. This was the start of the particle acceleration era in Hamburg, which eventually developed the DESY research institute of the same name to Germany’s largest accelerator centre, becoming a pioneer in technologies for particle detectors and experiments with synchrotron radiation.

ICFA and Linear Collider Board meeting at DESY

On 20 and 21 February, the International Committee for Future Accelerators (ICFA) and the Linear Collider Board (LCB) meet at DESY. Both strategy groups with members coming from the world’s renowned particle physics institutions will discuss the common future of particle physics and its large-scale accelerator facilities.

Milestone for Belle II: Test beam measurements at the vertex detector successfully completed

Last Friday, a sophisticated test beam campaign has been completed at DESY, which provided important data for the operation of the vertex detector in the Belle II experiment. Over a period of four weeks, an international group of more than 30 scientists for the first time submitted prototypes of all components of the detector simultaneously to an integrated system test and checked the functions of the detector together with its entire intricate infrastructure. “The result is more than encouraging,” said DESY project leader Carsten Niebuhr. “We were able to thoroughly test all aspects, including cooling with carbon dioxide, complex data taking and even the alignment of the detector layers – all this in a strong magnetic field, just as it will later take place in the real experiment.” As the test is extremely important for the Belle II Collaboration, spokesman Tom Browder (University of Hawaii) came to Europe to observe the experiments first-hand. He too was very pleased with the result: “This ’mother of all beam tests’ was really a big success. The conditions, support and infrastructure here at DESY perfectly matched our requirements for such a complex test.”

Innovative technology opens up new biomolecule analysis possibilities

At DESY, scientists from the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL), the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and the universities of Hamburg and Lübeck created new analysis possibilities for delicate biomolecules. At the X-ray source PETRA III, the scientists X-rayed micrometre-sized crystals of a key enzyme involved in sleeping sickness, thereby determining its atomic structure. The obtained structural data correspond to earlier analyses of the same enzyme at the world’s most powerful X-ray laser in Stanford (US). “Since only a few of these valuable crystals are needed, this method opens up new possibilities for the structural analysis of biomolecules,” said CFEL scientist Cornelius Gati, lead author of a research study which describes this new method in IUCrJ, the high-profile scientific journal of the International Union of Crystallography.

DESY presents Bjørn H. Wiik Prizes 2012 and 2013

Today, two Bjørn H. Wiik Prizes were awarded at DESY in Hamburg: particle physicist Kerstin Tackmann receives the prize for 2012, photon scientist Ralf Röhlsberger receives the prize for 2013

International Year of Crystallography 2014

2014 was proclaimed as the International Year of Crystallography by the United Nations (UN). On Monday, the Science Year was officially launched at the headquarters of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization UNESCO in Paris. “This year marks the centenary of the birth of modern crystallography,” UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a message. “We celebrate 100 years of ground-breaking advances.”

Targeting pathogens at atomic resolution by the most advanced radiation sources

At the Centre for Structural Systems Biology (CSSB) on the DESY campus, biologists, physicists and physicians will in future work hand in hand to fight pathogens. After a two-year preparatory phase by a task force, the scientific committee consisting of one representative from each of the nine partner institutions took up work. In its constituent meeting on 10 January 2014, Dr. Matthias Wilmanns, Head of EMBL Hamburg, was appointed founding director. The former chairman of the task force, Professor Chris Meier from the University of Hamburg, was thanked for his outstanding work. Head of the administrative office is Dr. Ina Plettner.

IceCube discovery selected as “Breakthrough of the Year”

The renowned British science magazine “Physics World” selected the IceCube collaboration’s discovery of the first high-energy cosmic neutrinos as the most significant scientific breakthrough in 2013. Between May 2010 and May 2012, with their one cubic kilometre large detector at the South Pole, the IceCube scientists successfully managed to capture a total of 28 neutrinos with energies greater than 30 teraelectron volts (TeV), two of them with an energy of more than 1000 TeV. Only some weeks ago, the research group published this first evidence of highest-energy astrophysical neutrinos in the scientific journal Science. This success was now awarded by Physics World. “The ability to detect cosmic neutrinos is a remarkable achievement that gives astronomers a completely new way of studying the cosmos,” Hamish Johnston, editor of physicsworld.com, justified the selection of the journalists. “The judges of the 2013 award were also impressed with the IceCube collaboration’s ability to build and operate a huge and extremely sensitive detector in the most remote and inhospitable place on Earth.”

DESY group develops new injection concept for plasma acceleration

A team around DESY’s plasma acceleration researcher Jens Osterhoff has developed a new concept to improve electron-beam-powered plasma accelerators. Simulations suggest that their idea should enable the acceleration of very high-quality particle bunches. The DESY researchers, who are planning experiments at SLAC in the USA and FLASH in Hamburg, have now presented the results of their studies in the scientific journal Physical Review Letters.

Two million euro grant for molecule tamer

For his work on the control of complex molecules, Professor Jochen Küpper from the Hamburg Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL, DESY and the University of Hamburg) is granted two million euros by the European Research Council (ERC). The council supports Küpper’s project "Controlling the Motion of Complex Molecules and Particles" (COMOTION) through an ERC Consolidator Grant for five years starting in early 2014. The aim of the project is to develop methods to control, e.g., to transport, to sort, and to align complex molecules like peptides and proteins, but also larger objects, such as virus particles or picoplankton.

Researchers Find Proverbial Needle in Haystack

Particle physicists from the international ZEUS collaboration have found the proverbial needle in a haystack. They identified a mere 15 Z⁰ bosons in over 500 million collision events at DESY’s former electron–proton accelerator HERA. Z⁰ particles are carriers of the weak nuclear force, one of four fundamental forces in the universe. Although Z⁰ bosons have been intensely studied at other particle accelerators, they have never been directly observed in electron–proton collisions before. Z⁰ production is the rarest process ever measured at HERA.

Association of the Friends and Sponsors of DESY awards best PhD thesis

The Association of the Friends and Sponsors of DESY is sharing its 2013 award for best PhD thesis in two equal parts between Johannes Hauk and Andrej Singer. The association awards this prize every year to the best thesis from the two previous university terms. The award ceremony took place today in conjunction with the Jentschke lecture in Hamburg.

Researchers Put the Squeeze on Polymers

Widespread opto-electronic devices such as LEDs, flat screens and solar cells rely on materials that transform electricity into light or vice versa. Organic materials built from chain-like molecules known as conjugated polymers are of a particular interest for industrial applications because they are inexpensive, easy to produce and flexible in shape.

Ioffe Röntgen Institute launched

With a kick-off meeting at DESY in Hamburg the newly founded German-Russian Ioffe Röntgen Institute (IRI) has taken up work on Wednesday. The new institution will serve as an umbrella for cooperation in the development and application of large-scale research infrastructures.

DESY congratulates François Englert and Peter Higgs on Nobel Prize in Physics

The Nobel Committee today awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics to François Englert and Peter Higgs for their theory explaining the mass of elementary particles. Germany’s particle physics centre DESY congratulates the Nobel laureates on this important recognition of their work. The physics theory, which has since become known as the “Higgs mechanism”, explains the mass of elementary particles through the ubiquitous interaction with a scalar Higgs field. With the discovery of the associated Higgs particle at the LHC particle accelerator at the European particle physics laboratory CERN in July 2012, the mechanism was finally confirmed after 48 years of searching. Numerous German researchers were significantly involved in the discovery.

DESY mourns Gustav-Adolf Voss

Prof. Gustav-Adolf Voss, former director of the accelerator division at Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY, passed away on 5 October in Hamburg at the age of 84.

International Cosmic Day

On September 25, 2013 the 2nd International Cosmic Day took place: an international event on astroparticle physics, targeted at high-school students. The International Cosmic Day was initiated by DESY and Netzwerk Teilchenwelt in Germany as well as by Fermilab with its student outreach project QuarkNet in the U.S. On that day, students from all over the world have measured particles that are produced in space and that carry information about the structure and origin of the universe to us.

Topping-out for FLASH experimental hall

The building shell of the FLASH II experimental hall is finished. On 25 September, DESY, building firms and architects celebrated the completion of the roof of the experimental hall with a traditional topping out ceremony. The hall construction started in January this year. It is part of the FLASH II project, in which the accelerator of the free-electron laser FLASH is equipped with a second lasing beamline to serve more users with the highly demanded X-ray light. The beamline branches off of the existing FLASH tunnel behind the FLASH accelerator.

Seeding with femtosecond precision

Researchers from the University of Hamburg and DESY for the first time have operated DESY´s free-electron laser FLASH in direct seeding mode. By overlapping short, extreme ultraviolet laser pulses with the ultra-relativistic electron bunches in their experimental setup called sFLASH, the team improved the pulse properties in intensity and length compared to unseeded FEL flashes. The method allows to create fully coherent electromagnetic radiation with high intensities and short wavelength, as now reported by a team around Jörg Rossbach and Markus Drescher from the University of Hamburg in Physical Review Letters (DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.111.114801). “This technology allows us to generate not only “laser-like” but real laser radiation in the extreme ultraviolet wavelength range with all its benefits for investigation of ultra-fast phenomena in, e.g., molecular dynamics,” notes co-author Tim Laarmann of DESY´s X-ray Femtochemistry research team.

Highest Austrian doctoral degree for Clemens Raab

Clemens Gunter Raab from the theory group in Zeuthen completed his doctoral studies with distinction in 2012 in the frame of the graduate school “Computational Mathematics” at the Research Institute for Symbolic Computation ofJohannes Kepler University Linz (Austria). On 13 September 2013, he was awarded with the doctoral degree “Promotio sub auspiciis Praesidentis rei publicae” by the President of the Republic of Austria for his achievements. In Austria, doctoral candidates receive this acknowledgement not only for excellent performance in all his university studies but also in the last years at high school.

New Helmholtz Young Investigators’ Group at DESY

In the present funding period, DESY will again establish a new Helmholtz Young Investigators’ Group. Particle physicist María Aldaya Martín was selected in a rigorous international peer review process and she will be supported by the Helmholtz Association and DESY in the creation of her own young investigators’ group.

Iron in the sun: a greenhouse gas for X-ray radiation

Scientists from the Heidelberg Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics (MPIK) in cooperation with DESY at the light source PETRA III have investigated for the first time X-ray absorption of highly charged iron ions. A transportable ion trap developed at MPIK was used for generation and storage of the ions. The high-precision measurements provide important new insight into the role of highly charged ions in astrophysical plasmas, e. g. for radiation transport inside stars.

Helmholtz PhD Prize for Stefan Pabst

Stefan Pabst is one of the winners of the first Helmholtz PhD Prize. The Helmholtz Association is honouring the CFEL researcher together with five other young scientists who are active in one of the Helmholtz research fields. The Helmholtz PhD Prize, which is endowed with 5000 Euro and awarded for first time this year, was created to support talented young scientists early on and encourage doctoral students to pursue a career in science.

New emittance world record at PETRA III

The PETRA III machine physicists set a new world record. At the beam energy of 3 Giga electron volts (GeV), they achieved a horizontal beam emittance of 160 picometre radiant (pm rad) – smaller than ever. The emittance is the product of cross-section and bundling of a particle bunch in an accelerator and consequently a measure for the size and order of the bunch. It significantly determines the properties of an accelerator as a light source.

Scientists develop new production technology for zinc oxide thin-films

Zinc oxide is one of the most important ingredients of today’s nano materials. At present, it is often used for many applications, e.g. for gas sensors or laser materials. Extremely thin layers of zinc oxide (ZnO) are also a component of solar cells and organic semiconductors. The conditions in the production of these layers with a thickness of only a few hundred nanometres will have a decisive impact on the exact properties of the material.

Quantum states out of nothing

Scientists from Heidelberg, Hamburg and Jena demonstrated a new method to produce very delicate quantum states which might be very important for the implementation of new quantum technologies in the future. In contrast to everyday experience, quantum mechanical objects can exist in multiple states simultaneously. However, these superposition states are extremely fragile and can already be destroyed by interaction with the vacuum, which – in terms of quantum mechanics – is not empty. The scientists now managed to manipulate the interaction with the vacuum in such a way that the vacuum produces and even stabilizes these superpositions instead of destroying them. This opens up a variety of future perspectives for quantum optics with novel X-ray light sources.

Dinosaur eggs x-rayed

An international team of researchers has peered into 150 million years old dinosaur eggs with the help of DESY's X-ray light sources. The research, done at two beamlines operated by the Helmholtz Centre Geesthacht, revealed similarities of the dinosaur egg shells with today's crocodile eggs, as the team around Ricardo Araújo from the Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas report in the journal "Scientific Reports".

Wireless communication between atoms

At DESY's free-electron laser FLASH, an international team of scientists has measured the duration of a radiationless energy transfer between atoms of a neon dimer directly for the first time. The efficient redistribution of energy in molecular systems after exposure to high-energy radiation is of fundamental importance for numerous chemical and biochemical reactions.

Speed Limit Set for Ultrafast Electrical Switch

An international team of researchers have clocked the fastest-possible electrical switching in magnetite, a naturally occurring magnetic mineral, at the X-ray laser LCLS in California. Their results could drive innovations in ultrafast tiny transistors that control the flow of electricity across silicon chips, enabling faster, more powerful computing devices.

DESY welcomes more than 100 summer students from 32 nations

They come from five continents: within the next eight weeks, more than 100 students from more than 30 countries will gain research experience at DESY in Hamburg and Zeuthen. The practical work in various projects of accelerator, particle and astroparticle physics and in research with X-ray radiation is accompanied by a comprehensive lecture programme for the guests. “Another very important factor is the exchange among the students,” says Olaf Behnke who organises the DESY Summer Student Programme.

Kerstin Borras elected as deputy spokesperson of the CMS experiment

DESY particle physicist Dr. Kerstin Borras was elected deputy spokesperson of the CMS experiment at the world’s largest particle accelerator LHC. At the turn of the year, the head of the CMS group at DESY will assume this office for two years, together with Professor Paris Sphicas from the University of Athens. New spokesperson will be Dr. Tiziano Camporesi from the European particle physics laboratory CERN near Geneva, the location of the CMS detector.

Scientists reveal structure of a supercooled liquid

If a liquid metal alloy is cooled slowly it will eventually form a solid phase. Before it solidifies, however, the liquid undergoes a liquid-liquid transition to a phase in which it has the same concentration but a more strongly ordered structure. This structure has now been demonstrated for the first time at DESY by material scientists from Saarland University in a collaborative project with the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) and the Leibniz Centre for Solid State and Materials Research (IFW) in Dresden. The experimental work, which was performed DESY's X-ray light source DORIS III in Hamburg, involved levitating hot metal droplets and observing them as they cooled by irradiating them with X-rays. The research work is funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) and the results have just been published in the scientific journal "Nature Communications".

Russian Minister Livanov visits X-ray laser European XFEL and DESY

Russia's Minister of Education and Science, Dmitry Livanov, visited the construction site of the next generation X-ray laser European XFEL in Hamburg and Schenefeld on Friday. The European XFEL Management Board and the DESY Board of Directors informed the Minister about the progress and the scientific research opportunities at the X-ray free-electron laser. Livanov, who is a physicist, later visited research facilities on the DESY campus and the European XFEL construction site in Schenefeld. The Russian Federation is an important shareholder of European XFEL and contributes about 27% of the costs, second only to the host country, Germany, which covers 58% and is represented by DESY.

Two million euros for nano research

Physicists of the Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel (CAU) raised funds amounting to about two million euros for three collaborative research projects at DESY.  With this financial support of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the scientists will develop unique high performance instruments for experiments with brilliant X-ray radiation. Their goal is to better understand liquid surfaces and the interfaces of solid materials; this will create the basis to develop new materials.

Research building of CFEL inaugurated

On Monday, the new research building of the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL) was inaugurated in Bahrenfeld. CFEL is a cooperation of DESY, the University of Hamburg and the Max Planck Society. In CFEL, the partners pool their university and non-university expertise to investigate structural changes, e.g. of atoms, molecules and condensed matter.

X-rays reveal secrets of metallic glass

Thanks to the superior X-ray vision of DESY's light source PETRA III, scientists have watched nanocrystals grow live inside a metallic glass. The method allows to follow the growth of metallic crystals from sizes as small as two nanometres (billionth of a metre) in real-time and may lead to an optimisation of these high tech materials. "The technique can also be applied to other materials and may be used to follow crystallisation processes during chemical reactions in real-time," says DESY scientist Jozef Bednarcik, lead author of a scientific paper appearing on the front cover of the journal Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics today.

Researchers X-ray Next Data Memory Innovation

Memories for data storage are crucial for a variety of modern-day technologies. Widespread consumer electronics including tablet computers and cell phones, for instance, develop rapidly and demand memory that is smaller, faster, and more energy-efficient than ever. Researchers from RWTH Aachen University and Forschungszentrum Jülich in Germany used DESY’s X-ray source DORIS to examine a promising new type of memory called ReRAM, or resistive switching memory. ReRAM is over a thousand times faster than current state-of-the-art memory types and may replace them in the near future.

ILC publishes its Technical Design Report

A five-volume report containing the blueprint for a future particle physics project, the International Linear Collider (ILC), was published today. In three consecutive ceremonies in Asia, Europe and the Americas, the authors of the Technical Design Report for the International Linear Collider, a next-generation particle collider to complement and advance beyond the physics of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, officially handed the report over to the international oversight board for projects in particle physics, the International Committee for Future Accelerators ICFA. The Technical Design Report presents the latest, most technologically advanced and most thoroughly scrutinised design for the ILC.

FLASH makes magnetisation invisible

Back to the Future with HERA

Over a time span of 15 years, DESY’s particle accelerator HERA served the international particle physics community as the world’s most precise electron microscope for studies of the proton’s inner structure. Although HERA experiments ended in 2007, ongoing data analyses continue to point the way for future particle physics experiments.

European Strategy for Particle Physics adopted

Today, at a special meeting hosted by the European Commission in Brussels, the CERN Council formally adopted the update of the European Strategy for Particle Physics. This strategy sets the course for the future of this research field in Europe, making recommendations for future projects and research fields. Particle physicists from all European countries together with colleagues from Asia and America participated in the development of the European strategy. German particle physicists also formulated their priorities for particle physics in Germany and Europe and contributed to the strategy process.

IceCube sees strong signs for first cosmic neutrinos

At the IceCube Particle Astrophysics (IPA) conference in Madison, U.S., the international IceCube collaboration presented the latest results of their search for astrophysical neutrinos. In the period between May 2010 and May 2012, the neutrino detector Ice Cube identified 28 neutrinos with energies above 30 teraelectronvolts (TeV). Two of them reached energies higher than 1 petaelectronvolt (1 PeV= 1000 TeV). With this, the astroparticle experiment, comprised of more than 5 000 digital optical modules suspended in a cubic kilometre of ice at the South Pole, made substantial progress in the hunt for extra-terrestrial neutrinos.

ATLAS and CMS receive prestigious prize from the European Physical Society

The High Energy and Particle Physics Prize 2013 of the European Physical Society goes to the research teams of the ATLAS and CMS particle physics experiments.Together with the three experimental physicists, Michel Della Negra (Imperial College London), Peter Jenni (CERN and University of Freiburg) and Tejinder Virdee (Imperial College London) the collaborations are awarded for the discovery of a new heavy particle with the properties of the long-sought Higgs particle.

Scientists decode molecule dynamics of benzene double molecule

A team of Dutch and German scientists decoded the inner dynamics of an important model system of organic chemistry. The investigation of the benzene dimer solves a 20-year old mystery, reported the group headed by Melanie Schnell from the Hamburg Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL). Her study was selected as cover story of the scientific journal “Angewandte Chemie International Edition”and categorised as “very important paper”(VIP) by the evaluators and publishers. CFEL is a joint enterprise from DESY, the Max Planck Society and the University of Hamburg.

Volcanoes can damage the ozone layer

The in some areas extremely thin ozone layer discovered in the 1980s was clearly due to manmade emissions. However, there are ozone killing sources also in nature. Scientists from GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel and DESY in Hamburg found that giant volcanic eruptions may have large amounts of ozone depleting gases. Their study is published in the internationally renowned scientific journal “Geology”.

Clearing the way for the gamma-ray observatory CTA

The Federal Ministry of Education and Research BMBF included the planned observatory for cosmic gamma rays CTA as one of three large-scale projects into its roadmap for large-scale research infrastructures. “This clears the way to define the open questions concerning contents and funding,” research minister Professor Johanna Wanka pointed out in a letter to Professor Christian Stegmann, head of the DESY institute in Zeuthen, and to Professor Werner Hoffmann, director at the Heidelberg Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics.

Scientists Measure X-ray Laser's Heartbeat

Many fundamental processes in nature, including certain chemical and biological reactions, occur on very small timescales. Researchers have been dreaming of the opportunity to film these fast processes in real time and to understand their underlying principles. X-ray free-electron lasers (FEL), with their intense light bundled into femtosecond pulses, hold promise for enabling breakthroughs in the ultrafast sciences. One femtosecond is one-thousandth of a trillionth of a second, or 0.000 000 000 000 001 seconds. Using DESY's pioneering FEL FLASH, a German-Polish research team has developed a novel pulse duration monitor, which allows the measurement of FEL pulses while simultaneously performing ultrafast experiments. The scientists reported their method in the journal "Nature Communications".

Special technique at PETRA III propels memory technology

Scientists have developed an in-operando Hard X-Ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (HAXPES) at PETRA III as key diagnostics for transferring basic materials research insights to redox-based resistive switching memory (ReRAM) prototyping development in the field of wireless sensor network applications.

Liquid on liquid goes solid

Not all liquids are mixable. An international team of researchers have investigated chemical processes with atomic resolution at the interface between two such liquids and have made an exciting discovery. During an experiment carried out at DESY, they observed the formation of an ordered crystal of exactly five atomic layers between the two liquids, which acts as a foundation for growing even bigger crystals. The experiment was performed in cooperation with scientists from Kiel University (CAU), Israel, the USA, and DESY. The results have just been published in the renowned scientific journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. They may result in new semiconductor and nano-particle production processes.

Caught in the cold

Modern X-ray light sources like PETRA III allow scientists to determine atomic structures of very large protein molecules or even whole viruses. However, the intense X-ray radiation also causes damage to biological and organic samples within a short period of time. In fact, the lifetime of samples irradiated with X-ray beams can be substantially extended by cooling them down to low temperatures, typically minus 196 degrees. For X-ray structure determination crystalline samples are required. So far, cryocooling these crystals, such as crystallised viruses, wasn’t always possible. An international team including DESY scientists now succeeded in cryocooling very large molecular complexes to minus 196 degrees with the technique high-pressure-freezing, thus extending their lifetime in the X-ray beam.

Astroparticle physics award for DESY scientist Rolf Bühler

DESY scientist Dr. Rolf Bühler receives this year’s Shakti P. Duggal Award for astroparticle physics. Every two years, this prestigious prize is presented to young scientists not older than 36 years for outstanding contributions in the field of cosmic ray and astroparticle physics research. Bühler is honoured for a series of ingenious works based on data from cosmic gamma-ray observatories.

How to freeze-frame electrons with X-rays

Electrons are the glue that keeps atoms together in matter, and their motion plays a key role in the function and transformation of materials. During complex chemical and biological reactions, electrons undergo ultrafast rearrangements, determining the later properties of the generated substance or material. One of the key characteristics of the new X-ray lasers like FLASH or European XFEL is to trace these ultrafast electronic rearrangements in detail, in order to understand and eventually change the behaviour of the reacting partners, to develop new functional materials. For ordinary synchrotron light sources, this motion of electrons has always been too fast for taking an image. But with the intense and ultra short light pulses of X-ray lasers, these facilities should be able to freeze-frame the electronic motion during a chemical reaction, even if the sample consists only of a handful of molecules.

New success in Higgs search

There is more and more evidence: today, at the Moriond Conference in La Thuile (Italy), scientists of both LHC experiments CMS and ATLAS announced that the particle discovered last year at the world’s largest particle accelerator is looking more and more like a Higgs particle. Analyses of both collaborations show that the particle very probably has no spin, as it is postulated for the Higgs particle. Whether this is the Higgs boson of the Standard Model of particle physics or possibly one of several Higgs particles predicted in other theories, physicists cannot yet determine. Additional intensive analyses are necessary to find the answer.

Best stopwatch for X-ray Lasers

With X-ray lasers like DESY's FLASH or the LCLS at the US National Accelerator Laboratory SLAC, timing is everything. Their pulses are designed to explore atomic-scale processes that are measured in femtoseconds, or quadrillionths of a second. Determining the instant in time at which the laser strikes a sample, either by itself or in concert with another laser pulse, can be vital to the success of an experiment.

Measles Virus Manipulates Immune Receptor

Researchers from Ludwig-Maximilians-University and the Center for Integrated Protein Sciences in Munich, Germany, have uncovered how paramyxoviruses, such as the measles virus, attempt to evade an organism’s inborn immune system. Receptor molecules, an important part of the immune system, are able to sense a broad range of viruses. Paramyxoviruses, in turn, produce what is known as V protein, which binds to the immune receptor MDA5 and limit the cell’s immune response. “Our work provides detailed insights into the mechanisms how viral proteins can inhibit host protein functions,” says Professor Karl-Peter Hopfner in a news release by Ludwig-Maximilians-University. “It may also open up opportunities for new therapeutic interventions.”

Further funding of “Netzwerk Teilchenwelt”

The particle world network “Netzwerk Teilchenwelt”, a successful collaboration of 24 German research institutes and CERN in Geneva will be funded for three additional years by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research. As from now, this network gives young people the opportunity at project days to evaluate original data from CERN, including true Higgs particle candidates. In this new funding period, the interested youths will also use the detectors developed by the network to measure cosmic particles to collect their own data. Thus, DESY in Zeuthen will continue the management and scientific coordination of the network’s cosmic project, with additional support of the Helmholtz Alliance for Astroparticle Physics.

Proof: Cosmic Rays Are Accelerated in Exploding Stars

A new study confirms what scientists have long suspected: Most cosmic rays – energetic particles that impact on Earth from all directions – are born in the violent aftermath of supernovas, exploding stars throughout the galaxy. A research team led by scientists at the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology at the U.S. SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory sifted through four years of data from NASA’s "Fermi" Gamma-ray Space Telescope to find the first unambiguous evidence of how cosmic rays are born.

Regional winners of German youth science competition „Jugend forscht“ selected at DESY

Robot assistants, noise in classrooms and phosphate in the Elbe river – mid of February, nearly 100 pupils presented their research projects to the jury at the regional youth science and experiments competition taking place at the DESY school lab in Hamburg. The result was really impressive: 34 contributions were awarded and 12 qualified for the next competition round.

Poland’s Science Minister visits European XFEL and DESY

On Thursday, 14 February Poland’s Minister of Science and Higher Education, Professor Barbara Kudrycka, visited the construction site of Europe’s new X-ray laser European XFEL and the research centre DESY. Poland is one of the eight shareholders of the European XFEL and contributes, among other things, a test facility for more than 800 superconducting cavities to the construction of the X-ray laser. Together with Professor Massimo Altarelli, Managing Director of European XFEL, and Professor Helmut Dosch, Chairman of the DESY Board of Directors, Kudrycka officially commissioned the test facility on the DESY campus.

Life under Pressure

OLYMPUS successfully concludes data taking

The nuclear physics experiment OLYMPUS at the DORIS accelerator successfully concluded its second data taking phase. In a two-month period until well into January, the scientists were able to collect four inverse femtobarns of electron-proton and positron-proton collisions. After definitely shutting down DORIS operation in January, the scientists used the detector for one month to take cosmic tracks to exactly determine the alignment of the detector components.

Attendant Record at DESY Photon Science and European XFEL Users‘ Meeting

This year’s users’ meeting of DESY photon science and the European X-ray free-electron laser European XFEL set up a new participant record. Roughly 800 attendants came together with other users, students and scientists from 23 to 25 January to get the latest news about the advances in the construction of the European XFEL and the newest developments at DESY’s light sources FLASH and PETRA III.

DESY‘s Administrative Council reappointed directors in office

DESY’s Administrative Council has extended the term of office of Professor Helmut Dosch, chair of the DESY Board of Directors, for another five years until the end of February 2018. The council also made the unanimous decision to confirm in office as of 2014 the DESY high-energy and astroparticle physics, and photon science research directors Professor Joachim Mnich and Professor Edgar Weckert for another five years. “We are glad that we were able to win Professor Dosch for another five years as chair of the DESY Board of Directors. At the same time, the reappointment of the research directors Professor Joachim Mnich and Professor Edgar Weckert sets the decisive course for the future of DESY” emphasised Dr. Beatrix Vierkorn-Rudolph, chair of the Administrative Council and head of the subsection “Large Facilities and Basic Research, ESFRI Special Task” of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. DESY’s accelerator physics research director Professor Reinhard Brinkmann and DESY’s administration director Christian Scherf had previously been reappointed for another five years.

"Science" lists first protein structure from an X-ray laser among top ten achievements in 2012

ERC Synergy Grant for CFEL scientist Andrea Cavalleri

Prof. Andrea Cavalleri from the University of Hamburg and three scientists from Oxford, Geneva and Paris have been awarded one of the first eleven Synergy Grants conferred by the European Research Council (ERC) for their "Frontiers in Quantum Materials' Control (Q-MAC)" research cooperation. They will receive about ten million euros over the next five years for the research on ultra-high-temperature superconductors. Roughly 2.7 million euros will go to the group of Andrea Cavalleri in Hamburg. Cavalleri is director of the condensed matter division at the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL). CFEL is a joint venture of DESY, the Max Planck Society and the University of Hamburg.

LHC proton collisions end with record

For the time being, the LHC concluded its last round of proton-proton collisions with an intensity record. Last weekend, 2748 particle bunches circled the 27-kilometre long particle accelerator in opposite directions, twice as many as before. At the beginning of 2013, the LHC will collide protons with lead ions for two months before going into a conversion phase of about two years to develop its full capacity.

New Helmholtz-Russia Joint Research Group at PITZ approved

Best injectors for modern X-ray sources: recently approved by the Helmholtz Association, the Helmholtz-Russia Joint Research Group headed by Mikhail Krasilnikov from DESY and Efim Khazanov from Institute for Applied Physics in Nizhny Novgorodand will optimise the generation of high charge electron bunches at PITZ (Photo Injector Test facility in Zeuthen), with the aim to further improve the properties of free-electron lasers. The Helmholtz Association will fund the group over a period of three years with a total of 390 000 euros, another 3.6 million rouble coming from Russia. The German-Russian research cooperation continues a long-term project funded by the German ministry of research in 2010, with the intention to develop the ideal electron sources for the research light sources of the future at DESY.

DESY X-ray source PETRA III uncovers how liquid crystals flow

From blood vessels to cement mixers – information about how substances flow is key knowledge for a wide variety of systems. The viscosity and elasticity of fluids are routinely investigated in food, cosmetics, oil and other industries. However,companies usually measure these properties with little understanding of what is going on inside the sample. Scientists from Forschungszentrum Jülich, Utrecht University, and Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY) have now chosen a novel approach to flow studies. With a unique setup at DESY’s PETRA III light source, the researchers monitored changes of the viscoelastic properties of liquid crystals under stress while, at the same time, followed the inner structure of the sample.

DESY and European XFEL scientists win Innovation Award

Gianluca Geloni, Vitali Kocharyan, and Evgeni Saldin will be awarded the Innovation Award on Synchrotron Radiation by the Association of Friends of Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin. Together with Paul Emma from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the physicists from DESY and European XFEL will receive the prize for their invention of a self-seeding option that significantly improves X-ray free-electron lasers.

DESY school labs participate in first nationwide Helmholtz Day

On Tuesday, the 25 school labs of the Helmholtz Association organised the first nationwide Helmholtz Day, a new type of event dedicated to Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-1894). The namesake of the Helmholtz Association was one of the last prominent polymaths; however, Helmholtz’s in many cases pioneering findings are often not associated with him.

DPG awards Max Born Prize to Max Klein

The German Physical Society (DPG) awards the Max Born Prize to Professor Max Klein for his fundamental experimental contributions to reveal the structure of the proton through deep inelastic scattering.

DPG awards Hertha Sponer Prize to DESY physicist Kerstin Tackmann

For her outstanding work on the road to the Higgs particle detection, the German Physical Society (DPG) awards the Hertha Sponer Prize to DESY physicist Dr. Kerstin Tackmann. The DPG jury selected the 34-year-old leading scientist for her decisive contributions to the detection of a new particle at the Large Hadron collider (LHC), a promising candidate for the long sought Higgs boson. The award will be presented in March 2013 at the DPG annual meeting in Dresden.

DESYs X-ray laser FLASH observes molecular explosion

Using DESY’s X-ray laser FLASH, a team of scientists from Hamburg has traced the ultrafast explosion of iodine molecules. The group headed by Markus Drescher from the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL) used the X-ray laser as a kind of high-speed camera –the observed molecular explosion took place within a millionth of a billionth of a second (i.e. within femtoseconds). The scientists presented their measurements in the scientific journal "Physical Review A". “Thanks to the ultra-short X-ray pulses of FLASH we are able to trace the time sequence in detail without disturbing the process,”said first author Maria Krikunova, who currently works at Technische Universität Berlin.

PIER Helmholtz Graduate School awards first scholarships

The first round of scholarship awards within the new PIER Helmholtz Graduate School is completed. Seven outstanding candidates can look forward to a three-year funding of their doctorate. Hong-Guang Duan, Nele Müller, Özgür Mehmet Sahin, Matthias Schlaffer and Clemens Wieck were awarded a Joachim Herz grant, Alena Wiegandt and Cornelius Gati are supported by a Helmholtz grant. The scholarship holders will conduct their Ph.D. in one of four PIER research fields.

Kenneth Beyerlein Receives EPDIC Young Scientist Award

The European Powder Diffraction Conference (EPDIC) honored DESY scientist Dr. Kenneth Beyerlein with the 2012 Young Scientist Award in Grenoble, France, this Wednesday. Beyerlein, a postdoctoral scientist in the group of Prof. Henry Chapman at the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL), received the highly competitive and prestigious award in recognition of his outstanding graduate research work on modeling and interpreting powder diffraction patterns from nanoparticles.

Presentation of PhD thesis award 2012

The PhD thesis award 2012 of the Association of the Friends and Sponsors of DESY is shared by Katarzyna Anna Rejzner and Arik Willner.

X-rays reveal surprising behaviour of superconductors

Ceramic superconductors don’t behave as expected, as a detailed X-ray analysis at the DESY X-ray source DORIS shows. An international research team observed unexpected structural distortions in the material at very low temperatures. These distortions, known as charge density waves, have a big influence on superconductivity, i.e. the lossless transport of electric current. The scientists led by Johan Chang of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne and the Paul Scherrer Institute present their results in the current issue of the journal “Nature Physics”. The analysis contributes to a better understanding of high-temperature superconductors, whose inner workings are in many aspects still mysterious more than 25 years after their discovery.

Scientists put stability of natural rubber to the test

Researchers from the Leibniz-Institut für Polymerforschung Dresden, Technische Universität Dresden, and DESY have used the PETRA III light source to study structural changes in natural rubber upon stretching. The scientists have followed these changes with an unprecedented time resolution of seven milliseconds, corresponding to over 140 static images per second. Considering that a large portion of the world’s natural rubber production goes into the manufacturing of automobile tires, which have to withstand large amounts of strain, the new research findings promise to be of interest for the global tire industry. The study has recently been published in the journal “Macromolecules” (DOI: 10.1021/ma3011476).

New CFEL Building Comes to Life

Deep X-ray gaze reveals: superconductors are more complex than expected

Ceramic superconductors are more complex than expected. This was shown by the investigation of so-called lanthanum cuprates with the X-ray sources DORIS III in Hamburg and BESSY II at Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin HZB. The electrical structures which form in this material may be quite different near the surface than in the bulk. This information is important to understand the complex processes in these materials, helping to build new superconductors with tailor-made properties. However, it may requires to add a series of investigations, as the international team of HZB scientist Christian Schüßler-Langeheine report in the scientific journal "Nature Communications".

DESY extends cooperation with Thailand

Germany’s largest accelerator centre strengthens cooperation with scientists in Thailand, with the aim to extend the exchange of knowledge, experience, equipment, and employees and students. In the presence of HRH Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, DESY Director Prof. Helmut Dosch and representatives of the Thai Synchrotron Light Research Institute SLRI, the Thailand Center of Excellence in Physics and the Thai National Science and Technology Development Agency signed a corresponding Memorandum of Understanding.

DESY extends X-ray laser FLASH – Start of construction work for FLASH II main tunnel

DESY’s X-ray laser FLASH doubles its research capacities: only recently, construction of the FLASH II extension has started with the main tunnel section. Next year, in this 110-metre-long tunnel, the technical system for a second X-ray laser beam will be installed to serve a second experimental hall. The first ground breaking is planned to take place already this year.

Consular Corps of Hamburg visits DESY

Today, the Consular Corps of Hamburg and Hamburg’s First Mayor Olaf Scholz (SPD) jointly paid a visit to DESY. About 60 consuls went on a campus tour which included DESY’s "Brilliant Ring" PETRA III - the accelerator ring is the most brilliant synchrotron radiation source in the world. Its intense X-ray light offers unique insights into the world of atoms and molecules. Scientists use it to decode the molecular structure of pathogens, investigate new catalytic materials and run chemical analyses.

Scientists from DESY and European XFEL develop method for dramatic improvement of X-ray lasers

X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) are new, large-scale research facilities that open up completely new insights in the nanoworld. With X-ray flashes of unprecedented brightness and shortness, the XFELs allow direct observation of single molecules, atoms, and even chemical reactions. Several of these new facilities have either just started operation or are currently under construction in the US, Japan, Germany, Switzerland, and Korea. In 2010, researchers from Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY) and European XFEL, both in Hamburg, had devised a way to dramatically improve the already remarkable features of these large machines by placing a special crystal into the path of the radiation. Now their colleagues from Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in the US and the Technological Institute for Superhard and Novel Carbon Materials in Troitsk, Russia, implemented the setting proposed by their colleagues in Germany and confirmed the predicted outcome. The results are now published in Nature Photonics (doi:10.1038/nphoton.2012.180).

About 100 summer students are gathering practical experience in research at DESY

They come from 33 nations: About 100 summer students are currently visiting DESY in Hamburg and Zeuthen to gather practical experience in different fields of research. For seven weeks they will be working with DESY scientists in different projects in the fields of photon science, accelerator, particle and astroparticle physics. A series of around 40 lectures complements the lab work and aims to impart physics basics as well as special aspects important for DESY research. Equally important are the cultural and scholarly exchange.

Particle Physicists Study Mystery of Hadronization

All ordinary matter, including ourselves, is built from only three particles: protons, neutrons, and electrons. In atoms, protons and neutrons assemble into the nucleus, which is surrounded by a cloud of electrons. In contrast to electrons, which are elementary particles and cannot be split into smaller particles, protons and neutrons are composite particles of elementary quarks. Individual quarks, however, are never observed alone and are doomed to be confined to composite particles, so-called hadrons. A recent study by the international HERMES collaboration has shed light on the process of hadron formation from quarks. The work has been published in The European Physical Journal and is featured in the latest DESY Particle Physics Annual Report.

How to shoot ultrafast electrons

X-rays are used to probe the atomic-level structure of complex molecules, and methods for that tasks have been developed to more and more perfection, for instance at light sources like the PETRA III storage ring at DESY. But the images generated to date have been static: pictures resolve situations in real-space, but not real-time. Free-electron lasers, a new generation of X-ray sources providing unprecedented intensity in very short light pulses, promise to solve the problem in near future, opening up whole new world of exploring matter in action. One goal of the emerging field of time-resolved imaging (TRI) is to visualize electrons as they move in atoms, complex molecules  or polyatomic systems, such as occurs for instance during bond formation and breakage. But how does an ultrashort X-ray pulse interact with electrons in motion? How do we interpret a scattering picture of a dynamic system?

New Virtual Institute for Plasma Acceleration

The Helmholtz Association will fund a new Virtual Institute at DESY which will advance a novel accelerator technology. Plasma wakefields have the potential toaccelerate particles over very short distances, thus offering a promising technology for future accelerator applications. The newly established Virtual Institute “Plasma wakefield acceleration of highly relativistic electrons with FLASH” will do basic research to explore the possibilities of using the extremely high electric fields created in a plasma to reliably accelerate high-energy electrons. The Helmholtz Association will fund the institute for a period of five years.

Sod cutting ceremony for future gamma-ray telescope

Construction of a telescope prototype for the planned Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) gamma-ray observatory started with a sod cutting ceremony in Berlin this week. At the research campus in Berlin Adlershof, a full-size mechanical prototype will be built in the coming months for the medium-sized of the three different planned CTA telescope types. “This is an important step for extending the astroparticle physics activities at DESY,” emphasised Professor Helmut Dosch, Chairman of the DESY Board of Directors.

Helmholtz funds commercialisation of a new industry standard of electronic systems

Modern accelerators are extremely complex machines; monitoring requires an extremely precise and fast technology which is able to process in parallel a large number of data sets. To solve this problem, in the past years DESY developed a new generation of control electronics for the free-electron lasers FLASH and European XFEL. After introducing this so-called low level RF system based on the new electronic standard MTCA.4, this standard created under the leadership of DESY proved to be very multifunctional. Funded by the Helmholtz Validation Funds,it is now prepared for commercialization and application in industrial enterprises and other large-scale research projects. The costs of about 4 million euros for this project are financed by the Helmholtz Association, DESY and partners from industry.

DESY’s X-ray laser FLASH observes quantum race of electrons

At DESY’s free-electron laser FLASH, scientists observed the quantum mechanical race of two electrons for the first time. The measurements which were published today in the research journal “Physical Review Letters” will improve the study of the properties of atoms and molecules. They will also increase the quality of so-called free-electron lasers as FLASH, which are new tools for many fields of science, from physics to biology.

Extra boost for physics in Hamburg

Physics in Hamburg achieved a major success in the excellence initiative of the federal and state governments: as from November 2012, funds will be granted to the “Hamburg Centre for Ultrafast Imaging“ (CUI), a new physics and chemistry research cluster which will study the movements of atoms in real-time. The University of Hamburg submitted this project proposal which was developed in cooperation with DESY, CFEL and the European XFEL GmbH. In July, the German Research Foundation (DFG) will publish the exact amount of funding.

DESY X-ray light reveals ozone killer from volcanic eruptions

Volcanic eruptions can cause large holes in the ozone layer. This is the conclusion from a study of Nicaraguan volcanic minerals by a team of Helmholtz scientists from Kiel and Hamburg. Using a new X-ray technology at DESY in Hamburg, the scientists were able to estimate the amount of bromine in volcanic gases.

Establishment of European free-electron laser collaboration

Today, ten European research centres, including DESY and the European XFEL, agreed on a long-term close collaboration in the field of free-electron lasers and accelerator-based short-pulse sources. With combined efforts, the technologies and methods will be further developed and implemented for operation and use of these novel research facilities, thus creating a unique top level research infrastructure for science in Europe, offering optimal experimental conditions for a wide range of applications. Today, in the margins of the ERF workshop “Socio-economic Relevance of Research Infrastructures”, this collaboration agreement was signed at DESY by representatives of all institutes.

Research facilities collaborate on data management and analysis

European XFEL, DESY, Forschungszentrum Jülich and the Kurchatov Institute in Moscow will cooperate to develop IT solutions for large scientific facilities. A memorandum of understanding (MoU) on collaboration to find new data management and data analysis solutions was signed on 22 May in Berlin during the closing event of the German–Russian Year of Education, Science, and Innovation 2011–2012. On 19 July 2011, the German and Russian ministries of research agreed on collaboration in the field of large-scale data management in high-performance computing.

New Helmholtz platform for detector technologies

The Helmholtz Association builds a new platform for the further development of detector technologies and detector systems. Nine Helmholtz institutes, together with DESY, are participating in this project, which also includes the bundling of competences of eleven universities and seven research institutes from Germany and abroad. As a portfolio theme, the Helmholtz Association funds the detector initiative with 13 million euros from 2012 to 2016.

20 000th visitor at the DESY school lab in Zeuthen

Today, the 20 000^th pupil was welcomed to an experiment day at the vacuum lab of the Zeuthen hands-on school lab physik.begreifen. To celebrate this, all classmates of the Friedrich Schiller Gymnasium who also came to DESY on this day received a small souvenir. As from the opening of the school lab in 2004, DESY closely cooperates with the schools in the region, and the Friedrich Schiller Gymnasium is one of the first DESY partner schools in Brandenburg.

DESY at the traditional Hamburg Port Anniversary! – Research down to earth

Out of the ivory tower and into the harbour mile: at this year’s 823th Hamburg Harbour Birthday, DESY presents itself and its research in a way that is easily understood by everybody.

First seeding at FLASH

There is a worldwide search of methods for initiating the process of producing laser light in free-electron lasers (FEL) with a well-defined radiation pulse, generated by an external laser source and superimposed to the electron bunch at the undulator entrance ("seeding"). Seeding promises an FEL pulse which is more stable and better reproducible in both pulse duration and frequency spectrum. Moreover, the obtained time resolution of pump-probe experiments is improved when the seeding laser simultaneously initiates a dynamic process in the investigated sample.

Helmholtz Association funds PIER Graduate School

The Helmholtz Association will fund the PIER Graduate School with a total of 2.4 million euros in the coming six years. This was announced today by the Helmholtz Association in Berlin. The PIER Graduate School offers an excellent training for doctoral students in a unique environment, thus attracting young talents from all over the world to come to Hamburg. It is part of PIER (Partnership for Innovation, Education and Research), the new cooperation of University of Hamburg and DESY, acting in four groundbreaking research fields: particle and astroparticle physics, nanosciences, photon science, and infection and structural biology.

Opening of German-South African Year of Science

Last week, Germany’s Minister of Education and Research Annette Schavan and South Africa’s Minister of Science and Technology Naledi Pandor opened the German-South African Year of Science 2012/2013 in Cape Town, South Africa. The topic of the month and one of the seven central themes is astronomy. The official opening in South Africa was also attended by DESY scientist Christian Spiering, chairman of the Committee for Astroparticle Physics (KAT) in Germany. In an exhibition and a talk, he presented the German-South African cooperation in astroparticle physics and the future project CTA (Cherenkov Telescope Array), for which the South African region also bids to host this project.

DESY cooperates with CAN

The research centre DESY became a member of the nanotechnology sponsors’ association which is the holder of theCenter for Applied Nanotechnology (CAN). CAN is a Hamburg based nanotechnology enterprise providing nanotechnology products applicable for example in medicine and food industry, and tailor-made nanotechnology research.

European particle physics bundles detector development

Hamburg and Dresden accelerator physicists cooperate

DESY and KEK intensify cooperation

DESY and the Japanese accelerator centre KEK want to intensify their long-standing cooperation. The directors of both centres see an enormous potential in the field of materials science and other applications of synchrotron radiation as well as in particle physics and accelerator technology.  This was made evident at the first joint workshop of both institutes, which covered the complete range of DESY and KEK research fields.

Snapshots of Firework in Nanoparticles: Beyond Conventional Ultrafast Spectroscopy

A Holy Grail of ultrafast science and technology is to image the changing structure of matter at the nanoscale during the interaction with light. An international collaboration including DESY photon scientists led by Thomas Möller of the Technical University Berlin and Christoph Bostedt of SLAC at Stanford (formerly Technical University Berlin) used intense laser pulses delivered by the FLASH free-electron laser for X-ray scattering from nanoparticles. The goal was to look into ultrafast electronic processes during the nanoplasma formation where conventional spectroscopy techniques are inherently blind. These experiments open up new routes for the investigation of transient electronic configurations of highly excited states of matter such as the interior of stars which can now be created in the laboratory. The scientists reported on their results in this week's issue of Physical Review Letters, 03 March 2012, and the key figure of the work was also considered as the journal cover image.

Accelerator tunnel for the European XFEL completed

Construction of the more than 2 kilometre long accelerator tunnel of the European XFEL facility has been completed. At the end of February, the construction company ARGE Tunnel XFEL officially handed over the tunnel to Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY). Currently ARGE Tunnel XFEL is carrying out final work and removing construction equipment.

Scientists Target Major Bottleneck in Structural Biology

In terms of potential drug development, membrane proteins are of immense pharmaceutical interest. Studying their structures is an imperative step for successful drug design. Unfortunately, membrane protein structure determination remains a major obstacle in structural biology. An international research team, including DESY scientists, took a large leap forward in this field by analyzing microcrystals of a membrane protein embedded in lipids with an X-ray free-electron laser (X-FEL). This emerging method has the potential of rapidly increasing the number of available membrane protein structures, thereby assisting future drug design. The study has recently been published in the journal “Nature Methods” (DOI: 10.1038/NMETH.1867).

Olaf Scholz visits DESY

On Wednesday, First Mayor of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg Olaf Scholz visited the research centre DESY. Olaf Scholz, who knows DESY well, informed himself about current plans and projects of Hamburg’s largest research centre.

Cooperation in theoretical particle physics

Since 2007,  DESY in Zeuthen and the RISC-Institute at Johannes-Kepler-University Linz (JKU) are working closely together in a cooperation for the development and use of computer algorithms. Until 2017, this cooperation will be prolonged and intensified. A corresponding agreement has been signed at JKU recently.

OLYMPUS starts research programme

In the past decades, the image of the proton has become ever more precise. Especially DESY's accelerator HERA has helped physicists to clearly understand the complexity of the particles they are currently smashing in the Large Hadron Collider LHC.

Promising New Material for Lithium Batteries

Reinhard Brinkmann confirmed in office for five more years

In the session on 14 December, the DESY Administrative Council appointed Dr. Reinhard Brinkmann for another five years as Director of the Accelerator Division. His second term begins on 1 July 2012.

DESY cooperates with Indian research centre

Today, in the Hamburg City Hall, an agreement was signed in the presence of Hamburg’s Science Senator and Second Mayor Dr. Dorothee Stapelfeldt that defines Indian participation at the X-ray sources PETRA III and FLASH. With this, the contracting partners DESY and Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics (SINP, India) concretise a general cooperation agreement which was concluded in May this year during the visit of Chancellor Angela Merkel to India. For five years, more than 3500 hours of measuring time at DESY research facilities will be made available to Indian scientists for joint research projects with DESY. India contributes with a total of 14 million euros to the construction of the PETRA III extension at DESY, the world’s most brilliant synchrotron radiation source.

Frank Tackmann establishes Emmy Noether research group at DESY

DESY theorist Frank Tackmann has been accepted to the Emmy Noether Programme of Germany’s research funding organization DFG. This programme allows outstanding young scientists to qualify for scientific leadership roles by managing their own junior research group. Frank Tackmann’s group is working on the topic of “Precision theory predictions for Higgs and new-physics measurements at the LHC”. The research will be funded for five years with a total of 940 000 Euros.

The search for the Higgs makes a significant step forward

Physicists at the world’s largest particle accelerator LHC made a significant step forward on the hunt for the sought-after Higgs particle. The teams of both large detectors – ATLAS and CMS – narrowed down further the last possible hideout of the hypothetical elementary particle. This is the result of a first evaluation of all observational data obtained in 2011, which both groups presented on Tuesday at a seminar at the European particle research centre CERN near Geneva, home of the LHC. To date, the scientists analysed about 400 billion particle collisions – over a hundred times more data than in the year before.

Humboldt Research Award for Vladimir Fateev

The Russian physicist Professor Vladimir Fateev (born in 1948) was honoured with a Humboldt Research Award, granted by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. Professor Fateev is an internationally renowned mathematical physicist, with non-perturbative quantum field theory as his main research field. For years, there are good contacts with the DESY theory group, based on numerous joint research interests. The Humboldt Research Award is valued at 60 000 Euros and offers Professor Fateev the possibility to stay at DESY for a period of up to one year.

Full steam ahead for SHIPS

At the Hamburg Observatory, the SHIPS experiment initiates a new era of astronomical observations – the search for hidden photons. These are a category of so far hardly explored elementary particles of possibly fundamental physical and astrophysical significance. The SHIPS experiment goes on the hunt for these mysterious particles which might be responsible for so far incomprehensible phenomena in the universe, and perhaps are a component of the ominous dark matter. For this purpose, a telescope will be used in which light must not penetrate.

Perfect layer for the right spin

Ever faster and ever more efficient: the next generation of electronics is spintronics. It uses not only the electrical charge of electrons but also their spin. Now, at the world’s most brilliant X-ray source PETRA III at DESY, a group of scientists headed by Martina Müller from Forschungszentrum Jülich explored a promising material for spintronics: europium oxide, which is excellent to produce and readout electron currents with a defined spin in a silicon semiconductor. The scientists’ report appeared in the cover story of the journal "PSS Rapid Research Letters".

Japanese ILC-delegation explores European labs

Two Japanese regions are possible candidates for the home of the next big accellerator, the International Linear Collider (ILC). A delegation from one of the regions, the prefectures Fukuoka and Saga on the Japanese island Kyushu, now visited two European labs, DESY and CERN, to learn about existing research infrastructures and the labs' experiences with management, administration, local communication and a whole lot more.

Prestigious research grant for nanoscience at PETRA III

For his investigations on nanoparticle growth at DESY’s X-ray source PETRA III, Professor Stephan Förster from Bayreuth University is honoured with the highest science award of the European Research Council (ERC). The so-called ERC Advanced Grant is endowed with 2.4 million euros and is presented for particularly promising research projects.

DESY recalls its founding father

The foundation of DESY in 1959 was above all realised thanks to the vision, charisma, persistence and negotiating skills of this man: Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Willibald Jentschke. Today, the physicist whose appointment to the University of Hamburg brought about the research centre DESY, would have turned 100 years.

BioStruct-X - A New Structural Biology Platform

High-profile structural biology research has just become more accessible. BioStruct-X, a new EU-funded project, will be holding its kick-off meeting at DESY’s worldwide unique free electron laser FLASH today and tomorrow. Managed by the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) Hamburg branch, and including partners such as DESY and the European X-ray Free Electron Laser European XFEL, BioStruct-X creates a multi-national research platform for established and emerging techniques in structural biology and provides researchers with access to eleven large-scale facilities across Europe.

DESY engages in Belle II

On 18 November, the laying of the foundation stone for the SuperKEKB accelerator took place at the Japanese accelerator laboratory KEK in Tsukuba. This accelerator with the corresponding particle detector Belle II will become a so-called Super-B-factory. Seven German universities, the Max Planck Institute in Munich and DESY will jointly build the pixel vertex detector for this ambitious experiment. The DEPFET technology, originally designed for the ILC, will be used for this purpose for the first time. On occasion of the foundation stone laying ceremony, there was an agreement with KEK on the participation of the German research institutes in the construction of Belle II, including future data taking and data evaluation.

First Electrons light up at REGAE

One of DESY’s smallest scientific accelerators reached an important milestone: last week, REGAE (Relativistic Electron Gun for Atomic Exploration) accelerated its first electrons, thus starting operation officially.

The Higgs particle is running out of places to hide

Scientists working at the world’s largest particle accelerator LHC near Geneva have presented the so far most extensive search for the Higgs particle, the last missing piece of the Standard Model of particle physics. It is the first combined analysis of data from the large detectors ATLAS and CMS. The LHC is well underway to solve the Higgs enigma by the end of next year, the physicists told the Hadron Collider Physics Symposium in Paris on Friday. The new analysis of up to 160000 billion proton collisions rules out any Standard Model Higgs particle in the energy range between 145 and 470 Giga electron volts (GeV).

New Helmholtz-Russia research group on the hunt for cosmic radiation

With innovative technologies, a German-Russian research group is in Siberia on the hunt for high enery cosmic gamma rays as well as for so-called cosmic rays. The latter are forming a continuous shower of high-energy atomic nuclei from outer space, its origin still being mysterious to a large extent, even a hundred years after its discovery. This coming project is funded within the framework of the Helmholtz-Russia Joint Research Groups (HRJRG), with an annual sum of about 150 000 euros for a period of three years.

CAU and DESY sign cooperation agreement

Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel (CAU) and DESY in Hamburg will cooperate more closely in the future. On Friday, 11 November, a cooperation agreement was signed in Hamburg on behalf of the University of Kiel (CAU) by President Professor Gerhard Fouquet and Professor Lutz Kipp, Dean of the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, and on behalf of DESY by Professor Helmut Dosch, Chairman of the DESY Board of Directors, and Edgar Weckert, Director in charge of Photon Science. The agreement provides that biology, chemistry, electrical engineering, materials science, theory and physics working groups of Kiel University focussing on nanoscience and surface research will actively participate in the development and use of the excellent synchrotron radiation sources at DESY in Hamburg. The cooperation between the University of Kiel and the Helmholtz research centre includes the establishment of two working groups with jointly appointed professors. This strengthens the close cooperation, already existing since the 1970s, of both research locations.

Award for outstanding PhD theses

Two outstanding PhD theses were honoured with the PhD thesis award 2011 of the Association of the Friends and Sponsors of DESY on Wednesday. The prize was shared by Dr. Martin Beye and Dr. Roman Kogler. Martin Beye earned his doctoral degree at the free-electron laser FLASH, Roman Kogler in the H1 Collaboration at HERA.

Open Day and Science Night: more than 13 000 visitors satisfied their curiosity at DESY

Science Festival at Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY: until midnight, thousands of curious people flocked to the DESY campus in Hamburg Bahrenfeld. The DESY Open Day and Science Night census counted a total of 13621 visitors. Thus, two out of three participants of the 4^th Hamburg Science Night also came to DESY. “I am glad that so many people took the opportunity to see and get informed about our research and even tried out for themselves some of the experiments,”  said Helmut Dosch, Chairman of the DESY Board of Directors. “This is a great success for DESY.”

Colder than space – first helium transfer line modules from Poland arrive at DESY

Many modern particle accelerators run at temperatures close to absolute zero. The accelerator of the European XFEL X-ray laser for example needs to be cooled down to minus 271 centigrade for revving up electrons to the speeds and energies needed. But before assembly, the main accelerator elements have to be tested at operating temperature. For these tests tons of cold helium will flow between the new DESY Accelerator Module Test Facility (AMTF) and the cryogenic plant. Liquid helium will make the test vessels some of the coldest spots in the solar system – 2 degrees colder than outer space! The first modules of the helium transfer line have just arrived at DESY from Wroclaw in Poland. Along with the test vessels (cryostats) and the actual testing, due to start next year, they belong to the in-kind contribution of Poland to the European XFEL.

Start of European project CRISP – Joint venture for tomorrow’s research

The development of accelerators, experiments and IT becomes more and more expensive and complex. Within the framework of the European project CRISP, 16 European physics research centres interlink for the first time to collaborate on central technical issues for their future research infrastructures to profit from each other. DESY has taken over the leadership in the accelerator sector with its work for free-electron lasers. This week the Cluster for Research Infrastructure Synergies in Physics (CRISP) was launched at the Czech embassy in Paris.

Federal Cross of Merit for Ulrich Gensch

Yesterday, Dr. Ulrich Gensch was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit First Class of the Federal Republic of Germany. Ulrich Gensch who went into retirement on 1 June, was Representative of the DESY Directorate in Zeuthen for 13 years and before this period he worked in Hamburg for three years as director of a DESY department. He now received the Federal Cross of Merit for his outstanding contributions for the science and industry location Germany.

Coherence matters

Free-electron lasers open a fascinating new insight into the structure, ultra fast dynamics and function of matter. With their ultra-short X-ray pulses of only a few femtoseconds and their unprecedented brightness, scientists will be able to make movies at the nano scale, thus getting a clue how friction, catalysis, photosynthesis or other processes of nature work at their fundamental level.

Two new Helmholtz Young Investigators Groups at DESY

Today, the Helmholtz Association announced its support for a new series of Young Investigators Groups. Again, DESY will take part in this programme with two young scientists.

Dieter Haidt wins Enrico Fermi Prize

The Italian Physical Society awarded DESY physicist Dieter Haidt with the Enrico Fermi Prize 2011. Haidt and Antonino Pullia from the University of Milano share the renowned research prize for their contributions to the discovery of weak neutral currents in the Gargamelle neutrino experiment at CERN.

On your mark, get the diggers set, go!

For years, the free-electron laser (FEL) FLASH has been generating X-ray laser light for an ever increasing user community. This week, construction started for the next expansion stage FLASH II, with the aim to serve more users and at the same time apply the most recent developments of FEL technology.

Light flashes keep electrons in check

An international team of scientists in cooperation with CFEL has taken a major step closer towards the possibility to control electron movements in atoms. For the first time, they generated white laser pulses that are shorter than a complete light oscillation and precisely synthesised their electromagnetic fields. These new tools hold promise for an extensive control of the motion of electrons in the microcosm. Possible future applications might be nanoscopic electronic circuits which by far exceed the switching speed of modern electronics. The scientists reported on their results in the scientific magazine Science (Science Express, 08 September 2011).

Christian Stegmann new head of DESY in Zeuthen

Today, Professor Dr. Christian Stegmann was introduced as new head of DESY in Zeuthen. He will assume office as of 1 October and represent the Zeuthen institute in the DESY Directorate. Stegmann follows the nomination of both, the University of Potsdam and DESY.

Molecular Tricks of the Motile Malaria Pathogen

It infects men and mosquitoes, changes its form multiple times, and moves very elegantly and rapidly through the body of its host: Plasmodium falciparum, the causative agent of malaria, shows an astonishing versatility and motility. An international team of researchers has now investigated the molecular basis behind this behaviour. They discovered that the pathogen is able to regulate its cytoskeleton very flexibly in an unusual way – with biochemical tools that, to this extent, are not known in unicellular organisms. The results have now been published in the current issue of the scientific magazine "Journal of Biological Chemistry". The work was done in a German-Finnish-Swedish collaboration, led by the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (Helmholtz-Zentrum für Infektionsforschung, HZI), at the Centre for Structural Systems Biology (CSSB) at DESY in Hamburg.

Boring of European XFEL accelerator tunnel completed

The tunnel boring machine TULA reached its goal in the last week of July. A few days later, the tunnel builders installed the last concrete ring of the tunnel tube for the accelerator. What will happen next?

The first continuous wave and long-pulse operation of the XFEL-type cryomodule

Continuous wave (CW) and long-pulse (LP) operation modes of the XFEL superconducting linac are an attractive future option to enhance the experimental potential of this European facility, being currently under construction. On Wednesday 7 July 2011, a two-week test was finished in which the XFEL-type cryomodule, a building block of the XFEL linac, for the first time was operated successfully in both, CW and LP mode with accelerating gradients up to 5.5 MV/m and 11.5 MV/m, respectively.

Royal visit to DESY

On her two-day stay in Hamburg, Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn from Thailand took the opportunity to visit the Helmholtz research centre DESY. Her Royal Highness was welcomed by Professor Helmut Dosch, Chairman of the DESY Board of Directors. Following the discussions with the DESY directorate, research director Professor Edgar Weckert took Her Royal Highness to the large PETRA III experimental hall where she was informed about the new experimental stations.

Insight into the dynamics of the nano world

On 1 July, the Helmholtz Association starts funding new Virtual Institutes. DESY is represented in two of these institutions that promote the cooperation of university and non-university scientists in a common theme project.

Kick-off meeting of the Helmholtz Accelerator Initiative

Modern accelerator facilities represent a decisive technology for the future and are vital for the successful approach of the major challenges of our time, particularly in the fields of energy, medicine and information. Today and in the future, the development of cutting-edge accelerators is a driving force for the development of new high-technology fields.

Cooperation agreement signed in Delhi with the Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics

Earlier this week, Chancellor Angela Merkel travelled to India, accompanied by a German delegation. Part of the delegation were DESY directors Helmut Dosch and Christian Scherf. On Tuesday, in India’s capital Delhi, they signed a cooperation agreement between DESY and the Saha Instutite of Nuclear Physics (SINP, Kolkata), represented by its director Milan Sanyal. The agreement manifests the intention of the German and Indian partners to extend future cooperation between both countries in the field of large-scale research infrastructures.

Starting shot for “Ioffe Röntgen Institute”

On the evening of 23 May in Moscow, DESY directors Helmut Dosch and Edgar Weckert and the director of the Kurchatov Institute Mihail Kovalchuk signed a letter of intent for the foundation of the Ioffe Röntgen Institute. The planned institution will in the long run intensify the cooperation between German and Russian scientists.

DESY cooperates with SESAME

Today, the directors of the synchrotron radiation source SESAME (Synchrotron-light for Experimental Science and Applications in the Middle East) in Jordan and of DESY signed a scientific cooperation agreement. The agreement was concluded on occasion of the “Solar Energy for Science” conference, a two-day event giving scientists and industrial representatives the opportunity to discuss the possibilities of a science and energy partnership between Europe and the Southern Mediterranean countries. In the long run, a considerable amount of energy for Europe could be produced in solar thermal power plants of the MENA region (Middle East & North Africa).

Cooperation agreement concluded in Brasília

In the presence of Germany’s Federal President Christian Wulff and Brazil’s President Dilma Rousseff, the three directors of DESY, the European XFEL and the Brazilian synchrotron laboratory LNLS signed an agreement on future cooperation on 5 May in Brasília.

Humboldt Research Award for Richard Milner

Professor Richard Gerard Milner from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) was honoured with a Humboldt Research Award, granted by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.

Brazil’s Minister of Science visits DESY and European XFEL

Today, Brazil’s Minister of Science and Technology Aloízio Mercadante visited DESY and the European XFEL GmbH. He came on occasion of the conclusion of the “German-Brazilian Year of Science, Technology and Innovation” and was accompanied by the director of the Brazilian Synchrotron Light Laboratory (LNLS),José Roque da Silva.

German Physical Society awarded dissertation prize

The German Physical Society (DPG) awarded this year’s dissertation prize of the divisions gravitation and theory of relativity, hadronic and nuclear physics, and particle physics, to Dr. Sebastian Klein.

First accelerator module from Saclay arrived at AMTF

Last Thursday, the first European XFEL accelerator module, assembled at Saclay, was delivered at DESY and unloaded in the AMTF hall. In the “Accelerator Module Test Facility“, all cavities and accelerator modules of the later serial production will be tested under operating conditions before being installed into the European XFEL tunnel.

Gay-Lussac Humboldt Prize for Volker Schomerus

Professor Volker Schomerus, head of the DESY theory department was awarded the Gay-Lussac Humboldt Prize. 

Helmut Dosch receives Honorary Doctorate from the Kurchatov Institute

The chairman of the Board of Directors of DESY, Professor Helmut Dosch, received an honorary doctorate from the Kurchatov Institute on 25 November.

PhD thesis award of the Association of the Friends and Sponsors of DESY

The PhD thesis award 2010 of the Association of the Friends and Sponsors of DESY is distributed equally to Dr. Ulrike Frühling...

Henry Chapman is awarded the Bjørn H. Wiik Prize

On 15 November, Henry Chapman received the Bjørn H. Wiik Prize 2010. The 43-year-old physicist and Professor at the Centre for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL) at DESY...

PETRA III runs at full speed

Last week, PETRA III was running with a beam current of 100 milliamperes (mA) during user operation for the first time. With this, the brilliant synchrotron radiation source has reached the final stage of its design values. “The PETRA III positron beam now simultaneously reaches all of our sophisticated beam parameters of emittance, beam current and beam position stability,” explains Klaus Balewski from the DESY accelerator division.

DESY triumphant in international particle physics photo competition

An international jury and a public vote confirm: the best photographers of particle physics come from around Hamburg.

FLASH opens the view through the water window

The free-electron laser FLASH (Free-Electron Laser in Hamburg) has set a new record: this weekend, the FLASH accelerator team operated the FEL ...

European XFEL accelerator components go into production

An important milestone was reached on the way to the European XFEL superconducting linear accelerator: ...

TULA reaches first milestone

After less than two months, the tunnel boring machine TULA broke through the wall of its reception shaft.

Topping-out ceremony for CFEL

Vis-à-vis the PETRA III experimental hall, a very special new building celebrated its topping-out ceremony: the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (CFEL) ...

Dr. Hans Weise appointed to be leading scientist at DESY

DESY's Administrative Council agreed in its July session to give Hans Weise the status of 'Leading Scientist' in the accelerator division at DESY.

Faraday Cup 2010

Kirsten Hacker (DESY) and Florian Löhl (formerly DESY, now working at Cornell University) were awarded the Faraday Cup 2010 at the Beam Instrumentation Workshop BIW10. 

Record wavelength at FLASH – First lasing below 4.5 nanometres at DESY´s free-electron laser

For the first time, FLASH produced laser light with a wavelength of 4.45 nanometres; thus, DESY’s free-electron laser for soft X-ray light considerably beat its previous record of 6.5 nanometres.

Flat FLASH – The 3.9 GHz system acting on beam

One of the key components of the recent FLASH upgrade, the newly integrated 3.9 GHz rf system demonstrated for the first time its ability to flatten the energy distribution of the electrons in a bunch, the so called phase space linearization.

Strong partners for future research

At DESY, on the day of the research centre's official 50th-anniversay ceremony, the course was also set for the future:

Röntgen Medal for Helmut Dosch

The Chairman of the DESY Board of Directors, Professor Helmut Dosch, has been awarded the Röntgen Medal 2010 of the city of Remscheid.

Brandenburg Research Minister Martina Münch visits DESY

On Friday, 9 April, Dr. Martina Münch, Research Minister of Brandenburg, visited DESY in Zeuthen.

Watch the kestrels at DESY

A kestrels’ couple is breeding on the DESY campus. 

LHC lets the particles collide!

The physics programme of the Large Hadron Collider LHC, the world’s largest particle accelerator at CERN in Geneva, has started.

All birds use the same navigation system

How do birds find their way when they fly?

Tate Medal for Gustav-Adolf Voss

The American Institute of Physics (AIP) awarded the Tate Medal for International Leadership in Physics to Prof. Gustav-Adolf Voss.