Projects

Project 01: Splash!: laser breakup of a water droplet
Laser-droplet interactions play a key role in state-of-the-art nanolithography which makes use of extreme ultraviolet (EUV) light. This light is generated from tin droplets using high-energy... read more

Project 03: Three nanoscale thermometers in one
Nanoparticles of noble metals such as gold and silver, efficiently convert light energy into heat, thanks to plasmon resonances, light-driven oscillations of their free electrons. Such photo-thermal conversion...read more

Project 05: Recycling plastics with a pulsed laser
Plastics are an essential part of our lifestyle, yet the accumulation of plastic waste poses severe health and environmental concerns. Pyrolysis is a feasible thermochemical recycling method... read more

Project 07: Programming nanoscale chemistry with short flashes of light
Reactions on catalytic nanoparticle surfaces, such as CO₂ hydrogenation and CO oxidation, have attracted increasing attention over the years as effective strategies for converting CO₂ or CO to valuable or harmless products... read more

Project 09: Optical Neural Network
Deep learning has transformed many areas of science and technology, including image recognition, natural language processing, and scientific imaging. In photonics, neural-network-based methods... read more

Project 11: Interferometric Delay Tracking System for Petahertz Field Sampling
Are you excited by the idea of measuring time on the scale of attoseconds: one billionth of a billionth of a second? In 2023, the Nobel Prize in Physics celebrated breakthroughs in attosecond science... read more

Project 13: Forces, Polymers and Molecular Scissors
We offer an exciting and interdisciplinary master thesis project and invite motivated students to join us in investigating how human cells resolve a complex puzzle: topological entanglements between DNA molecules... read more

Project 15: Rasnik optical tracking of inter-table motion in gravitational-wave detectors
The Rasnik alignment system was developed in 1993 for aligning the ATLAS muon chambers [1]. Now, Rasnik will also be used in gravitational-wave (GW)... read more

Project 21: Physics informed image segmentation for clinical biology
We survive and potentially also die due to microorganisms: they help us digest food and efficiently kill pathogens that come in contact with our body, to protect their “own” territory... read more

Project 25: Investigating Z-RNA stabilization upon protein (ZBP-1) binding with high-throughput MT-TIRF correlative measurements
Double stranded RNA (dsRNA) exists in two structural conformations, namely A- and Z-form RNA (Figure 1A) [1]. Typically... read more

Project 27: Simulating an entangled optical clock for enhanced timingkeeping
Are you interested in pushing the limits of quantum-enhanced sensing for precision timekeeping? We are developing a Ba⁺ ion trap experiment for high-precision spectroscopy beyond the Standard Quantum Limit... read more

Project 29: Determining the energetic landscape of photosynthetic phycobiliproteins using ultrafast time-resolved spectroscopy and advanced modelling
Plants, algae and cyanobacteria are capable of oxygenic photosynthesis: the process in which water and carbon dioxide are used to synthesise complex organic molecules. The starting point for this process is light absorption... read more

Project 35: Extreme-Ultraviolet Scatterometry for Advanced Nanostructure Metrology
The continuous shrinkage of feature sizes in nanofabrication demands metrology techniques capable of resolving structural parameters with nanometer precision. Optical scatterometry provides a non-destructive alternative to imaging-based methods... read more

Project 43: Image Analysis for 2D, 3D and 4D higher harmonic generation microscopy data
In our group we work with higher harmonic generation microscopy techniques for clinical applications. Higher harmonic generation microscopy is a fast, label-free and non-damaging imaging technique... read more