Department
"Low-dimensional and Metastable Materials"

The research mission of the department "Low-dimensional and Metastable Materials" is the advancement of our microscopic understanding of matter and materials in confinement, in reduced dimensions, and in metastable states. We utilize modern Synchrotron radiation and neutron technologies and employ scattering and spectroscopy techniques in non-­conventional schemes in order to unravel the nature of order/disorder transitions, fluctuations, structure formation and self-organisation at surfaces, interfaces, and in thin films.

Within our current research projects we focus on binary nanostructures, on the oxidation of metal surfaces and nanostructures, on the growth, structure and transport properties of organic films, on soft-soft-epitaxy, on the structure of solid-liquid and ice interfaces, as well as on metal-metal interfaces.

We operate a Synchrotron radiation beamline for high-­resolution analysis of advanced materials at the ANKA facility (FZK) and a combined X-ray/neutron reflectometer at the new neutron reactor FRM-II in Garching.

We operate various facilities for sample preparation, such as metal and organic molecular-beam epitaxy (MBE), sputter chambers, and crystal growth chambers, and for sample characterization, such as imaging (atomic-­force/scanning-tunneling microscopy, AFM/STM), spectroscopy (Auger-electron spectroscopy, AES ), and diffraction (low energy electron diffraction, LEED and x-ray diffraction).

Acting director:

Prof. Dr. J. Spatz

Former director:

Prof. Dr. H. Dosch



Address:

Max-Planck-Institut
für Intelligente Systeme
Heisenbergstr. 3
D-70569 Stuttgart

How to find us...