Anton Paar’s Award for Physics, 2016

2016-11-02 | Corporate

For Anton Paar it is very important to support research work in the field of science and technology. Every year the company gives two awards: one for physics and one for chemistry. An expert jury made up of members of the Austrian Physical Society and representatives of a number of Austrian universities selects the winners.

This year's Anton Paar Award for Physics goes to Dr. Andreas Pospischil for his PhD "Generation and detection of light in two-dimensional materials", submitted to the Technical University of Vienna (Austria), Institute for Photonics.

The winner , Andreas Pospischil, gives an insight into the subject of his thesis:

"It doesn't get any thinner than this: Graphene, a carbon material which shows special electronic properties, consists of just one single layer of atoms. At the Technical University of Vienna we managed to combine a graphene photodetector with a conventional silicone chip. With this it is possible to convert light signals into electrical signals directly on the chip. We could show that this novel photodetector works extremely quickly over wide frequency ranges. Therefore, this technology could further pave the way for optical data transfer within computer chips.

Exciting technological possibilities are opened up when other materials are arranged in single or only a few layers of atoms. At the Institute for Photonics we produced the first diode made of a single layer of tungsten diselenide. The material absorbs light - similar to graphene - but with tungsten diselenide it is possible to generate electrical power. Experiments show that this material is suitable for producing wafer-thin, flexible solar cells. It could even be possible to produce wafer-thin displays as the ultra-thin layer not only converts sunlight into electricity but also the opposite is true: with an electricity supply the layer can be made to light up."

DI Dr. Andreas Pospischil completed the Higher Technical School for Electronics and Information Technologies in Hollabrunn (Austria). He then studied Electrical Engineering and Information Technology at the Technical University of Vienna. During this course he spent one semester at the Oulun Yliopisto University of Oulu (Finland), was a visiting scholar with the group of Prof. Xia at Yale University (USA), and worked as a research assistant in the group of Prof. Müller at the Technical University of Vienna. He completed his studies in January 2016.

 

Picture: Alberta Bonanni (Professor of Physics, Head of the Nitride Compound Semiconductors Laboratory, Chair of the Condensed Matter Division of the Austrian Physical Society, Johannes Kepler University), Andreas Pospischil (Winner of the Anton Paar Award for Physics, 2016)