Summer BBQ 2025

On a nice summer evening, our group enjoyed cold drinks and delicious food together with familiy & friends.

The highlights of the evening were a pot of Zaziki and the impressive skills of the Er-Dy team of organizing the BBQ grill in time. Most notably, Leonardo won against Clemens in the final round of an epic pingpong tornament that showcased both impressive skills in the sport as well as astonishing trick shots (accompanied by the permanent threat of FF’s dog Pincho stealing the pingpong ball).

Eva wins the “Best Paper Award” 2025!

Photo Credit: Uni Innsbruck / Anna Maria Huber

Congratulations to Eva for winning the UIBK “Best Student Paper Award” in the Faculty of Mathematics, Computer Science and Physics!

The prize was awarded for her paper, “Observation of vortices in a dipolar supersolid” published in the Nature journal here. You can also read about the paper in the press releases by the UIBK.

The ceremony for the award took place on Tuesday, June 24 at the main university in Innsbruck. You can find more details about the ceremony and the other award winners here.

Quantum Science Documentary by ORF Tirol

Photo Credit: ORF

We’re excited to share that our group is featured in the ORF Tirol documentary “The Future Begins Now – Innsbruck at the Center of Quantum Research” (in German), part of the Österreich-Bild series.

In the documentary, Éric Berdaguer explores how Innsbruck became a world-leading hub for quantum research. The story begins in the 1990s, when Anton Zeilinger—later awarded the Nobel Prize—laid the groundwork for quantum science in Tirol and helped put Innsbruck on the map. The film then shifts to the present, highlighting today’s cutting-edge research, including a visit to our labs and interviews with Francesca and other members of our group.

📺 Watch the full documentary here.

📰 Read the quantA article about the documentary here.

Sarah defends her thesis!

Congratulations to our Masters student, Sarah Embacher, who defended her thesis today! 🥳 Sarah worked in the ERBIUM lab where she implemented a scanning optical dipole trap and also carried out simulations of how q-plates can be used to create optical potentials. ⚛️🔦

After a short break, Sarah will be returning to the ERBIUM lab as a PhD student. Well done on your defense, and we look forward to having you back soon, Sarah!

2024’s Biggest Breakthrough in Physics

Quanta Magazine has declared our research on the ‘Observation of vortices in a dipolar supersolid‘ one of 2024’s Biggest Breakthrough in Physics!

Moving from the largest stage to the very smallest one, physicists who manipulate atoms, molecules and crystals in the lab have also spent 2024 in the throes of discovery, having achieved astonishing levels of precision and control over their quantum quarries. A team in Innsbruck created a long-predicted exotic state of matter called a supersolid, and even imaged the hallmark “quantum tornadoes” that formed when they stirred an otherwise rigid crystal of dysprosium atoms. Astrophysicists suspect that this supersolid phase might arise inside incredibly dense, fast-spinning stars called pulsars.

Read the rest of 2024’s Biggest Breakthroug here: The Year in Physics

Watch the Quanta video, featuring Francesca and PhD student Elena Poli, here: Youtube Explainer

Read the feature by Quanta Magazine here: Physicists spot quantum tornadoes twirling in a supersolid

See the article in Nature here: Observation of vortices in a dipolar supersolid

Read the pre-print here: arXiv:2403.18510.