BESSY II: Phosphor chains - a 1D material with 1D electronic properties

23-Oct-2025 - For the first time, BESSY II has succeeded in experimentally demonstrating one-dimensional electronic properties in a material. The samples consisted of short chains of phosphorus atoms that form on a silver substrate in a self-organized manner at specific angles. Using a sophisticated analysis, ...

Metallic nanocatalysts: what really happens during catalysis

New insights into the chemical behaviour

12-Sep-2025 - Using a combination of spectromicroscopy at BESSY II and microscopic analyses at DESY's NanoLab, a team has gained new insights into the chemical behaviour of nanocatalysts during catalysis. The nanoparticles consisted of a platinum core with a rhodium shell. This configuration allows a better ...

An elegant method for the detection of single spins using photovoltage

This could lead to a much more compact design of quantum sensors

17-Apr-2025 - Diamonds with certain optically active defects can be used as highly sensitive sensors or qubits for quantum computers, where the quantum information is stored in the electron spin state of these colour centres. However, the spin states have to be read out optically, which is often experimentally ...

The Secret Life of Catalysts

New Discoveries in Chemical Reactions

30-Jan-2025 - Scientists from the Interface Science Department of the Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society in collaboration with beamline scientists at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin have made an advancement in the field of electrocatalysis. Their latest research, published in the journal Nature ...

Unique X-ray microscope paves the way to more powerful batteries

New insights into the morphological and chemical changes in battery materials

21-Nov-2024 - New cathode materials are being developed to further increase the capacity of lithium batteries. Multilayer lithium-rich transition metal oxides (LRTMOs) offer particularly high energy density. However, their capacity decreases with each charging cycle due to structural and chemical changes. ...

MXenes for energy storage: Chemical imaging more than just surface deep

19-Jun-2024 - A new method in spectromicroscopy significantly improves the study of chemical reactions at the nanoscale, both on surfaces and inside layered materials. Scanning X-ray microscopy (SXM) at MAXYMUS beamline of BESSY II enables the investigation of chemical species adsorbed on the top layer ...

Quantitative analysis of cell organelles with artificial intelligence

The analysis of cryo-X-Ray-microscopy data still requires a lot of time: AI now identifies structures at high accuracy within a few minutes

21-Jul-2023 - BESSY II's high-brilliance X-rays can be used to produce microscopic images with spatial resolution down to a few tens of nanometres. Whole cell volumes can be examined without the need for complex sample preparation as in electron microscopy. Under the X-ray microscope, the tiny cell organelles ...

Nanopatterns of proteins detected by cryo-electron microscopy

Nanostructures for electronics, catalysis, medicine

22-Oct-2020 - A team from Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) used cryo electron microscopy to detect regular, two-dimensional structures in the form of Pascal triangles in a shock frozen protein material. The samples have been synthesized by a Chinese research group. The method of cryo electron microscopy has the ...

Malaria pathogens under the X-ray microscope

X-ray microscopy at BESSY II reveals how antimalaria-drugs might work

04-Nov-2019 - Malaria is one of the most threatening infectious diseases in the world. An international team has now been able to investigate malaria pathogens in red blood cells in vivo using the BESSY II X-ray microscope and the ALBA and ESRF synchrotron sources. The scientists reveal the mechanisms used by ...

How the internal compass is constructed in magnetotactic bacteria

19-Apr-2018 - Magnetotactic bacteria are usually found in freshwater and marine sediments. One species, Magnetospirillum gryphiswaldense, is easily cultivated in the lab - with or without magnetic nanoparticles in their interior depending on the presence or absence of iron in the local environment. "So these ...