With single laser pulses on single molecules

Physicists at MPQ succeed in resolving the internal dynamics of individual molecules using UV femtosecond laser pulses

14-Feb-2012 - Nowadays, large laser systems provide ultra-short light pulses of very high intensity which – in principle – allow the imaging of matter and its dynamics on atomic scales, down to a single molecule or a virus. However, current methods fall short in efficiency to overlap a target molecule in a ...

Sharp images from the living mouse brain

Max Planck scientists in Goettingen have for the first time made finest details of nerve cells in the brain of a living mouse visible

08-Feb-2012 - To explore the most intricate structures of the brain in order to decipher how it functions – Stefan Hell's team of researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen has made a significant step closer to this goal. Using the STED microscopy developed by Hell, the ...

Taming light

White laser pulses with precisely tailored waveform enable the control of electrons in the microcosm

12-Sep-2011 - An expedition through the fast-paced microscopic world of atoms reveals electrons that spin around at enormous speeds and have gigantic forces are acting on them. Monitoring the ultrafast motion of these electrons requires ultrashort flashes of light. However, in order to control them, the ...

Deep recycling in the Earth faster than thought

Sunken oceanic crust resurfaces from Earth's mantle after only 500 million years

12-Aug-2011 - The recycling of the Earth's crust in volcanoes happens much faster than scientists have previously assumed. Rock of the oceanic crust, which sinks deep into the earth due to the movement of tectonic plates, reemerges through volcanic eruptions after around 500 million years. Researchers from the ...

Tunnel view of how electrons play

Scanning tunnelling microscopes provide insights into mysterious electronic effects in some metals

24-Jun-2011 - Electrons behave like football teams: the match becomes interesting when the teamwork is as good as that conjured up by the players of FC Barcelona. Electrons which interact strongly with each other give rise to superconductivity, the lossless transport of current, for example. A team headed by ...

Bleach in the Icelandic Volcanic Cloud

Chlorine in the ash plume of the Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajökull attacked atmospheric trace gases

31-May-2011 - One year after the Eyjafjallajökull volcano in Iceland brought European air traffic to a standstill its ash plume revealed a surprising scientific finding: Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Mainz found that the ash plume contained not only the common volcanic gas sulfur ...

Software for the discovery of new crystal structures

16-May-2011 - A new software called QED (Quantitative Electron Diffraction), which has been licensed by Max Planck Innovation, has now been released by HREM Research Inc., a Japan based company, which is developing products and services in the field of High-Resolution Electron Microscopy. QED allows ...

Nanotubes: cellular membranes on supply

Osmotic forces play a role in nanotube formation in cells

16-Mar-2011 - When unfolding a tent for the first time, you may wonder how the huge tarpaulin fits into a bag the size of a football. Biologists wonder about something similar: when a cell divides, the surface area of the cell membrane grows. Moreover, when molecules are brought from one organelle to another ...

Neutrino detector starts measurement

New facility in France to measure fundamental properties of neutrinos

31-Jan-2011 - The Double Chooz collaboration recently completed its neutrino detector which will see anti-neutrinos coming from the Chooz nuclear power plant in the French Ardennes. The experiment is now ready to start collecting data in order to measure fundamental neutrino properties with important ...

The Amazon rainforest -- a cloud factory

22-Sep-2010 - The forest in the Amazon Basin produces its own rain. During the wet season, aerosol particles, which serve to condensate clouds and precipitation here, mainly consist of organic material. These aerosols are released by the rainforest itself. This has been demonstrated by scientists from the Max ...