News

The group went out to Bergeralm on the 5th of March for some night skiing (and rodeln for the non-skiiers)!

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.

Congratulations to Senior Scientist, Dr. Manfred Mark on officially receiving his habilitation at UIBK!

The Ferlaino group headed down south to Florence from October 29th to the 31st for the Ultracold Florence-Innsbruck Joint Meeting hosted at the beautiful National Institute of Optics (Istituto Nazionale di Ottica, CNR-INO).  We had a great time sharing our latest research with presentations by Elena and Eva (Theory and Er-Dy), Louis (ERBIUM) and Daniel (T-REQS)!