Current News

March 2024
Roadmap on Magnetic Microscopy Published

On the 8th, Journal of Physics: Materials published a ‘roadmap’ article, in which experts in different areas of magnetic microscopy provide their views on the current capabilities of available techniques, forecast future advances, and assess how such advances may impact materials science. The work is entitled, 2024 Roadmap on Magnetic Microscopy Techniques and Their Applications in Materials Science. The focus of the article is on material science and physics. Prof. Dennis Christensen (DTU) led the team putting together the article, which included Dr. Urs Staub (PSI), Prof. Nini Pryds (DTU), Prof. Denys Makarov (HZD Dresden), and Prof. Poggio.

February 2024
New Masters Students

Early this year, 3 new students have joined the group to pursue their Masters theses: Loris Durante, Katharina Kress, and Moritz Haberthür. Both Loris and Katharina have already worked in the group as part of one of their Masters projects. We welcome all three to the group and wish them luck on their projects!

Party for Kousik

On the 23rd, the group held a farewell party for Dr. Kousik Bagani, who will be leaving the group at the end of the month. Kousik joined the group in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic in October 2020, after a post-doc in the lab of Prof. Eli Zeldov (Weizmann). Since then, he has led our efforts on developing SQUID-on-lever probes and applying them to the study of 2D magnets. He has also helped manage our FIBsuperProbes collaboration, taking over for Dr. Marcus Wyss. Kousik is now moving to Munich to start a job at Attocube AG. We wish him the best of luck in this new adventure and hope to continue working with him for a while longer on the projects he started. His contributions to the group — scientific and otherwise — will be missed by all!

NW MFM of bilayer EuGe2

On the 15th, Nanoscale published our article entitled, Mapping the phase-separated state in a 2D magnet, as an “accepted manuscript” before the final edited and formated version appears. In the paper, we employ a high-sensitivity magnetic force microscopy (MFM) technique, using a nanowire (NW) transducer, to probe the spatial distribution of magnetic states in the paradigmatic 4f 2D ferromagnet EuGe2. Below the ferromagnetic transition temperature, we discover the phase-separated state and follow its evolution with temperature and magnetic field. The characteristic length-scale of magnetic domains amounts to hundreds of nanometers. These observations strongly shape our understanding of the magnetic states in 2D materials at the monolayer limit and may contribute to engineering of future ultra-compact spintronic devices.

The research was carried out in our group by former Ph.D. student Dr. Hinrich Mattiat and current Ph.D. student Lukas Schneider, who did the MFM. The collaboration included Ph.D. student Patrick Reiser (Basel) and members of the Budakian group (University of Waterloo), who provided the NW MFM transducers. Members of the group of Prof. Vyacheslav Storchak (Kurchatov Institute) grew the EuGe2 samples, carried out experiments using complementary techniques, and did analysis of the measurements. 

Scanning NV Magnetometry of Nanomagnets

On the 7th, ACS Applied Nano Materials published our article entitled, Scanning Nitrogen-Vacancy Magnetometry of Focused-Electron-Beam-Deposited Cobalt Nanomagnet. The work discusses the patterning of nanomagnets via focused-electron-beam-induced deposition (FEBID).  We report on the fabrication of cobalt nanomagnets and characterize their content, saturation magnetization, and stray magnetic field profiles, using a combination of transmission electron microscopy and scanning nitrogen-vacancy magnetometry. We find agreement between the measured stray field profiles and saturation magnetization with micromagnetic simulations. We further characterize magnetic domains and grainy stray magnetic fields in the nanomagnets and their halo side-deposits. The published work may aid in the evaluation of such nanomagnets for applications in spin qubits, magnetic field sensing, and magnetic logic.

The research was carried out by Ph.D. student Liza Žaper and the project was led by research scientist Dr. Floris Braakman. Research scientist Dr. Boris Groß helped with magnetic simulations. The work also benefitted from close collaborations with Dr. Peter Rickhaus (Qnami), Dr. Marcus Wyss (Nano Imaging Lab, Swiss Nanoscience Institute), and Dr. Kai Wagner (Maletinsky group, Department of Physics, University of Basel).

January 2024
Swiss Quantum Days

From the 31st to February 1st, Prof. Poggio attended the first two days of the second edition of the Swiss Quantum Days in Villars-sur-Ollon, Switzerland. The conference focused on quantum materials, quantum sensing, quantum information, and quantum computation and included a number of prominent researchers in the field based in Switzerland.

Group Members at Nano in the Snow

From the 17th to the 19th, Ph.D. students Lukas Schneider, Luca Forrer, Mathias Claus, and Prof. Poggio attended this year’s edition of Nanoscience in the Snow, which was held at the Hotel Mont Paisible in Crans-Montana, Switzerland. Each presented a poster and Prof. Poggio gave a talk entitled, “Using nanomechanics to study nanomagnetism”.

Joe Wilcox Visits

From the 9th to the 11th, Dr. Joe Wilcox from the University of Bath, UK visited our group. Joe is an experimental physicist working on understanding the fundamental physics of unconventional superconductivity in the group of Prof. Simon Bending. Post-doctoral researcher Dr. Estefani Marchiori and Ph.D. student Lukas Schneider have started a collaboration with Joe.

December 2023
Hinrich and David Bid Farewell

At the end of the month, Ph.D. students David Jaeger and Hinrich Mattiat will leave the group and move on to new adventures. Both intend to take a few months off before taking on new jobs. Both will be sorely missed in the lab and within the group. Good luck to you both and come visit us soon! 

Year-end Dinner

On the evening of the 1st, the group celebrated its annual year-end dinner, this time at Valentino’s Place. Over 30 group members, alumni, and friends joined us for an evening of eating, drinking, and lively conversation. Thanks to Boris for organizing. See you next year!

Ph.D. Student Starts

On the 1st, Aris Lafranca started as a Ph.D. student in the group. Aris received his Bachelor of Science in Nanoscience in 2021 from the University of Basel. After doing both his Master project in 2022 and Master thesis in 2023 in our group, he has decided to join as a Ph.D. student. Welcome back Aris!

November 2023
SPIN Site Visit

On the 16th and 17th, the large collaborative project NCCR SPIN on “Spin qubits in Si” lead by members of our Department hosted a site visit. As part of the collaboration, members of the group attended talks and presented posters including Ph.D. students Liza Žaper, Andriani Vervelaki, Aurèle Kamber, and Luca Forrer. Prof. Poggio gave a summary talk.

Raffi Budakian Visits

On the 6th and 7th, Prof. Raffi Budakian of the University of Waterloo, Canada visited our group here at the Department of Physics. Raffi gave a talk on the afternoon of the 6th at our department’s Quantum & Nano Seminar entitled, “Novel Approaches in NanoMRI for Probing Atomic-Scale Material Structure”.

October 2023
FIBsuperProbes Annual Meeting in Zaragoza

From the 30th to the 31st, Ph.D. student Daniel Jetter, post-doc Dr. Kousik Bagani, and Prof. Poggio attended the 3rd annual meeting of the “FIBsuperProbes” FET-Open collaboration between our group, the group of Dieter Kölle in Tübingen, the group of Armin Knoll at IBM Zürich, and the group of José María De Teresa in Zaragoza. Daniel gave a talk entitled, “Visualizing thickness-dependent spin texture in few layer Cr2Ge2Te6“. The meeting was organized by Prof. De Teresa in Zaragoza and featured a full day of talks, discussion, lab tours, and dinner. Thank you to José María for being an excellent host.

September 2023
Prof. Poggio at KRYO 2023

From the 24th to the 26th, Prof. Poggio attended the “Kryoelektronische Bauelemente (KRYO 2023)” Conference at the Seminaris Hotel in Bad Boll, Germany. The conference was organizing by Prof. Reinhold Kleiner and Prof. Dieter Kölle and covered recent developments in superconducting electronics and related techniques. Prof. Poggio gave a tutorial talk entitled, “Nanoscale magnetic field imaging for 2D materials.”

David earns Ph.D.

On Thursday the 21th, Ph.D. student David Jaeger defended his thesis, entitled, “Fiber-cavity optomechanics with hexagonal boron nitride drum resonators”, earning his doctorate in physics summa cum laude. The defense was chaired by Prof. Patrick Maletinsky with Prof. Eva Weig (TU Munich), Prof. Poggio, Prof. Richard Warburton, and Dr. Floris Braakman making up the committee.

After doing his Masters thesis in the Maletinsky group, David joined our lab as an intern in October 2017 and as a Ph.D. student in January 2018. Congratulations to Dr. Jaeger!

Group Trip to Levanto

From the 14th to the 18th, 13 group members and friends traveled to Levanto, Italy for a long weekend at the beach. Levanto is a familiar getaway spot for Prof. Poggio, as his family has a house there and he has many friends in the town. The group enjoyed swimming, boating, kayaking, cliff jumping, hiking, sight seeing, eating, drinking, and of course relaxing by the sea. Thanks to all for an great time!

SNI Annual Meeting

From the 6th to the 8th, Ph.D. students Lukas Schneider, Luca Forrer, and Prof. Poggio attended the Swiss Nanoscience Institute’s Annual Meeting, which was held for the first time in Meisterschwanden on the banks of lake Hallwil in the Canton Aargau, Switzerland. Lukas and Luca both gave talks on their research and Prof. Poggio hosted the proceedings as the Director of the SNI.

Andriani and Kousik in Rome

From the 4th to the 8th, Ph.D. student Andriani Vervelaki and post-doctoral researcher Dr. Kousik Bagani attended the Trends in MAGnetism 2023 conference in Rome, Italy. This was the third edition of this multidisciplinary forum on the advancements in magnetism with a focus on trending topics. Andriani presented a poster entitled, “Revealing the spin texture of 2D vdW Cr2Ge2Te6“, while Kousik presented a poster entitled, “Layer-dependent magnetization in 2D vdW Cr2Ge2Te6“.