Electronic Properties of Metals, Semiconductors and Ceramics

The quantum-mechanical behavior of electrons in a solid or liquid is the microscopic basis for the chemistry and for most of the physical properties of solids and surfaces.

Specific interests: Electronic band structure of metals, semiconductors and ceramics. Magnetism: GMR-effect, spinvalves. Surface-reconstruction. Adsorption on surfaces of semiconductors and metals. Interfaces between semiconductors, metals and insulators.

Disordered Systems and Phase Transitions

Atomic order-disorder transitions or phase transitions like freezing-melting are about the most dramatic effects occurring in condensed matter.

Special interests: Structure and dynamics of metallic and nonmetallic glasses. Diffusion and reaction of particles in solids, melts and in porous materials. Formation and dynamics of defect-structures in solids. Elastic effects during phase-changes.

Nonlinear Dynamics and Pattern Formation

Nonequilibrium systems tend to produce structures through nonlinear dynamical processes. This leads to regular or irregular structures, fractal patterns and chaos, for example in crystal growth or in hydrodynamic flow.

Special interests: Pattern formation during solidification and in chemical reactions. Theory of crystal-growth. Dynamics of fracture. Hydrodynamic pattern formation. Universal scaling laws for emergence of complex structures and chaos in nonlinear dynamical systems with many degrees of freedom.