Transport at Nanoscale Interfaces Laboratory
Our interdisciplinary team gathers physicists, materials scientists, (bio-) chemists, and engineers focusing on bringing novel materials to devices. We are interested in understanding the fundamental electronic, optoelectronic, thermal and ionic transport processes involved in atomically-precise nanostructures and low-dimensional materials. The heterogeneous integration of novel nanomaterials requires custom-made methods for nanoscale patterning and interfaces nanostructuring. Overall, we strive to master the chain of competences leading from designer materials with tailored quantum properties to devices with targeted application in information & quantum technology, energy conversion & storage as well as biochemical sensing & diagnostics.
Research
Technical Expertise
We’re happy to welcome Paulina Novakowska and Elena Mavrona to our lab!
Paulina joins us as a Ph.D. student, working with Mickael on thermopower in graphene nanoribbon quantum dots. Elena returns as an Entrepreneur Fellow, leading the start-up company Lepto. We're thrilled to have them both on board!
We’re delighted to welcome three new members to our lab!
Lara Linke joins as a master’s student working with Mira on quasi-1D materials. Nora Oelhafen is conducting her bachelor project on thermopower in graphene nanoribbon quantum dots with Mickael. Piraven Manoharan joins as a guest student, focusing on DFT calculations of charge and heat transport through carbon nanotubes, also with Mickael. We’re happy to have them all on board!
We’re delighted to welcome Caroline to our lab! Coming from Zurich, she is pursuing her master’s degree in electrical engineering at ETH Zurich. During her semester thesis at Empa, Caroline will work on h-BN encapsulation of graphene nanoribbons for nanoelectronic device applications. We’re happy to have her with us!
We are pleased to welcome Guanting to our lab! With a background in physics and expertise in infrared spectroscopy, Guanting joins us from Empa, where his Ph.D. work focused on spectroscopic approaches for early diagnosis and biomarker detection in chronic wounds. We’re excited to have him as part of the team!
Well done to Yanis Strübi and Silvio Müller on completing your Physics Lab Technician apprenticeships and earning the Federal Vocational Baccalaureate! We’re proud of you and wish you all the best for what’s next.
Dachraoui, W., Kühnel, R. S., Kummer, N., Battaglia, C., & Erni, R.
ACS Nano, 19(20), 19213-19224. (2025).
Aeppli, D., Hack, E., & Held, M.
Journal of Energy Storage, 129, 117135 (23 pp.). (2025).
Chacko, A., Hack, E., Lohde, S., Bucher, R., Yildirim, O., Müller, A. M., Calame M., Hug H.J. & Dimitrievska, M.
Journal of Physics: Energy, 7(3), 035017 (19 pp.). (2025).
Chen, Q., Jamilpanah, L., Künniger, T., Furrer, R., Song, Q., Zhang, K., Chumakov A., Harder C., Bulut Y., Müller-Buschbaum P., Roth SV. &Braun, A.
Advanced Materials Interfaces, 12(13), 2500269 (11 pp.). (2025).
Tsarev, S., Proniakova, D., Liu, X., Wu, E., Matt, G. J., Sakhatskyi, K., Fu F., Shorubalko I., Yakunin S. & Kovalenko, M. V.
Nature, 642(8068), 592-598. (2025)
Upcoming Conferences / Events
2025
- Oct. 20 - 20, ENRICH event in WSL, Birmensdorf - CH
- Oct. 29 - 31, 6 th SFCNS Conference in Lausanne - CH
- Nov. 06 - 07, Swiss Dementia Forum 2025 in Bern - CH
- Dec. 08 - 09, ETH domain conference in EPFL, Lausanne - CH