Dear DESY-colleagues,

Finishing the year in style at DESY! In this newsletter, we present the human and technical DESY highlights of the past weeks. We report on a colleague from Zeuthen who is guaranteed to have a white Christmas (at the South Pole). And we are already looking forward to 2025 and DESY's new Research Director Britta Redlich, about whom you can also find out more in this issue.

We wish you happy holidays and hope you enjoy the read,

Your DESY-inform team

PETRA IV: Stability thanks to Bauhaus design

Extraordinary components for DESY's extraordinary future project: engineers are currently testing important girder prototypes as part of the PETRA IV preparatory programme which also includes the funds from the start-up financing. Girders are the massive, swinging support structures that will later support the sensitive magnets. For the prototypes, Normann Koldrack relies on the Bauhaus principle of “form follows function” and used cast metal bases for the first time. The head of the Girder working group optimised their design beforehand using algorithmic models. The advantage: with this construction method, the base frames can be designed to be lighter and yet stable. “The new designs prevent disruptive vibrations and also save material,” explains Koldrack. The first prototype has already been completed and is already being tested. The initial results give Koldrack confidence: “We have met the criteria for stability and sustainability. Nothing stands in the way of series production of the 288 girders for PETRA IV.”

If you would like to read more about this sustainable construction method, you can find the full text here:

Britta Redlich – what DESY's new research director is planning

She is convinced “that DESY's Photon Science department will reinvent itself.” She raves about PETRA IV - “a real dream for every scientist”. And it is important for her to “stay close to research.” Britta Redlich – chemist, Professor of Experimental Physics, Senator of the Helmholtz Association for the Research Field Matter, and from 1 January 2025 DESY's new Director of the Photon Science Department. Britta Redlich has a lot of experience, big goals and already a place in her heart for her new home in Hamburg. If you want to find out more about her now, read our interview. Anyone who would like to meet her in person is cordially invited to do so at the "Welcome Britta" event on 8 January 2025 from 1 to 3 p.m. in the DESY main auditorium.

BEST OF DESY DAY

13 November was DESY DAY. Young scientists met a Nobel laureate and directors met PhD students. There were fascinating talks, fantastic research highlights and inspiring discussions - as well as prizes, awards and recognitions, of course. “It was a great afternoon,” sums up Ismar Kiseljakovic, who was responsible for the organisation of DESY DAY. “This was of course due to our great colleagues. Many thanks to everyone who took part, helped and watched; also for the feedback. And congratulations once again to all the award winners!” The DESY Award for Exceptional Achievements was traditionally only announced live in the lecture hall. This year, it went to the Zeuthen colleagues Katharina Henjes-Kunst and Adelheid Sommer as well as Christian Reckleben. If you were unable to attend or would like to find out more about the other award winners, you can do so in the DESY DAY inform-Newsletter read or HERE watch the DESY DAY video recording.

SAFETY-RELEVANT RESEARCH AT DESY: “We have to take time to discuss.”

Between ethical challenges and security policy responsibility: in times of global crises and wars, research institutions and universities are coming under increasing scrutiny. The big questions are: What role do science and technology play in Europe's security and defence capabilities? And how can research institutions position themselves? In search of orientation and answers, a panel of experts came together for the panel discussion “Turning point in research - what does this mean for DESY?” at DESY in mid-November. Read here who represented which positions and the consequences that DESY is drawing:

Researching with the big players – INTERNATIONAL COSMIC DAY

Celebrating the invisible all over the world: 26 November was International Cosmic Day (ICD). Thirteen years ago - on the 100th anniversary of the discovery of cosmic radiation - DESY initiated this day for young people for the first time. Since then, the ICD has become an established format; every year, young people dedicate this day to invisible cosmic particles. In 2024, over 100 groups from schools, universities and research institutions in 24 countries came together to experiment together and share their results in video conferences worldwide. The day was not just an experience for the young people. The live connections between the teams around the world were supervised by 15 scientists, PhD students and students at the headquarters in Zeuthen. Carolin Gnebner, scientific coordinator of the astroparticle projects for young people in Zeuthen, gives a positive summary: “The way young people around the world use the opportunity to experience scientific research - such as our colleagues at the IceCube Neutrino Observatory or the Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory - inspires us every year.”

Off to the ice

Sarah Mechbal sits in the Antarctic Terminal at Christchurch Airport, New Zealand, and waits. She has been doing so for days. It is 10 December. For days, her onward flight to the Antarctic base at McMurdo has been postponed again and again. Postdoctoral researcher Sarah Mechbal is on her way to the South Pole, to the Amundsen-Scott Station. Her mission: the upgrade of IceCube, on which the scientist has been working at DESY in Zeuthen since 2020. “With enormous dynamics, great creativity and a lot of fun", as DESY's Astroparticle Physics Director Christian Stegmann confirmed at DESY DAY, when she talked about the mDOMs - designed, built and tested at DESY - and her upcoming trip to Antarctica.

It is Sarah Mechbal's first trip to the IceCube project at the South Pole. She will be testing those sensors in the ice that she played such a key role in developing in Zeuthen. “Large-scale hardware projects such as these only happen once in a decade in the history of these experiments. Working at the intersection of engineering and physics teams is a privilege,” she says. And while she waits in the Antarctic Terminal at Christchurch Airport to finally get closer to her dream and mission, she quickly answers a few questions for us.

All together now – DESY spirit during cleanup

You've probably heard that at the end of October, there was a fire in the synchrotron electronics room of the pre-accelerator DESY II. Fortunately, the situation was quickly brought under control and the facility was back in operation three weeks later. How this was even possible and who and what was needed to achieve it can be read here:

Detector component: special transport to DESY

Highly sensitive and extremely exciting – the ATLAS team at DESY is celebrating an important event. It's all about the new silicon strip detector for the ATLAS experiment at CERN in Geneva. Specifically the endcap of this detector. For its construction, the basic structure made of carbon fibre has now been delivered to the Hamburg campus. The transport of this sensitive component from the production site in Amsterdam to the Detector Assembly Facility (DAF) at DESY was tricky, complicated – and, fortunately, went smoothly. A special transport company had to develop a special box for this purpose, the inside of which was insulated with material from space travel. The complex transport was also a successful dress rehearsal: in around three years, the finished endcap will take its journey from Hamburg to Geneva in this box.

ERC Grants for DESY scientists

Excellent! The European Research Council (ERC) has awarded DESY scientists Aditya Pathak (left) and Christoph Heyl (right) financial grants for their outstanding research.

Physicist Christoph Heyl, who heads the photonics research and innovation group at DESY, receives an ERC Consolidator Grant. This goes to scientists whose own independent working group is already in the consolidation phase. Heyl and his team were also awarded the DESY Innovation Award on DESY DAY for their promising project "Gas-phase sono-photonic light control", which involves the contactless control of light in air or other gases using intense ultrasound waves.

Theorist Aditya Pathak receives an ERC Starting Grant. This funding supports excellent young scientists so that they can realise their outstanding research projects and build their own teams. From September 2025, Pathak will lead a group whose work aims to improve the accuracy of measurements and thus determine the mass of the top quark more precisely.

The ERC is an institution set up by the European Commission to finance cutting-edge fundamental research. It supports groundbreaking project ideas from outstanding scientists. The grants for various career stages are considered to be among the most prestigious and sought-after funding opportunities in Europe.

Hertha Sponer Prize for Katharina Behr

A great honour: DESY physicist Katharina Behr has been awarded the Hertha Sponer Prize of the German Physical Society (DPG) for her work in the Higgs sector. "She has made a significant contribution to expanding the boundaries of our knowledge of Higgs physics (...)," the citation reads. Behr has headed the Helmholtz Young Investigator Group ‘Fingerprints of the Vacuum’ at DESY since 2020. The ATLAS researcher is also a senior scientist on the Quantum Universe Cluster of Excellence at Universität Hamburg. The Hertha Sponer Prize is endowed with 3000 euros and is awarded annually to a female scientist for outstanding achievements in the field of physics. Our warmest congratulations!

NEW FEMTO: HOW COLLABORATIONS ADVANCE SCIENCE

Whether the observatory in the Antarctic ice sheet, the detectors at the world's most powerful accelerator or a field of special telescopes in a Chilean desert Chile: behind every ambitious scientific projects there usually stand research teams made up of different institutions, countries and disciplines. International collaborations are indispensable and have an impact far beyond research – especially at DESY. In the new issue of our research magazine “femto,” we introduce you to various scientific collaborations. The magazine will be published in January. You will be able to find it in the femto displays on campus or you can download or order it HERE.

DESY inform team:

Editing and realisation: Kristin Hüttmann and Christina Mänz
Editorial team: Thomas Zoufal, Maike Bierbaum, Ulrike Behrens, Barbara Warmbein
Production and design: Stefanie Fahlfeder and Cristina Lopez Gonzalez
Images: DESY: Maike Bierbaum, Carolin Gnebner, Kristin Hüttmann, Christina Mänz, Marta Mayer, Sarah Mechbal, Jörg Müller, Susann Neidworok; istockphoto.com, estherpoon
Contakt: inform@desy.de