Helmholtz Doctoral Award for Hanna Trzesniowski
Helmholtz president Otmar D. Wiestler presented Hanna Trzesniowski with the Helmholtz Doctoral Prize on 8 July 2025. © Oliver Walterscheid
The Helmholtz President surrounded by the doctoral prize winners (from left to right): Marvin Carl May, Clara Vázquez García, Stephan Hilpmann, Lars Grundhöfer, Otmar D. Wiestler, Laura Helleckes, Monica Keszler, Benedikt Wagner, Hanna Trzesniowski, Celia Dobersalske, Tim Ziegler, and Vanessa Stenvers. © Oliver Walterscheid
During her doctoral studies at the Helmholtz Centre Berlin, Hanna Trzesniowski conducted research on nickel-based electrocatalysts for water splitting. Her work contributes to a deeper understanding of alkaline water electrolysis and paves the way for the development of more efficient and stable catalysts. On 8 July 2025, she received the Helmholtz Doctoral Prize, which honours the best and most original doctoral theses in the Helmholtz Association.
Almost 9,000 doctoral students are conducting research at Helmholtz. Eleven of them have now been honoured – one of them is Hanna Trzesniowski, who wrote her doctoral thesis at HZB and now works in Berkeley in the USA. On 8 July, she received the Helmholtz Doctoral Prize in the ‘Matter’ category from the President of Helmholtz, Prof. Otmar D. Wiestler.
“Cutting-edge research thrives on outstanding young talent from all over the world. That is why we at Helmholtz do everything we can to provide them with an environment in which they can fully develop their potential,” said Otmar D. Wiestler. “This year's award winners are shining examples of scientific excellence and innovation at the highest level.”
About the award-winning work
Hydrogen is considered an important building block for the energy system of the future and is also needed in large quantities as a raw material for the chemical industry. With the help of catalysts, water can be split electrolytically to produce hydrogen.
As part of her doctoral research, Hanna Trzesniowski investigated nickel-based electrocatalysts for water splitting. Under alkaline conditions, these represent a promising alternative to rare materials such as iridium for hydrogen production. A key finding of her research was the elucidation of the electronic structure of nickel-iron oxide catalysts in their catalytically active state. In addition, she succeeded for the first time in spectroscopically observing the processes at the electrochemical interface – i.e. exactly where water splitting takes place. Hanna Trzesniowski's work contributes to deepening our understanding of alkaline water electrolysis and paving the way for the development of more efficient and stable catalysts.
- Spin waves inside a nano-oscillator imaged for the first timeFor the first time, researchers have directly imaged the magnetisation dynamics inside a spin Hall nano-oscillator — a nanoscale device that converts direct current into tunable microwave signals and is a promising building block for energy-efficient wireless communication and brain-inspired computing. A Swedish–German team led by the University of Gothenburg and Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) achieved this using time-resolved scanning transmission X-ray microscopy at the MAXYMUS instrument at BESSY II. The results, now published in Advanced Materials, reveal spin-wave features that had escaped previous, indirect measurement techniques.
- BESSY II: High-resolution insights into individual biomolecules and catalystsVery small biological samples and even individual biomolecules can now be examined under near-physiological conditions with high confidence at the BESSY II infrared beamline with a newly validated and improved technique: The nanoscale infrared spectroscopy (s-SNOM) with ultra-thin silicon-based membranes. An international team demonstrated after an initial proof of concept, that high-resolution (a few tens of nanometres) nano-IR measurements reliably match expected far-field IR spectra in an aqueous environment. This methodological advance provides a solid foundation for studying biomaterials or observing catalytic processes in a liquid environment.
- New method shows how molecular switches are influenced by their neighborsResearchers at Friedrich Schiller University Jena and the Helmholtz Centre Berlin (HZB) have, for the first time, been able to directly observe how the environment surrounding a molecular switch influences its electronic structure. Molecular switches are molecules that can be switched between two states by external influences such as changes in temperature—similar to a switch with the positions »On« and »Off«. Such molecules are being investigated as potential building blocks for future data storage devices or sensor materials. Using magnetic-field-dependent terahertz spectroscopy, the researchers have now, for the first time, been able to distinguish whether neighbouring molecules in a material are in the same or different states. The results have been published in the journal »Angewandte Chemie International Edition«.