HZB expert appointed chair of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Barcelona Research Centre
Prof. Dr. Susan Schorr © CCEM
Prof. Dr. Susan Schorr has been appointed to the newly established Scientific Advisory Board of the Barcelona Research Centre in Multiscale Science and Engineering and elected as its chair.
The Barcelona Research Centre in Multiscale Science and Engineering (CCEM) is part of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya in Barcelona. It is one of the world's leading centres for materials science, particularly in the fields of micro- and nanotechnology, nanotechnology and biomaterials. In 2024, the CCEM received the ‘Excelencia María de Maeztu’ accreditation of excellence. It promotes internationally renowned research institutes that contribute significantly to the further development of Spain as a centre of science and technology.
The CCEM's Scientific Advisory Board comprises a total of seven experienced scientists from Italy, Spain, Sweden, the Netherlands and Germany.
Susan Schorr heads the ‘Structure and Dynamics of Energy Materials’ (SE-ASD) department at the Helmholtz Centre Berlin and is a professor in the Department of Earth Sciences at the Free University of Berlin. With her team at HZB, she researches fundamental structure-property relationships of materials for energy conversion, including novel materials for solar cells.
HZB expertise in advisory boards, committees and scientific commissions
Twenty-five scientists from HZB are currently involved in scientific advisory boards, supervisory boards or similar advisory bodies. There, they contribute their recognized expertise and critical assessments, which help to ensure well-founded decisions.
- 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«.
- 3D magnetic field experiment at BESSY II takes spintronics a step further(Fe0.63Ni0.3Pd0.07)3P or FNPP is a magnetic material that exhibits complex magnetic structures even at room temperature. This makes the material of interest for spintronics, a field that could enable data processing with significantly lower energy consumption. One potential application is novel magnetic memory devices. However, generating and modifying the desired structures in a controlled manner remains a challenge to date. A new study led by HZB has now taken a step forward in this regard. They demonstrated at the worldwide unique VEKMAG-Station at BESSY II, that a tiny external B-field in the plane of the magnetic patterns is sufficient to change them.
- BESSY II: Evaporated perovskites in tandem solar cells improvedPerovskite-silicon tandem solar cells achieve significantly higher efficiencies than silicon solar cells on their own. One particularly attractive method is co-evaporation of the perovskite precursor molecules on top of the silicon subcell. Scientists at HZB have analysed film growth on the nanoscale at BESSY II and found a new way to improve the quality of the perovskite layer: adding a thin seed layer of caesium chloride between the two sub-cells promotes uniform perovskite growth and suppresses the formation of undesired lead iodide at the interface.