Centre for Advanced Laser Applications: Hauptseite

At the Centre for Advanced Laser Applications (CALA), located on the Research/HighTech Campus in Garching, physicists, physicians and biologists are exploring the practical potential of a unique array of state-of-the-art laser technologies. Their principal goal is to develop sensitive and cost-efficient laser-based methods for detection and therapy of cancer and other types of chronic disease, as early diagnosis is the key to successful treatment of these conditions.

Current efforts focus on the use of high-intensity X-rays for diagnostic biomedical imaging, and the application of laser-generated proton and carbon-ion beams to tumor therapy. In addition, CALA’s researchers are investigating innovative approaches to the analysis of blood samples and expired air by means of high-resolution laser-based infrared spectroscopy, which could provide the basis for risk-free screening procedures. less

ATLAS PFS-pro LION LUX ETTF HF SPECTRE BIRD InfraLight

Light Sources

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advanced multilayer optics

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We aim at pushing the frontiers of designing, fabricating and characterizing multilayer optics for sub-cycle control of infrared-to-ultraviolet laser light.

Volodymyr Pervak — Ever since their invention, aperiodic optical multilayer structures have been driving the advancement of ultrafast laser technology towards ever broader bandwidth and ever shorter pulses. Deposition of dozens of dielectric layers with sub-nanometer accuracy permits manipulation of the spectral phase and amplitude of optical radiation over a full octave and beyond. With the help of design, fabrication, and characterization techniques defining the state of the art, We develop optical multilayers for wide-band light waveform synthesis all the way from the infrared to the ultraviolet, for the pursuit of our Just Cause and – via Ultrafast Innovations – for the ultrafast community world wide. … more

Volodymyr Pervak — Ever since their invention, aperiodic optical multilayer structures have been driving the advancement of ultrafast laser technology towards ever broader bandwidth and ever shorter pulses. Deposition of dozens of dielectric layers with sub-nanometer accuracy permits manipulation of the spectral phase and amplitude of optical radiation over a full octave and beyond. With the help of design, fabrication, and characterization techniques defining the state of the art, We develop optical multilayers for wide-band light waveform synthesis all the way from the infrared to the ultraviolet, for the pursuit of our Just Cause and – via Ultrafast Innovations – for the ultrafast community world wide. … more
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attosecond metrology 2.0

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Controlling and measuring ever faster electron dynamics with ever better accuracy is going to have applications across multiple disciplines.

Matthew Weidman, Vladislav Yakovlev and Johannes Schötz — In solids, electronic motions underlie signal processing. In molecules, they spawn “fingerprints” of their atomic structure and composition. The valence-conduction band and vibrational-electronic energy level separations, respectively, imply their unfolding on sub-picosecond to sub-femtosecond scales. The emanating electromagnetic field contains the full history of the underlying dynamics. By advancing our ability to induce, control, and monitor charge-carrier dynamics with controlled light, as well as our insight into light-electron interactions, we pursue increasing the bandwidth and sensitivity of time-resolved electric-field metrology. This will serve the pursuit of our Just Cause by extending the bandwidth of electric-field molecular fingerprints from 100 THz to several PHz, as well as help pushing the frontiers of electron-based signal processing.… more

Matthew Weidman, Vladislav Yakovlev and Johannes Schötz — In solids, electronic motions underlie signal processing. In molecules, they spawn “fingerprints” of their atomic structure and composition. The valence-conduction band and vibrational-electronic energy level separations, respectively, imply their unfolding on sub-picosecond to sub-femtosecond scales. The emanating electromagnetic field contains the full history of the underlying dynamics. By advancing our ability to induce, control, and monitor charge-carrier dynamics with controlled light, as well as our insight into light-electron interactions, we pursue increasing the bandwidth and sensitivity of time-resolved electric-field metrology. This will serve the pursuit of our Just Cause by extending the bandwidth of electric-field molecular fingerprints from 100 THz to several PHz, as well as help pushing the frontiers of electron-based signal processing.… more
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Center for Molecular Fingerprinting

laser science life science

The next generation of field-resolved spectrometers promises novel avenues to probing human health at the populational level.

Mihaela Žigman and Alexander Weigel — Health state changes in the body cause characteristic changes in the molecular composition of human blood. Thus, sensitive probing of liquid biopsies (blood plasma/serum) offers a potential means of assessing human health. Electric-field molecular fingerprinting (EMF) has the potential to capture even minor differences across complex molecular mixtures within a single measurement. Our research aims at developing the next-generation field-resolved molecular fingerprinting devices for infrared sensing that provide new levels of spectral coverage and molecular sensitivity. Similarly important, our goal is to reach the robustness and measurement reproducibility to perform large-scale populational cross-section studies and follow the condition of a single person over many years. Together with the development of bio-medical procedures, large-scale blood storage solutions, and reliable data analysis procedures we work towards our Just Cause to establish standardized human health monitoring based on electric-field molecular fingerprint spectroscopy of blood samples. … more

Mihaela Žigman and Alexander Weigel — Health state changes in the body cause characteristic changes in the molecular composition of human blood. Thus, sensitive probing of liquid biopsies (blood plasma/serum) offers a potential means of assessing human health. Electric-field molecular fingerprinting (EMF) has the potential to capture even minor differences across complex molecular mixtures within a single measurement. Our research aims at developing the next-generation field-resolved molecular fingerprinting devices for infrared sensing that provide new levels of spectral coverage and molecular sensitivity. Similarly important, our goal is to reach the robustness and measurement reproducibility to perform large-scale populational cross-section studies and follow the condition of a single person over many years. Together with the development of bio-medical procedures, large-scale blood storage solutions, and reliable data analysis procedures we work towards our Just Cause to establish standardized human health monitoring based on electric-field molecular fingerprint spectroscopy of blood samples.… more
laser science life science
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electric-field molecular fingerprinting

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Within the vanguard of probing living systems, we develop electric field molecular fingerprinting for detecting human disease.

Mihaela Žigman — The molecular composition of living organisms is a sensitive indicator of their physiological states. The capability of simultaneously observing changes in concentrations of a variety of molecules embedded in complex organic consortia is thus relevant to biology, medicine and more generally to all life sciences. Capitalizing on the broadband optics, ultrafast sources and precision femtosecond-attosecond field-resolving metrologies of Cala, we develop electric-field molecular fingerprinting (EMF) as a new cross-molecular analytical technique for fingerprinting human biofluids. In strategic partnership with the Center for Molecular Fingerprinting, we aim at advancing EMF to a high-throughput method for deep molecular fingerprinting and pursue clinical and populational studies to validate the utility of EMF for early detection of abnormalities in future quantitative health monitoring envisioned in our Just Cause. … more

Mihaela Žigman — The molecular composition of living organisms is a sensitive indicator of their physiological states. The capability of simultaneously observing changes in concentrations of a variety of molecules embedded in complex organic consortia is thus relevant to biology, medicine and more generally to all life sciences. Capitalizing on the broadband optics, ultrafast sources and precision femtosecond-attosecond field-resolving metrologies of Cala, we develop electric-field molecular fingerprinting (EMF) as a new cross-molecular analytical technique for fingerprinting human biofluids. In strategic partnership with the Center for Molecular Fingerprinting, we aim at advancing EMF to a high-throughput method for deep molecular fingerprinting and pursue clinical and populational studies to validate the utility of EMF for early detection of abnormalities in future quantitative health monitoring envisioned in our Just Cause. … more
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THz-to-PHz field-resolved metrology

FRM-Group AMPIII-Group

Generating stable optical waveforms and measuring them with (sub-)attosecond temporal accuracy, sub-wavelength spatial resolution, and single-photon sensitivity will enable spectroscopy and microscopy at its fundamental limits.

Ioachim Pupeza and Nicholas Karpowicz — We aim to reach unprecedented levels of precision and sensitivity in probing the response of matter to finely controlled excitation forces using waveforms stable on the level of quantum noise, combined with innovative PHz-bandwidth detection techniques. Field-resolved spectroscopy of impulsively-excited molecular vibrations will thus reveal a tremendous amount of information about the molecular makeup of complex biological systems. Field-resolved microscopy leveraging these advances will allow us to augment our measurements with sub-diffraction-limited resolution, giving an unparalleled view into the inner workings of plasmonic and biological systems… more

Ioachim Pupeza and Nicholas Karpowicz — We aim to reach unprecedented levels of precision and sensitivity in probing the response of matter to finely controlled excitation forces using waveforms stable on the level of quantum noise, combined with innovative PHz-bandwidth detection techniques. Field-resolved spectroscopy of impulsively-excited molecular vibrations will thus reveal a tremendous amount of information about the molecular makeup of complex biological systems. Field-resolved microscopy leveraging these advances will allow us to augment our measurements with sub-diffraction-limited resolution, giving an unparalleled view into the inner workings of plasmonic and biological systems… more
FRM-Group AMPIII-Group

Experiments

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Attosecond Science Laboratory

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ASL is strongly interested in new applications of photonics, especially in the medical field. It aims to become a center of excellence, making a strong impact on the local and regional level, while earning the recognition of international scientific organizations.

Abdallah Azzeer — Our isolated attosecond pulses of extreme ultraviolet light coming in synchronism with controlled few-cycle near-infrared laser waveforms are being used to explore the ultrafast response of emerging materials, such as two-dimensional (2D) materials and organic semiconductors under intense light-field excitations for the development of novel ultrafast optoelectronic devices. Novel sources of high-order harmonics based on organic semiconductor thin films are also investigated. In parallel, we are coordinating a multi-lateral collaboration between Cala at LMU-MPQ, KSU and KAUST aiming at validating electric-field molecular fingerprinting of human blood for detection and diagnosis of different types of cancer, based on samples collected at KSU and in clinical studies coordinated by KSU. … more

Abdallah Azzeer — Our isolated attosecond pulses of extreme ultraviolet light coming in synchronism with controlled few-cycle near-infrared laser waveforms are being used to explore the ultrafast response of emerging materials, such as two-dimensional (2D) materials and organic semiconductors under intense light-field excitations for the development of novel ultrafast optoelectronic devices. Novel sources of high-order harmonics based on organic semiconductor thin films are also investigated. In parallel, we are coordinating a multi-lateral collaboration between Cala at LMU-MPQ, KSU and KAUST aiming at validating electric-field molecular fingerprinting of human blood for detection and diagnosis of different types of cancer, based on samples collected at KSU and in clinical studies coordinated by KSU. … more
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field-resolved nano spectroscopy

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We push both experimental and theoretical development in ultrafast many-body physics. This combination provides a stimulating environment for students and postdocs.

Matthias kling — We develop and apply optical field sampling metrology on the nanoscale for resolving ultrafast processes in molecules and nanosystemson atto- to femtosecond timescales. Our fundamental experimental and theoretical research aims at facilitating novel lightwave electronics devices, uncovering and tailoring light-induced nanocatalysis, and exploring field-resolved bio-medical micro-spectroscopy.

Matthias kling — We develop and apply optical field sampling metrology on the nanoscale for resolving ultrafast processes in molecules and nanosystemson atto- to femtosecond timescales. Our fundamental experimental and theoretical research aims at facilitating novel lightwave electronics devices, uncovering and tailoring light-induced nanocatalysis, and exploring field-resolved bio-medical micro-spectroscopy.
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high-field lasers and applications

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Discovery on the smallest scales requires the most accurate tools - such as novel ultrabright particle and X-ray sources.

Stefan karsch — Our group focuses on developing state-of the art ultraintense solid-state lasers and applying them to drive energetic particle and photon sources. We operate the ATLAS Ti:Sa high-intensity laser, and currently upgrade it to deliver 25 fs, 60J, 2.5 PW pulses to serve as the backbone for CALA activities in particle acceleration, high-field and medical physics.

Stefan karsch — Our group focuses on developing state-of the art ultraintense solid-state lasers and applying them to drive energetic particle and photon sources. We operate the ATLAS Ti:Sa high-intensity laser, and currently upgrade it to deliver 25 fs, 60J, 2.5 PW pulses to serve as the backbone for CALA activities in particle acceleration, high-field and medical physics.
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laser ion acceleration

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Laser particle acceleration will enable novel insights in radiation chemistry, biology, and ultimately therapy.

Jörg schreiber — The claim that laser-driven ion beams bare high potential for applications, eventually even for a cost-effective therapy, is commonly based on the fact that the field structures in which the ions are accelerated have considerably smaller dimensions as compared to conventional accelerators. This may promise more compact and therefore less expensive accelerators in the future. But the microscopic dimensions over which electrons and ions are rapidly accelerated by the gigantic fields that are set up by the laser offer even more.

Jörg schreiber — The claim that laser-driven ion beams bare high potential for applications, eventually even for a cost-effective therapy, is commonly based on the fact that the field structures in which the ions are accelerated have considerably smaller dimensions as compared to conventional accelerators. This may promise more compact and therefore less expensive accelerators in the future. But the microscopic dimensions over which electrons and ions are rapidly accelerated by the gigantic fields that are set up by the laser offer even more.
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ultrafast x-ray physics

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Spatial, spectral and temporal shaping of attosecond soft x-ray pulses is a prerequisite for the control and steering of electron dynamics ins solids and nanostructures.

Ulf kleineberg — Our research is focused on the development of ultrafast X-ray optics for spatial, spectral and temporal shaping of attosecond soft X-ray pulses. For this purpose, we operate a nanotechnology cleanroom at MPQ equipped with state-of-the art thin film deposition and nanolithography tools. Ultrafast X-ray optics components are used as key elements in experiments revealing the ultrafast electronic dynamics in nanosystems with the required nanometer spatial and sub-femtosecond temporal resolution.

Ulf kleineberg — Our research is focused on the development of ultrafast X-ray optics for spatial, spectral and temporal shaping of attosecond soft X-ray pulses. For this purpose, we operate a nanotechnology cleanroom at MPQ equipped with state-of-the art thin film deposition and nanolithography tools. Ultrafast X-ray optics components are used as key elements in experiments revealing the ultrafast electronic dynamics in nanosystems with the required nanometer spatial and sub-femtosecond temporal resolution.
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