On 13 September, a delegation from the German national research centre for fundamental science DESY (Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron) visited FTMC.

 

It is one of the world's leading particle acceleration centres, with accelerators used to investigate the structure, dynamics and function of matter, and conducts a broad spectrum of interdisciplinary scientific research in four main areas: particle and high energy physics; photon science; astroparticle physics; and the development, construction and operation of particle accelerators.

 

DESY's motto is "The Decoding of Matter", and this is reflected in its work. Scientists here explore the microcosm in all its variety – from the interactions of tiny elementary particles and the behaviour of new types of nanomaterials to biomolecular processes that are essential to life.

 

The accelerators and detectors they are designing and building generate the world’s most intense X-ray light, accelerate particles to record energies and open completely new windows onto the universe, DESY says.

 

DESY cooperates with industry and business to promote new technologies that will benefit society and encourage innovations. And more recently, the centre has been visiting the Baltic countries to explore opportunities for collaboration with other research institutions.

 

 

 

On Friday afternoon, the FTMC was visited by DESY representatives: the head of the delegation, Prof. Dr. Wim Leemans, Director of the Accelerator Division, Dr. Ingmar Hartl, Head of the DESY FS-LA Laser Science & Technology, Dr. Deike Pahl, representative of the European X-Ray Free-Electron Laser Facility (European XFEL) project, as well as DESY scientists Dr. Kristjan Põder, Dr. Rolf Treusch, Dr. Martin Sandhop and Dr. Hans-Christian Wille.

 

The FTMC was represented at the meeting by the Director of the Center, Prof. Dr. Ramūnas Skaudžius, the Acting Deputy Director for Science, Dr. Lina Mikoliūnaitė, and the Deputy Director for General Affairs, Marija Gutauskienė.

 

 

 

The meeting started with a visit to several of our laboratories. Dr. Zigmas Balevičius, a physicist at the FTMC Department of Laser Technologies, presented the work carried out in the Plasmonics and Nanophotonics Laboratory; Artur Plotnikov, Chief Engineer at the Department of Nuclear Research, talked about radiocarbon dating at the Accelerator Mass Spectrometry Laboratory; Dr. Jan Devenson from the Department of Optoelectronics demonstrated the molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) facility for growing crystalline semiconductor structures, and Dr. Linas Minkevičius, a physicist in the same department, presented terahertz radiation research in the Terahertz Photonics Laboratory.

 

 

 

This was followed by presentations by FTMC and DESY and informal discussions. The German research centre is particularly interested in laser cooperation – FTMC Department of Laser Technologies has already established contacts in the past and this time our Center was invited to participate in next year's international event Science City Day in Hamburg. The DESY representatives expressed their interest in the FTMC potential to contribute to industrial development and innovation, and added that they were very interested in terahertz research and its applications for consumers.