MAT Collaboration Meeting 2026

Over the past three decades, interest in nanoporous structures—including
single nanopores and nanoporous membranes—has grown enormously. Nanopores have
become powerful platforms for fabricating biomimetic channels, developing
model systems for exploring new nanoscale phenomena, and creating single-
molecule biosensors. Nanopores enabled DNA sequencing and progress has been...

Nanofluidic memristors have emerged as promising substrates in neuromorphic computing applications due to their programable conductance memory states that are reminiscent of the brain synapses. We explore different options for the modulation of the conductance of track-etched conical nanopores by programming series of rectangular voltage pulses of different characteristics: amplitude,...

Over the past years, our group has explored the use of bioinspired solid-state nanochannels and nanofluidic architectures as versatile platforms for controlling ionic transport at the nanoscale. Inspired by the remarkable transport and gating mechanisms found in biological ion channels, our research has focused on understanding how confinement, surface chemistry, molecular recognition, and...

Nanofluidic membranes can be used to harvest energy from salinity gradients, and bullet-shaped nanochannels offer promising characteristics, as their asymmetric geometry enhances power output relative to other nanochannel shapes [1]. For practical applications, however, energy conversion must be scaled from individual nanochannels to membranes containing large number of pores. In this...

Swift heavy ions deposit enormous electronic energy densities in solids, leading to the formation of latent ion tracks that provide a unique platform for investigating radiation–matter interactions under extreme conditions. Beyond their fundamental scientific significance, ion tracks have emerged as an enabling tool for the fabrication of nanoporous membranes, nanostructures, and advanced...

Ion-track etched membranes provide a versatile platform for the fabrication of highly ordered one- and three-dimensional (3D) nanostructures with precisely controlled architectures. Such control over nanoscale geometry, connectivity, and interfaces is essential for understanding how structure governs material properties and for developing functional nanostructured materials. At GSI, polymer...

The presentation will cover ESA’s needs for radiation testing of electronics,
materials, and other technologies for space applications, in support of
qualification, technology development, radiation hardness assurance and
failure investigations.
It will explain how the GSI UNILAC facility, and in particular the X0 heavy-
ion microprobe, can complement conventional...

The use of fast-timing radiation-resistant materials, e.g. diamond [1-3] or silicon [4], which will survive to the FAIR beam rates longer than plastics (typically lifetime of 1 week) has being investigated in the last decade using SIS18 ion beams produced at GSI. Despite the excellent results obtained, none of these options was suitable to cover an active area of 400x100 mm^2 for detecting...

Silicon carbide (SiC) power devices are promising for space applications but suffer from single event leakage current (SELC), single event burnout (SEB) and single event gate rupture (SEGR) under heavy ion irradiation. Our recent experimental and simulation studies have systematically investigated the mechanisms including heavy ion induced degradation in SiC junction barrier Schottky (JBS)...

The control interface to the microprobe has evolved pragmatically in step with user's needs over the past 40 years. In this process, utmost care was taken to create as little latency reacting to beam events as possible in order to accept the maximum amount of beam from the accelerator into the experiment. In the pre-FPGA or very early microcontroller era that meant implementing custom,...

We present a compact laser setup for investigating single-event-effects in semiconductors. In the presentation, we give an overview, how we used the setup for beamtime-preparation at GSI-microprobe with SuperJunction MOSFETs and microcontrollers as well as an overview of further use-cases.
The developed pulse-laser-setup uses an optical pick-up-unit of a DVD-writer including laserdiodes with...

The development of radiation-hard particle detectors is essential for next-generation nuclear physics experiments within the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) framework. Among candidate materials, Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD) diamond stands out due to its wide bandgap, high carrier mobility, and excellent radiation hardness, enabling operation in extreme environments [T....

The radiation-induced monoclinic-to-tetragonal phase transition in ZrO2 and HfO2 has been the subject of many investigations, but the transformation pathways and underlying structural mechanisms are still not well understood. In this study, microcrystalline powder samples of ZrO2 and HfO2 were irradiated with 946 MeV and 1470 MeV Au ions to a wide fluence range up to 3 × 1013 ions/cm2. To...

The recent discovery of irradiation-induced self-organized formation of the β/γ-Ga₂O₃ double-polymorph structure has revealed new opportunities to study ion-beam-driven phase transformations in radiation-tolerant semiconductors. While most previous studies considered nuclear (Sₙ) and electronic (Sₑ) energy deposition as largely independent, their coupled effects and the resulting...

Metallic glasses are ideal model systems for studying vitreous solids, yet linking atomic structure and its evolution in the potential energy landscape to mechanical properties remains a fundamental challenge. While structural rejuvenation is known to increase the Gibbs free energy and modify plastic deformation behavior, its microscopic origin, particularly the roles of medium-range order...

To induce material modification, including ion track formation, under high-energy ion irradiation in the electronic stopping regime, the electronic stopping power (S_e) is one of the important parameters. Since Se increases with ion energy at low energies and then decreases at high energies, it exhibits a maximum whose value becomes larger for heavier ions. Therefore, among monatomic ions, the...

Ultrathin and thin graphene oxide (GO) membranes with well-defined in-plane nanopores are promising for separation, sensing, molecular transport, and nanofluidic applications. A versatile route to fabricate such porous GO architectures is heavy-ion irradiation in the high electronic energy loss ($S_e$) regime or with intermediate-$S_e$ ions at grazing incidence ($1-10^\circ$). The resulting...

Radiation effects in polymers span a wide range of chemical and structural modifications, depending on the energy deposited by the ion and on the dimensions of the material. Our research has focused on polymer thin films as model systems for investigating these effects under controlled conditions of film thickness and ion irradiation. Over the past years, we have explored a broad range of...

Over the past decades, the effects of swift heavy ion (SHI) irradiation have been extensively studied across a wide range of materials. Most of these investigations have focused on bulk materials, providing fundamental insights into irradiation-induced processes and supporting the development of materials for high-radiation environments such as nuclear facilities, particle accelerators, and...

In cold space environments, the synthesis of organic molecules can occur following radiolysis of small molecules (H2O, CO, CH4, NH3 etc.) on cold surfaces like dust grains (molecular clouds) and icy bodies of the solar system [1].
We performed swift ion irradiation experiments related to formation and destruction of organic molecules at different accelerator facilities (GANIL, Caen/France,...

In this talk, we will provide an overview of the irradiation and in situ analysis facilities present at the beamline M3 at UNILAC. A focus will be on recent projects and developments related to questions in astrochemistry - from a detailed view on the radiolysis of complex organix molecules to effects of space weathering on cosmic dust analogues [1,2].

Moreover, we will provide a short...

Gallium oxide (Ga₂O₃) is a compelling member of the polymorphic oxide family, where ion beam modification offers a powerful route to tailor material structure and functionality. While the creation of defects in this crystal through elastic energy transfer (Sₙ) is well established and drives, for example, monoclinic‑to‑orthorhombic transformations, the role of inelastic energy loss (Sₑ) remains...

β-Ga2O3 has attracted growing attention as a new wide-bandgap semiconductor material, because it has an extremely high bandgap energy of 4.8–4.9 eV and an expected high breakdown field of 8 MV/cm. Understanding irradiation effects on β-Ga2O3 materials is essential to evaluate the electrical performance and reliability of devices in harsh radiation environments. The ion tracks and the thermal...

Beam nanolattice is a new class of mechanical metamaterials with characteristic sizes on the order of hundreds of nanometers. Due to extremely special size effects, structural characteristics and material selection, the mechanical properties of this type of porous materials can simultaneously achieve high strength and high strain with lighter weight, which is expected to bring revolutionary...

Swift-heavy-ion irradiation experiments under high static pressures in diamond anvil cells (DACs) have shown that ion-induced processes can drastically influence the pressure-dependent phase behavior of materials. For example, irradiation can transform zirconia (ZrO$_2$) into the orthorhombic-II phase or induce the formation of the high-pressure zircon (ZrSiO$_4$) polymorph reidite at...

The rainbow effect is a fundamental phenomenon in any scattering theory of waves and particles, describing the accumulation of trajectories at characteristic angles due to extrema of the deflection function. In particular, the atomic rainbow effect – arising in semiclassical particle scattering due to singularities in the classical differential cross section – provides valuable information...

The simultaneous exposure of materials to high pressure and swift heavy-ion irradiation represents a unique experimental approach, pioneered at the GSI Helmholtz Center Darmstadt [1-3]. Ion-irradiation induced structural transformations have been observed in compressed samples, including non-equilibrium phase transitions [1], the formation of novel phases and their stabilization [2].

Here...

Swift heavy ion (SHI) irradiation creates unique extreme conditions because each ion deposits a large amount of energy within a localized region [1,2]. Such intense excitation can induce local melting, amorphization, defect formation, phase transformations, and rapid recrystallization [1]. An important consequence is the modification of interatomic bonding and the local chemical environment,...

The energy deposition of ions in water generates pressure waves, known as ionoacoustic signals. These are commonly described within the thermoacoustic approximation, where localised heating and subsequent volume expansion are considered the primary sources of wave generation. According to this model, no pressure wave should be observed at 4 °C, a prediction confirmed in laser absorption...

The two experimental target stations operated by the University of Duisburg-Essen (UDE) for ion–matter interaction studies at GSI will be presented, with a focus on the ToF-SIMS/SNMS setup at the M1 beamline of the M-branch. The setup enables direct in-situ comparison of ion-induced particle emission under both swift-heavy-ion and keV ion bombardment using mass-spectrometric detection....

The Diamond-window-Paris–Edinburgh Cell (D-PEC) system is designed to combine a Paris–Edinburgh press with large-volume diamond-anvil chambers for experiments under simultaneous high-pressure and high-temperature conditions, up to 10 GPa and 1000 K. The setup enables optical access for in-situ measurements and observations. Compared with conventional diamond-anvil cell experiments, the various...

Nanostructured materials with hierarchical architectures are of increasing interest due to their tunable surface properties and enhanced functional performance in catalysis, sensing, and energy applications. For electrochemical applications, in particular, maximizing the accessible surface area while maintaining efficient transport and electrical connectivity is a key challenge. Hierarchical...

Summary: Solid-state nanochannels offer unique opportunities for miniaturized biosensing by coupling molecular recognition with iontronic signal transduction. In enzyme-functionalized nanochannels, biochemical reactions can locally modify the chemical environment at the channel interface, thereby altering the surface charge and ionic transport. Here, we experimentally investigate the...