Research areas

Surface Science

The mission of the Surface Science Laboratory at the Technical University of Darmstadt is to advance the fundamental understanding of the chemical and physical processes, energetics and dynamics of surfaces and interfaces in functional materials and devices for renewable energy conversion and storage.
The group uses advanced surface science techniques to investigate surfaces and interfaces of functional materials and devices. The aim is to yield chemically resolved high-resolution insight in space and time into the processes and phenomena which determine function, efficiency, and lifetime of energy materials and devices.
We operate various integrated ultrahigh vacuum systems, which combine different surface analytical tools like photoemission spectroscopies (XPS/UPS/IPES), scanning probe techniques (STM/AFM), vibrational spectroscopies (HREELS, (time-resolved) FTIR and Raman), and electron diffraction (LEED) with the preparation of thin films (thermal evaporation, close-spaced sublimation, magnetron sputtering, CVD, ALD). Next to studies on well-defined model system in ultrahigh vacuum, we perform experiments under realistic reaction or working conditions using optical spectroscopies as well as synchrotron-based X-ray spectroscopy and scattering methods.