Detecting hidden objects with terahertz beams
A self-learning system detects objects, no camera needed, just a single beam sensor. Terahertz beams are a useful tool for detecting hidden objects: They have a much longer wavelength than visible light and can easily penetrate many materials – such as biological tissue. Terahertz beams can therefore be used to image metal objects hidden in a wooden box, for example. An amazing variant of such a measurement has now been presented by a research team from the Institute of Photonics (Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology) at the TU Wien: With the help of a very special learning algorithm, which is not based on computer code as usual, but on optical elements, hidden objects can be detected – using a single radiation sensor that does not record an image, but can only measure a signal between “light” and “dark”.
Article: Detecting hidden objects with terahertz beams
The gravity of money laundering
Large masses attract objects – large economies attract money. TU Wien and Utrecht School of Economics show how global money laundering flows can be described with simple models. Money laundering is a problem that spans the globe: Proceeds from criminal activities – drug trafficking and corruption, for example – are shifted, often across national borders and through multiple stops, until the origin is no longer traceable and the original criminal money is white-washed. This enables criminal activity, makes it more difficult to solve crimes, and comes at a high economic cost – from the consequences of criminal activity and corruption to enormous losses in tax revenues. The TU Wien and the Utrecht School of Economics have now analyzed how to estimate the volume of dark financial flows and found that relatively simple statistical models inspired by physics can describe black money flows surprisingly well. A conservative estimate of the total volume of black money in the world is 2.3 trillion U.S. dollars per year.
Article: The gravity of money laundering
Microchips of the future: Suitable insulators are still lacking
Until now, hexagonal boron nitride was considered to be the insulator for miniaturized transistors of the future. New studies by the TU Wien show that this was the wrong approach: Here, one was probably on the wrong track. For decades, the trend in microelectronics has been toward ever smaller and more compact transistors. 2D materials such as graphene are seen as a beacon of hope here: they are the thinnest material layers possible, consisting of only one or a few atomic layers. Nevertheless, they can conduct electricity – conventional silicon technology, on the other hand, no longer works at this low layer thickness. However, such materials are not used in a vacuum; they have to be combined with suitable insulators in order to seal them off from unwanted environmental influences on the one hand and to control the flow of current via the so-called field effect on the other. Until now, hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) has generally been used for this purpose, as it forms an excellent environment for 2D materials. However, new investigations now show that, contrary to previous assumptions, thin hBN layers are not suitable as insulators for future miniaturized field-effect transistors – exorbitant leakage currents occur.
Article: Microchips of the future
ERC Grant for Ansgar Jüngel
The ERC grants of the European Research Council (ERC) are considered to be the most prestigious and highest endowed grants in the European research landscape. In this year’s round of awards, one of these grants again went to the TU Wien: Prof. Ansgar Jüngel from the Institute of Analysis and Scientific Computing at the TU Wien is awarded an ERC Advanced Grant, endowed with 1,945,000 euros. Prof. Jüngel draws inspiration for his mathematical research from biology, physics and also electrical engineering. In his research project “Emergent Network Structures and Neuromorphic Applications”, for which he receives the ERC Advanced Grant, Ansgar Jüngel wants to develop mathematical methods to better understand network structures. This involves, for example, the behavior of individual nerve cells, which can be described at the physical level, but also the laws of their interplay, their collective behavior, and possibilities for producing similar networks from electronic components as well.
Article: ERC Grant for Ansgar Jüngel
New biochip technology for better drug testing
Mini-organs in the form of small tissue spheres are used for tests in the pharmaceutical industry. Thanks to a method developed by the TU Wien, a uniform standard is now being created. Before drugs can be tested in clinical trials, they have to be tried out on artificially produced tissue samples. To do this, cells are cultivated and small spheres with a diameter of less than one millimeter are produced. However, a major problem in the past was that there were no uniform standards for these beads and no reliable method for producing tissue samples of uniform size and shape. As a result, results from different laboratories were hardly comparable, since tissue size has a direct influence on the behavior of cells and drugs. An invention from the TU Wien can now solve this problem: A biochip has been developed that can be used to produce tissue beads in exactly the desired sizes and supply them with nutrients or even drugs through a thin channel. A patent application has already been filed for the new biochip technology.
Article: New biochip technology for better drug testing
Three START Prizes for TU Wien
Laura Donnay, Julian Léonard and Hannes Mikula, three young researchers at TU Wien, have been awarded the prestigious START Prize by the Austrian Science Fund FWF, which is considered the most important Austrian award for young scientists. It is endowed with up to 1.2 million euros and is intended to support excellent young scientists in setting up their own research group at a top international level. The FWF announced the results of this year’s awards on 22 June: No less than three of the six START prizes go to TU Wien this year: physicist Laura Donnay is being honoured for her research on black holes, Julian Léonard is receiving the START prize for his project to realise a new quantum computing concept, and Hannes Mikula is researching ways to specifically combat tumour cells without damaging healthy cells.
Article: Three START Prizes for TU Wien
A little more rain – a lot more flooding
TUW uses past flood disasters to research future, even more severe extreme weather situations in the Petzenkirchen hydrology laboratory. Climate change increases the risk of flood disasters in Europe. The recent severe flooding has shown how quickly heavy rain can have devastating effects. It is to be expected that there will be even more dramatic flood events in the future. Research conducted by the Wien University of Technology and the Federal Office of Water Management in the 60-hectare hydrology laboratory in Petzenkirchen makes it possible to predict the effects of such events and to estimate the measures that can be taken to mitigate them – for example, by using suitable soil cultivation methods in agriculture that incorporate new findings in hydrology.
Article: A little more rain – a lot more flooding
Quantum cryptography record with higher-dimensional photons
A research team at TU Wien developed a new quantum transmission protocol that allows a higher data transmission rate and is at the same time much more robust against interference. Quantum cryptography is one of the most promising quantum technologies of our time: Exactly the same information is generated at two different locations, and the laws of quantum physics guarantee that no third person can intercept this information. This creates a code with which information can be perfectly encrypted. The team of Prof. Marcus Huber from the Atomic Institute of TU Wien developed a new type of transmission protocol, which has now been tested in practice in cooperation with Chinese research groups: Whereas until now one normally used photons that can be in two different states, the situation here is more complicated: Eight different paths can be taken by each of the photons. As the team has now been able to show, this makes the transmission of the quantum cryptographic key faster and also significantly more robust against interference.
Article: Quantum cryptography record with higher-dimensional photons
TACO – tamed materials
In the newly founded special research area TACO, researchers from TU Wien and the University of Wien are jointly investigating fundamental processes that take place in complex materials. Can materials be tamed? The special research area TACO, short for TAming COmplexity in Materials Modelling, is taking up this challenge. Complex new materials not only arouse the scientific interest of physicists and chemists, but the scientists also expect concrete benefits from new oxide compounds.
Article: TACO – tamed materials
TU Wien establishes Center for AI and Machine Learning
With the founding of the Center for Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (CAIML), TU Wine aims to firmly anchor itself in the top international field of this research area. We are living in the midst of a technological revolution: artificial intelligence and machine learning increasingly determine our everyday lives – even if we are often not even aware of it. Computer algorithms suggest videos we might like, they help us find the right way in the car, and scientific research is no longer imaginable without artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML). At TU Wien, research in this field has been carried out intensively and with great success for years – at different institutes and faculties, with different methods and objectives. In order to strengthen, network and bring together these research initiatives, the Center for Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (CAIML) has now been founded at TU Wien.
Article: TU Wien establishes Center for AI and Machine Learning
Bacteria as climate heroes
In order to establish a carbon-neutral circular economy in the future, technologies are needed that use CO2 as a raw material. In the form of formate, CO2 can be metabolised by certain bacteria. Acetogens are a group of bacteria that can metabolise formate. For example, they form acetic acid – an important basic chemical. If these bacteria are manipulated to produce ethanol or lactic acid, a comprehensive circular economy for the greenhouse gas CO2 could be realised. To make the process sustainable, the CO2 is extracted directly from the air and converted to formate using renewable energy. To find out how exactly formate can be utilised by the acetobacterium woodii (A. woodii for short), a team led by Stefan Pflügl from the Institute of Process Engineering, Environmental Engineering and Technical Biosciences at TU Wien investigated how the bacterium metabolises various substrates – including formate.
Article: Bacteria as climate heroes
TU Wien develops intelligent transistor
Revolutionary new electronic components can perform very different tasks depending on the need: A technology made for artificial intelligence. Normally, computer chips consist of electronic components that always do the same thing. In the future, however, more flexibility will be possible: New types of adaptive transistors can be switched at lightning speed so that they can take on different logical tasks as needed. This fundamentally changes the possibilities of chip design and opens up completely new opportunities in the field of artificial intelligence, neural networks or even logic that works with more values than just 0 and 1. In order to achieve this, the TU Wien did not rely on the usual silicon technology but on germanium and was successful: the most flexible transistor in the world has now been produced on the basis of germanium and presented in the specialist journal “ACS Nano”. The special properties of germanium and the use of dedicated programme electrodes made it possible to create a prototype for a new component that is set to usher in a new era of chip technology.
Article: TU Wien develops intelligent transistor
