Aurèle Adam develops THz near-field imaging and spectroscopy. Research: (1) apertureless scattering-type near-field optical microscopy (s-SNOM) at THz frequencies for nanometre spatial resolution imaging of material properties; (2) THz time-domain spectroscopy of quantum materials and condensed matter systems; (3) antenna-coupled detectors and sources for THz near-field imaging. Relevant to quantum material characterisation at the nanoscale.
Boland's group focuses on THz spectroscopy of semiconductor nanostructures and 2D materials for quantum sensing applications. Research directions: (1) THz optical pump–THz probe spectroscopy — measuring ultrafast carrier dynamics in semiconductor nanowires, quantum wells, and 2D materials (graphene, TMDs, perovskites) after optical excitation; (2) Near-field THz nanoscopy — sub-wavelength THz imaging of carrier distributions and quantum phase domains; (3) THz-active quantum devices — studying exciton and polaron dynamics in perovskite and III-V semiconductors at THz frequencies; (4) 2D material sensors — graphene-based THz detectors and emitters. Applications in quantum-material characterization and quantum sensing.
Develops second- and third-harmonic generation (SHG/THG) nonlinear optical microscopy to image collagen and other non-centrosymmetric structural proteins label-free in tissue, with applications to cancer diagnosis and fibrosis, pushing spatial/orientational resolution of structural imaging in intact tissue.
Curmi is a structural and single-molecule biophysicist whose most-cited work is on the light-harvesting antenna proteins of cryptophyte algae, where he and collaborators reported long-lived electronic coherence at ambient temperature — one of the founding results of the quantum-biology field and still one of its most argued-over. His group determines the structures of these antenna complexes and engineers them, and separately works on protein-based molecular motors and on single-molecule fluorescence and FRET measurements of conformational dynamics. Positioned against the established body of NV-ensemble quantum sensing work — DEER, nanoscale NMR and T1 relaxometry protocols operating at pT/sqrt(Hz) field sensitivity — Curmi supplies the biological systems in which quantum coherence is actually claimed to matter; a pT/sqrt(Hz)-class spin sensor capable of watching radical-pair or exciton dynamics in situ would be aimed at exactly the questions his structures raise. Preferred attribute present: genuine quantum-biology substrate rather than a quantum-flavoured metaphor.
Research focuses on quantum dynamics and excited-state reactivity in biological and synthetic light-harvesting systems. Discovered long-lived quantum coherence in photosynthetic light-harvesting complexes (FMO, 2007). Develops 2D electronic spectroscopy techniques to probe excitonic transport, open quantum systems, and photochemical reaction dynamics on femtosecond timescales. Director NSF QuBBE; co-director Berggren Center for Quantum Biology and Medicine.
Fayer's group develops and applies ultrafast 2D infrared spectroscopy to resolve structural dynamics of water, proteins, and complex fluids on femtosecond-to-picosecond timescales, pushing the temporal resolution of vibrational spectroscopy well past what linear methods can access.
Fleming pioneered two-dimensional electronic spectroscopy and used it to reveal long-lived quantum coherences in photosynthetic light-harvesting complexes, work that reframed how energy transfer efficiency in natural and artificial light-harvesting systems is understood.
Prof. Gaynor (Chemistry, joined summer 2023) develops cutting-edge ultrafast spectroscopy at the physics-chemistry frontier. Directions: (1) Attochemistry — new ultrafast laser spectroscopies operating on attosecond to femtosecond timescales to directly measure how electron spin and orbital motion couple to molecular geometry (spin-vibronic coupling) in chiral molecules and materials of interest for energy conversion and spintronics; (2) Multidimensional nonlinear spectroscopy (2D electronic spectroscopy, 2D vibrational) to track energy and charge transfer immediately after photoexcitation; (3) Instrumentation-first approach: building novel attosecond transient absorption and correlation spectroscopy apparatus from scratch, enabling entirely new observables (e.g., electron-nuclear and spin-orbital correlations). INQUIRE faculty affiliate. Beckman Young Investigator 2025 ($600k, 4 yrs); Packard Fellow 2025 ($875k, 5 yrs).
Ginsberg's group devises new ultrafast electron- and optical-microscopy modalities to watch charge, energy, and structural dynamics in soft and hybrid materials (organic semiconductors, perovskites, biomolecular assemblies) on their native nanometer/femtosecond scales. The lab is actively recruiting postdocs to extend these methods toward operando imaging of energy materials.
Halsall is a senior PSI photonics researcher focusing on semiconductor spectroscopy and photonic quantum device characterization. Research directions: (1) Deep-level transient spectroscopy (DLTS) — characterizing defects and impurities in semiconductor quantum device structures (Si, GaN, SiC) that are relevant to qubit coherence; (2) Photoluminescence mapping — spatial mapping of optical quality in quantum well and dot wafers for quantum sensing device development; (3) InGaN/GaN quantum wells — non-destructive optical characterization of LED and sensor structures; (4) THz and infrared spectroscopy — contactless Hall measurements and Drude response for quantum material characterization. Provides photonic metrology tools for characterizing quantum sensing device materials.