New poster prize winner

Besides Gabriel Rein (Theoretische Physik 1, Prof. Dr. Fakher Assaad), Simon Widmann is one of two poster prize winners who prevailed over 40 contributions to the poster presentations at the Quantum Matter Academy (QMA) Retreat on “Topological Quantum Matter” that took place in Leipzig from September 25-27, 2023. Simon Widmann, who is now a PhD student at the Chair for Applied Physics, presented a poster with the title “Acoustic Inclined 2D SSH Model”, a part of his master thesis that he wrote at the Chair for Experimental Physics VII (Prof. Dr. Friedrich Reinert, supervisor and first reviewer). The QMA is a part of the "Cluster of Excellence ct.qmat" and a kind of association for young researchers in the cluster.

Simon Widmann built a two-dimensional crystal that uses small cylindrical resonators for sound waves positioned on the individual lattice points instead of atoms. The resonators are hollow and filled with air. Small connections between neighboring hollow cylinders allow sound to propagate in the acoustic crystal. Due to the lattice constant in the centimeter range, the band structure of the acoustic crystal is in the audible range. In this system, they were able to realize, among other things, a topological insulator in which sound waves of a certain frequency propagate only at the edge of the lattice.

He has now moved from sound to light, working on Topological Photonics with Prof. Dr. Sebastian Klembt as a supervisor.