The Gaede Prize 2020 is awarded to Dr. Takashi Kumagai for his outstanding work on near-field physics and chemistry in plasmonic nano-junctions. The Gaede award recognizes excellent work in the area of vacuum science and is awarded by the German Physical Society (DPG) in cooperation with the Gaede foundation to scientists in an early career stage.
Takashi Kumagai studied chemistry at the University of Kyoto and received his PhD degree in 2011 on visualization of hydrogen bond dynamics at surfaces. [more...]

Phase-Change materials such as the Ge₃Sb₂Te₆ compound (GST) can be reversibly switched between the amorphous and crystalline crystal phases by ultrashort laser pulses. At infrared wavelengths, the two phases of GST exhibit a large permittivity contrast, which can be used to control the dielectric background sensed by guided optical modes that propagate in close proximity.
In their work, the authors demonstrate experimentally and theoretically that a thin GST film on a polaritonic substrate (SiC) serves as an actively tunable material [more...]