The Award Committee of the Japan Society of Vacuum and Surface Science (JVSS) has selected Dr. Takashi Kumagai (Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society, Germany) as the Rising Medalist of The Heinrich Rohrer Medal for the his achievements to combine plasmonic near-field physics with low-temperature scanning tunneling microscopy (STM). The prize will be awarded in a ceremony at the International Symposium on Surface Science(ISSSS-9) in November 2020, Takamatsu, Japan.
The work by Takashi Kumagai combines highly original research on naoscale surface science with the physics of locally enhanced electromagnetic fields in atonically controlled STM junctions. A key development technical development are nano-fabricated plasmonics tips allowing to localize of light down to the atomistic (i.e. Angstrom) length scale. This enabled highly reliable and reproducible experiments and the discovery of a novel processes like plasmon-assisted resonance electron transfer, near-field induced chemical reactions, and the demonstration of tip-enhanced resonance Raman spectroscopy in quantum point contacts.