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Most people value large chunks of gold - but scientists at the Vienna University of Technology are interested in gold at the smallest possible scale, because single gold atoms are potentially the most reactive catalysts for chemical reactions. However, when gold atoms are placed on a surface they tend to ball up into tiny nuggets consisting of several atoms.

First Bose-Einstein condensate of erbium produced in Innsbruck Francesca Ferlaino's research team at the University of Innsbruck is the first to successfully create a condensate of the exotic element erbium. The Innsbruck experimental physicists hold the world record in attaining the first Bose-Einstein condensates of different chemical elements.

A strong laser beam can remove an electron from an atom - a process which takes place almost instantly. At the Vienna University of Technology, this phenomenon could now be studied with a time resolution of less than ten attoseconds (ten billionths of a billionth of a second). Scientists succeeded in watching an atom being ionized and a free electron being "born".

Two lamps are brighter than one. This simple truism does not necessarily apply to lasers, as a team of scientists, led by the Vienna University of Technology found out. When one laser is shining and next to it another laser is turned on gradually, complex interactions between the two lasers can lead to a total shutdown and no light is emitted anymore.

Methanol, water and a copper-zinc catalyst may be used to produce carbon monoxide depleted hydrogen, a power source for PEM (polymer-electrolyte-membrane) fuel cells, with high efficiency. By identifying the copper-zinc phase, which generates particularly clean hydrogen, Innsbruck scientists have cleared a hurdle for cutting-edge energy use.

Printing three dimensional objects with incredibly fine details is now possible using "two-photon lithography". With this technology, tiny structures on a nanometer scale can be fabricated. Researchers at the Vienna University of Technology (TU Vienna) have now made a major breakthrough in speeding up this printing technique: The high-precision-3D-printer at TU Vienna is orders of magnitude faster than similar devices (see video).

Scientists at Vienna University of Technology have found a way to detect chemicals over long distances, even if they are enclosed in containers. People like to keep a safe distance from explosive substances, but in order to analyze them, close contact is usually inevitable. At the Vienna University of Technology, a new method has now been developed to detect chemicals inside a container over a distance of more than a hundred meters.

Embargoed until 20:00 CEST Thursday , The physicists of the University of Innsbruck and the Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information (IQOQI) in Innsbruck have come considerably closer to their goal to investigate complex phenomena in a model system: They have realized a digital, and therefore, universal quantum simulator in their laboratory, which can, in principle, simulate any physical system efficiently.

The planet Jupiter keeps asteroids on stable orbits - and in a similar way, electrons can be stabilized in their orbit around the atomic nucleus. Calculations carried out at the Vienna University of Technology have now been verified in an experiment. Planets can orbit a star for billions of years. Electrons circling the atomic nucleus are often visualized as tiny planets.

Previous theories imposed a limit on how "liquid" fluids can be. Recent results at the Vienna University of Technology suggest that this limit can be broken by a quark-gluon plasma, generated by heavy-ion collisions in particle accelerators. How liquid can a fluid be? This is a question particle physicists at the Vienna University of Technology have been working on.

Heisenberg's Uncertainty principle is arguably one of the most famous foundations of quantum physics. It says that not all properties of a quantum particle can be measured with unlimited accuracy. Until now, this has often been justified by the notion that every measurement necessarily has to disturb the quantum particle, which distorts the results of any further measurements.

Glass fiber cables are indispensable for the internet - now they can also be used as a quantum physics lab. The Vienna University of Technology is the only research facility in the world, where single atoms can be controllably coupled to the light in ultra-thin fiber glass. Specially prepared light waves interact with very small numbers of atoms, which makes it possible to build detectors that are extremely sensitive to tiny trace amounts of a substance.

The effect can be seen just by poking a stick into the water; at the water surface, the light changes its direction, the stick appears to be bent. This tilt is described by the refractive index. For years, scientists have been trying to create special materials with a negative refractive index - their optical properties are quite different from those of normal materials.

Two completely different quantum systems were successfully joined at Vienna University of Technology (TU Vienna). This should pave the way to feasible quantum-computer microchips. For years, quantum computers have been the holy grail of quantum technology. When a normal computer has to solve a number of problems, it can only execute them one after the other.

[ Florian Aigner A liquid does not have to be a disordered bunch of particles: A team of researchers at Vienna University of Technology (TU Vienna) and the University of Vienna has discovered intriguing structures formed by tiny particles floating in liquids. Under mechanical strain, particle clusters in liquids can spontaneously form strings and dramatically alter the properties of the liquid.

[ Florian Aigner The novel material graphene makes faster electronics possible. Scientists at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology at the Vienna University of Technology (TU Vienna) developed light-detectors made of graphene and analyzed their astonishing properties. High hopes are pinned on this new material: Graphene, a honeycomb-like carbon structure, made of only one layer of atoms, exhibits remarkable properties.

Repetitive error correction in a quantum processor A team of physicists at the University of Innsbruck, led by Philipp Schindler and Rainer Blatt, has been the first to demonstrate a crucial element for a future functioning quantum computer: repetitive error correction. This allows scientists to correct errors occurring in a quantum computer efficiently.

[ Florian Aigner At the Vienna University of Technology, sophisticated atomchips have been used to create pairs of quantum mechanically connected atom-twins. Until now, similar experiments were only possible using photons. Objects that are well separated in space but still cannot be understood separately belong to the profoundest mysteries of quantum physics.

[ Florian Aigner Quantum mechanical methods can now be used to study gravity: At the Vienna University of Technology (TU Vienna), a measurement method was developed, which allows to test the fundamental theories of physics. The world's most precise measurement methods are based on quantum physics. Atomic clocks or high-resolution magnetic resonance, which is used in medicine, rely on accurate measurements of quantum leaps: A particle excited at exactly the right frequency changes its quantum state ' this is called 'resonance spectroscopy'.

Scientists at the Vienna University of Technology (TU Vienna) have developed a method to steer waves on precisely defined trajectories, without any loss. This way, sound waves could be sent directly to a target, avoiding possible eavesdroppers. Tossing a ball to someone without anyone else being able to catch it is simple.