Mierk Schwabe receives PhD Research Prize from the European Physical Society

March 24, 2011
The Plasma Physics Division of the European Physical Society (EPS) awards its PhD Research Prize this year to Mierk Schwabe and two other physicists. With this award, the EPS honours the exceptional quality of the work carried out by young physicists as part of their PhD research in any area of plasma physics. The MPE scientist Schwabe receives the prize for her thesis on Complex Plasmas.
Just as in a genuine liquid, the micrometre-sized particles in a complex plasma can form drops.

The award ceremony will take place in the framework of the annual EPS Plasma Physics Conference in June 2011 in Strasbourg. In addition to three years' EPS individual membership, Schwabe will have the opportunity to present her thesis in a talk at the EPS conference.

During her PhD, Schwabe concentrated on Complex Plasmas - ionized gases, which contain small particles with a size of only a few micrometres. In these Complex Plasmas she studied effects that occur in normal liquids as well, such as the propagation of waves or the formation of drops and bubbles. Schwabe was able to show that already a few thousand particles in a complex plasma can behave just like a liquid. In conventional liquids containing tiny molecules this would correspond to only a few nanometres. Studying processes in complex plasmas therefore is an important step to better understand nano-liquids.

Plasma Crystal Project at MPE

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