Welcome to the Condensed Matter Physics Group

We found a new class of materials which is now referred to as 2D atomic crystals. Such crystals can be seen as individual atomic planes “pulled out” of bulk, 3D crystals. Despite being only one atom thick and unprotected from the immediate environment, these materials are stable under ambient conditions, exhibit high crystal quality and are continuous on a macroscopic scale (see our popular articles in Scientific American, Physics Today and Physics World as well as reviews in Nature Materials, Science and Review of Modern Physics).

 

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We study liquids at sufficiently low temperatures so that the quantum properties of the particles forming the liquid prevail. There are two isotopes of helium, 4He (boson) and 3He (fermion), that remain liquid to absolute zero and show the phenomemon of superfluidity. Both are excellent systems for testing our understanding of the quantum behaviour of condensed matter from first principles, especially the role of various symmetries which are spontaneously broken when different superfluid states form.

Our current work includes:

Quantum turbulence in superfluid 4He in the T=0 limit Quantised vortices and domain walls in 2d superfluid 3He-A

 

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We have nanofabricated a medium with strong magnetic response at visible-light frequencies, including a band with negative m. A medium is made of electromagnetically coupled pairs of gold dots with geometry and symmetry carefully designed at nanometre level. The 600-700Thz magnetic response arises due to the excitation of an antisymmetric plasmon resonance. The high-frequency permeability qualitatively reveals itself in a novel effect of optical impedance matching. Our approach shows for the first time the feasibility of magnetism at visible frequencies and paves a way towards magnetic and left-handed components for visible optics.

 

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We developed a pioneering technique named ballistic Hall magnetometry, which allowed magnetisation measurements of individual superconductors of submicron size. This work has led to a number of surprising and counter-intuitive observations, such as giant, fractional and “negative” vortices and the paramagnetic Meissner effect.

 

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Our educational experiments on magnetic levitation have attracted both intense attention of experts and massive media coverage and are featured in dozens of textbooks.

 

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We demonstrated a new microfabricated adhesive based on the same physics mechanism that underlies the amazing climbing ability of geckos. The work is rated by experts as the first proof of concept of dry adhesives based on van der Waals interaction.

 

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We have also exploited the technique of ballistic Hall micromagnetometry to detect sub-nanometre changes in the position of individual domain walls and observed how they move between adjacent Peierls valleys

 

Selected publications - In the News - Further Information