École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

SW
EPFL
www.epfl.ch
 

Organization profile:
The activity of the Laboratory of Physics of Complex Matter (LPMC) at Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) covers a broad range of topics. It includes studies of the basic physical properties of novel electronic materials like cuprate or pnictide superconductors, organic kagome lattices, low-dimensional conductors, graphene and magnetic semiconductors. One of our goals is to learn how to improve the materials’ quality in order to reveal their intrinsic features. The broad ranges of materials are studied by original experimental techniques developed and implemented in our group. These are electronic transport measurements (50 mK to 1000 K, at pressure sup to 20 GPa), Electron Spin Resonance (up to 420 GHz, with high pressure, high temperature and stopped-flow options), and Atomic- and Photonic Force Microscopy. We are extending our activity by implementing a laboratory for high pressure, high temperature crystal growth.
 

Leader:
Laszlo Forro is Professor of Physics at LPMC in high pressure transport and magnetic properties of novel electronic conductors, including organic metals, fullerene superconductors, carbon nanotubes, high Tc superconductors etc. He has over 400 publications and 14.000 citations.
Prof. Janusz Karpinski is an expert in high pressure high temperature synthesis of materials and crystal growth. Recently he joined LPMC and he organizes the HP laboratory at LPMC. J. Karpinski’s team at ETH Zurich was one of the first who succeeded in the single crystal growth of pnictides, MgB2, Hg- and Os-based superconductors and YBa2Cu4O8. His team is working on the crystal growth of the LnFeAsO phases (Ln=La, Pr, Nd, Sm, Gd) pure and substituted with F, Th, Co and P with the goal to investigate basic properties relevant for applications and on searching for new superconductors. He is coauthor of more than 400 papers. 
 

Expertise:
Synthesis of materials at high pressure and high temperature. Crystal growth of superconductors.  Structure, magnetic and transport property measurements. Investigations of transport properties at high pressure. Electron spin resonance measurements up to high frequencies and high pressures. Optical conductivity measurements under high pressures.
 

Specific facilities:
High pressure cubic anvils for synthesis and crystal growth. SQUID, PPMS, Focused Ion Beam, Magnetotransport facilities, High pressure cells for transport measurements up to 25 GPa and 50 mK.
ESR spectrometers up to 420 GHz.
 

Personnel assigned to this project:
Prof. L. Forro, Dr. J. Karpinski, Dr. S. Katrych
 

Main tasks in SUPER-IRON:

• Material preparation under high pressure
• Magnetotransport and optical properties under high pressure
• FIB nanopatterning