Tobias Esswein, IBM Research prize winner 2019
We are very proud to announce that Tobias Esswein, PhD student of the Materials Theory group, has been awarded the IBM Research Forschungspreis for his excellent Master Thesis "Exploring Ferroelectric Quantum Criticality and Superconductivity in KTaO3".
Tobias Esswein's computational research explored the existence of quantum criticality and its possible relationship to superconductivity in dielectric potassium tantalate. He found that this material exhibits a ferroelectric quantum critical point, with the quantum phase transition occuring as a function of electron doping. He discovered that the quantum critical point coincides with the emergence of superconductivity, suggesting a correlation between the phenomena as in strontium titanate.
The award will be handed over to the prizewinner at the ETH-day on November 16, 2019. Congratulations Tobias!