Ferenc Krausz

Ferenc Krausz (born 17 May 1962 in Mór, Hungary) is a Hungarian-Austrian physicist, whose research team has generated and measured the first attosecond light pulse and used it for capturing electrons’ motion inside atoms, marking the birth of attosecond science.

Academic career

Krausz studied theoretical physics at Eötvös Loránd University and electrical engineering at the Technical University of Budapest in Hungary. After his habilitation at the Technical University of Vienna, in Austria, he became professor at the same institute. In 2003 he was appointed director at the Max Planck Institute for Quantum Optics in Garching and in 2004 became chair of experimental physics at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich. In 2006 he co-founded the [http://www.munich-photonics.de/map.en.html Munich Centre of Advanced Photonics (MAP)] and began serving as one of its directors.

Research

After advancing femtosecond laser pulse generation and measurement (briefly: femtosecond technology) to its ultimate limit set by the field oscillation cycle of light by a series of innovations [ [http://www.attoworld.de/publications/publ_2000.html T. Brabec & F. Krausz, "Rev. Mod. Phys." 72, 545 (2000)] ] , including the co-invention of chirped mulilayer dielectric mirrors for dispersion control of ultrashort light pulses [ [http://www.attoworld.de/publications/publ_1994.html R. Szipöcs, K. Ferencz, Ch. Spielmann & F. Krausz, "Opt. Lett." 19, 201 (1994)] ] , he and his coworkers, in 2001, were the first to generate and measure an attosecond pulse (of extreme ultraviolet light) [ [http://www.attoworld.de/publications/publ_2001.html M. Hentschel "et al.", "Nature" 414, 509 (2001)] ] and – one year later – demonstrated the ability of attosecond metrology to track sub-atomic-scale electron dynamics in real time [ [http://www.attoworld.de/publications/publ_2002.html M. Drescher "et al.", "Nature" 419, 803 (2002)] ] . With controlled light waveforms [ [http://www.attoworld.de/publications/publ_2003.html A. Baltuska "et al.", "Nature" 421, 611 (2003)] ] , he and his collaborators demonstrated steering electrons in and around atoms, with several far-reaching implications. These include attosecond pulse generation with reproducible characteristics [ [http://www.attoworld.de/publications/publ_2004.html R. Kienberger "et al.", "Nature" 427, 817 (2004)] ] , sampling the field oscillation of light with an attosecond oscilloscope [ [http://www.attoworld.de/publications/publ_2004.html E. Goulielmakis "et al.", "Science" 305, 1267 (2004)] ] , controlling chemical reactions via steering electrons in molecules with the field of light [ [http://www.attoworld.de/publications/publ_2006.html M. Kling "et al.", "Science" 312, 246 (2006)] ] , and real-time observation of electron tunnelling from atoms [ [http://www.attoworld.de/publications/publ_2007.html M. Uiberacker "et al.", "Nature" 446, 627 (2007)] ] and atomic-scale electron transport in solids [ [http://www.attoworld.de/publications/publ_2007.html A. Cavalieri "et al.", "Nature" 449, 1029 (2007)] ] . For these achievements, he received the [http://www.wittgenstein-club.at/ Wittgenstein Award] in Austria in 2002 and the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft in Germany in 2006, which are the highest honours awarded in science in these countries, along with several awards in other countries including Hungary, Sweden, United Kingdom, and USA.

Publications

External links

* [http://www.dfg.de/aktuelles_presse/preise/leibniz_preis/2006/krausz.html Portrait at the Deutschen Forschungsgesellschaft]
* [http://www.attoworld.de/people/Krausz/FKrausz.html Homepage of Ferenc Krausz]