1 July 2024

Alexander Impertro receives this year‘s Theodor Hänsch Dissertation Prize

Alexander Impertro has been awarded this year's Theodor W. Hänsch Doctoral Thesis Award for his dissertation „Quantum Gas Microscopy of Interacting Quantum Matter with Artificial Gauge Fields.“
The prize, named after the Nobel Prize winner and pioneer of laser spectroscopy, honours particularly outstanding and ground-breaking dissertations in the field of physics.

In his laudatory speech, Impertro’s doctoral supervisor, Professor Immanuel Bloch, who mentored the thesis together with Professor Monika Aidelsburger, particularly emphasized the quality of Impertro‘s research and his approach to problem-solving. Impertro, Bloch noted, not only possesses the „magic touch“ needed to solve specific scientific questions. „Through his work, he also creates tools that are reusable - tools that research groups around the world adopt, develop further, and apply in new contexts,“ Bloch said. „One could hardly wish for more from scientific research.“ The dissertation thesis, which Impertro completed with the distinction summa cum laude (grade 0.7), was exemplary in its structure, attention to detail, presentation, and integration into the scientific literature.

Alexander is now working as a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information in Innsbruck in the research group of Hannes Bernien.

The TWH doctoral prize is sponsored by the Wilhelm and Else Heraeus Foundation, a private organisation for the promotion of science and teaching with a focus on physics. It is donated to the Faculty of Physics at LMU Munich and endowed with 4,000 euros. The prize was awarded for the fourth time this year. The award ceremony took place in Mayx 2026 as part of the LMU graduation ceremony.

Congratulations, Alexander!

Source: LMU Physics