Dr. Lorenz Herrmann
Since 2022, Lorenz Herrmann has been head of the Department “Advanced Materials and Surfaces” at Empa and a member of Empa’s directorate. He studied Physics at the University of Regensburg and the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris. He followed a binational PhD program in solid state physics and received his degree in 2010 from the Université Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris and the University of Regensburg. Afterwards he joined ABB Corporate Research in Baden-Dättwil where he worked as a scientist, group leader and department head on technology development projects in the context of the company’s product portfolio. His main research interest is material development and characterization in the context of electrical engineering applications.
Dr. Xavier Maeder
Xavier Maeder is the group leader for research in microstructure at the Laboratory of Mechanics of Materials and Nanostructures at Empa. He studied geoscience at the University of Lausanne and earned his PhD in 2007 at the University of Mainz in Germany, where he worked on the physics of de-formation of rocks and minerals. In 2007-2008 he did one year post-doc at the department of Earth Sciences at the University of Utrecht, where he studied the microstructure and deformation mechanism of highly deformed limestone. He joined Empa in 2008, where he did three years post-doc working mainly on the microstructure and mechanical properties of thin films and coatings. In 2011, he took a first assistant position at the University of Lausanne, working on the deformation mechanism and mi-crostructure in shear zones. He moved back to materials science in 2012 as a post-doc at CSEM in Neuchâtel, where he conducted several applied project on microsystems and coatings using advanced X-ray diffraction techniques. Maeder is an expert in electron backscattered and X-ray diffraction techniques.
Prof. Johann Michler
Johann Michler is head of the Laboratory of Mechanics of Materials and Nanostructures at Empa. He received his diploma in Materials Science at the University of Erlangen-Nürnberg in Germany in 1995 and a PhD degree in Materials Science at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne, Switzerland in 2000. He has been a lecturer at EPFL since 2005. At Empa, he started his activities as staff scientist in mechanical properties of thin films in 2000. His current research interest focuses on scale dependent mechanical properties of materials. His research efforts include the development of in-situ SEM, Raman, AFM mechanical testing methods and novel synthesis methods for metals and semiconductors like electrochemical or physical vapor deposition. He is the author or co-author of more than 300 publications, organized several international conferences, and is co-founder of two start-ups.
Assistant-Professor Barbara Putz
Barbara Putz is a group leader for research on interfaces at the Laboratory of Mechanics of Materials and Nanostructures at Empa and Assistant Professor in the Material Science Department at the Technical University of Leoben, in Austria. She obtained her PhD degree in Materials Science at the University of Leoben in 2017, in collaboration with the European Space Agency and including a 1-year research stay at ESA-ESTEC in the Netherlands. Since, she received several research grants, including an SNSF Ambizione (in 2020) and ERC starting grant (in 2024). Her research focuses on mechanical and functional behavior and characterization of surfaces and interfaces in the context of reliable and recyclable thin film composite and energy materials.