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Dr. Tobias Utikal

  • Wissenschaftlicher Referent (Research Coordinator)
  • Room: A.3.232
  • Telephone: +49 9131 7133316
  • E-mail

My research interest ranges from cryogenic Nano-Quantum-Optics with single emitters to Nano-Bio-Photonics using iSCAT microscopy. As research coordinator of the division I am involved in many research projects pushing the experiments forward, coordinating resources, and preserving the knowledge in the group. In various exploratory side-projects I am breaking new ground for future experiments.

I am always interested in the latest technology developments of narrow-band lasers, cryogenics, nano-positioning, microscopy at and beyond the diffraction limit, single photon detectors, and scientific cameras.

2014

Nonlinear Plasmon Optics

Mario Hentschel, Tobias Utikal, Bernd Metzger, Harald Giessen, Markus Lippitz

Progress in Nonlinear Nano-Optics: Nano-Optics and Nanophotonics 155-181 (2014) | Journal

We study nonlinear optics in plasmonic nanosystems, discuss the role of structural symmetries and the influence of linear optical properties. In particular, we investigate third harmonic generation from dimer nanoantennas and show that the nonlinear optical response, in contrast to common belief, is not governed by gap nonlinearities but fully described by the linear optical properties of the antenna. A simple nonlinear harmonic oscillator model is shown to reproduce all experimental features.

Spectroscopic detection and state preparation of a single praseodymium ion in a crystal

Tobias Utikal, Emanuel Eichhammer, L. Petersen, Alois Renn, Stephan Götzinger, Vahid Sandoghdar

Nature Communications 5 3627 (2014) | Journal

The narrow optical transitions and long spin coherence times of rare earth ions in crystals make them desirable for a number of applications ranging from solid-state spectroscopy and laser physics to quantum information processing. However, investigations of these features have not been possible at the single-ion level. Here we show that the combination of cryogenic high-resolution laser spectroscopy with optical microscopy allows one to spectrally select individual praseodymium ions in yttrium orthosilicate. Furthermore, this spectral selectivity makes it possible to resolve neighbouring ions with a spatial precision of the order of 10 nm. In addition to elaborating on the essential experimental steps for achieving this long-sought goal, we demonstrate state preparation and read out of the three ground-state hyperfine levels, which are known to have lifetimes of the order of hundred seconds.

Tobias Utikal studied Physics at University of Bonn from 2001 to 2007. For his Diploma thesis on “Ultrafast Spectroscopy of Metallic Photonic Crystals” he moved to University of Stuttgart where he worked in the group of Prof. Harald Giessen. The following PhD thesis on “Ultrafast Nonlinear Spectroscopy of Hybrid Plasmonic Systems” he partially conducted at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research in Stuttgart. In 2011 he joined the Group of Prof. Vahid Sandoghdar at ETH Zurich as a postdoc. After the move of the group to the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light (MPL) in Erlangen he became a permanent senior scientist and is acting as research coordinator of the division. In his function as safety officer he is member of the work safety council of the institute. Tobias has been elected as the scientific staff representative of MPL from 2015 – 2021.

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