Sassa research group

Most of the materials used in today’s technologies have properties that are relatively unaffected by electron interactions. Aluminum, diamond or even graphene are materials that may be reasonably explained within the non-interacting electrons model. However, when the interactions between electrons, spins, charges and orbitals become important, novels and fascinating physical phenomena emerge. Such materials are usually named correlated electron systems, and their understanding and possible implementation in future devices, are one of the great challenges of condensed matter physics.

Our interest is to understand why and how unconventional phenomena arise, and how they can be optimized for technological applications. We are studying various types of correlated systems ranging from metal-to-insulator transition, superconductors, topological insulator or magnetic materials. We are investigating their electronic and magnetic properties using a combination of X-ray, neutron and muon techniques at large scale facilities all over the world. In principal, the electronic properties are studied using angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy (ARPES) and resonant X-ray scattering (RIXS), while the magnetic properties are probed with elastic/inelastic neutron scattering (ENS/INS) and muon spin rotation (µ+SR). We also synthesize organometallic compounds and thin-film deposition to study quantum magnetism and interface effects.  Our experimental results are combined with theoretical models performed in collaboration with the Materials Theory group in Uppsala University and Nordita.

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Selected Publications