My current research focuses on defect mediated diffusion and potential sputtering caused by solar wind ions. See the entry in the SNSF Grant Search Portal for a detailed abstract with references
My PhD research was on space weathering of atmosphere-free bodies through solar wind irradiation with a focus on Mercury and the Moon. Together with collaborators from the Technical University of Vienna we performed irradiation experiments on representative samples. I was in charge of selecting reasonable samples, preparing them for irradiation experiments as well as pre- and post-irradiation sample analysis.
As a side project from 2020-2021 I led an interdisciplinary team modelling the potential surface alteration caused by the loss from an early atmosphere surrounding Mercury which culminated in an open access paper published at The Planetary Science Journal.
Research illustrated
MSc thesis at ETH Zurich: Tomography of 4.5 billion years old melt droplet found in meteorites. A report on the findings is published in the Meteoritics & Planetary Science journal.
First lead author paper: Solar wind shifts in IR are directly tied to
irradiation energy and reach their maximum extent within a few hundred
years, independent of the type of mineral irradiated.
Second first author paper: Insignificant sodium loss and/or accumulation during Mercury's magma ocean stage cannot explain todays suggested surface composition. See
press release
here on phys.org.
