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IAP alumna Elisabeth Gruber receives prestigious FWF-ASTRA Prize

Friedrich Aumayr, Elisabeth Gruber, and Richard Wilhelm

© F. Aumayr | IAP

Friedrich Aumayr, Elisabeth Gruber, and Richard Wilhelm

Dr. Elisabeth Gruber, a graduate of the Atomic and Plasma Physics research unit at the Institute of Applied Physics (IAP), TU Wien, has been awarded one of the first ASTRA Awards by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF). This highly competitive and generously funded program (€1.2 million over five years) supports outstanding researchers in developing their independent research profiles at the highest international level.

Elisabeth Gruber studied Technical Physics at TU Wien and earned her doctorate with distinction in 2017. For her dissertation—supervised by Prof. Fritz Aumayr—she received both the Hannspeter Winter Prize and the Loschmidt Prize of the Austrian Chemical-Physical Society. After her PhD, she conducted postdoctoral research at Aarhus University (Denmark) before moving to the University of Innsbruck, where she now leads a successful research group in the field of chemical physics.

Her work builds an impressive bridge between ion physics, molecular spectroscopy, and astrophysics. Among other topics, she has investigated photoactive biomolecules in helium nanodroplets, the ultrafast dynamics of retinal, and potential carriers of diffuse interstellar bands.

The Institute of Applied Physics—especially the Atomic and Plasma Physics research unit—congratulates Dr. Elisabeth Gruber on this exceptional achievement and wishes her continued success in her scientific career.

Richard Wilhelm