Annual meeting and symposium: a farewell to Dwayne Miller

12 October 2022

Photo: UHH/CUI, Peter Garten

Once a year, the members of the cluster meet in Hohwacht on the Baltic Sea, if possible.

Photo: UHH/CUI, Peter Garten

Dwayne Miller was one of the initiators of the cluster and reported from the early days at the farewell symposium.

Photo: UHH/CUI, Peter Garten

From left: Prof. Michael Thorwart, Prof. Dwayne Miller, Prof.  Henrike Müller-Werkmeister and Prof. Henry Chapman.

Photo: UHH/CUI, Peter Garten

The audience also learned how a Cluster of Excellence comes about.

Photo: UHH/CUI, Peter Garten

Conversations are an important part of the annual meeting.

Photo: UHH/CUI, Peter Garten

Researchers report on their research findings and exchange ideas.

Photo: UHH/CUI, Peter Garten

The cluster thanked Dwayne Miller with a framed picture. It shows the then mayor and now German Chancellor Olaf Scholz visiting the cluster at the beginning of the first funding phase.

Photo: UHH, RRZ, MCC, Mentz

The photo from 2014: Olaf Scholz had the research explained to him and also visited the lab of Dwayne Miller, who was one of the cluster's speakers at the time.

More than ten years ago, Prof. R. J. Dwayne Miller was one of the initiators of the Hamburg Centre for Ultrafast Imaging. Now the cluster has bid farewell to the pioneering chemist with a symposium during its annual meeting. In the future, he will concentrate on projects in his native Canada.

The cluster's annual meeting in Hohwacht on the Baltic Sea is a networking and discussion event. It provides an opportunity to learn about scientific highlights, present one's own work in poster sessions, learn more about future directions and about supporting structures. An additional key program item at this year's meeting from 28 to 30 September 2022 was the farewell symposium for Dwayne Miller.

Just over ten years ago, the chemistry and physics professor at the University of Toronto and at Universität Hamburg, who co-founded the Max Planck Institute for Structure and Dynamics of Matter in Hamburg around the same time, started thinking about a Cluster of Excellence. Miller is considered a pioneer in developing methods of coherent multidimensional spectroscopy methods and ultrafast laser technology. He introduced the concept of using ultrabright electron sources to directly observe atomic motions during crucial moments in chemistry. The cluster provided an opportunity to realize this dream experiment.  In the farewell symposium, Dwayne Miller looked back at the early years and what it took to bring the Cluster of Excellence to life.

Henrike Müller-Werkmeister experienced much of it firsthand. Now a professor at the University of Potsdam, she worked as a postdoc in Miller's "Atomically Resolved Dynamics" department and reported on the research group and its successes. For a long time, Dwayne Miller has also been committed to translating research results into real-world applications, founding six companies. His cooperation partner at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Prof. Hartmut Schlüter, described advances in laser surgery and outlined the next steps towards applications.

Prof. Henry Chapman, Prof. Franz Kärtner, Prof. Arwen Pearson and Prof. Michael Thorwart spoke on behalf of the cluster. Symposium moderator Prof. Robin Santra presented a framed photo as a parting gift. It shows Dwayne Miller in conversation with the then Mayor of Hamburg and now Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who came to learn about the new cluster in 2014.