The European Research Council (ERC) has awarded Prof. Dr. Stephan Schlemmer with an ERC Advanced Grant. Schlemmer will receive 2.5 million euros in funding for his project ‘MissIons’ (https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/101020583). The ERC Advanced Grant is considered the most important funding award in the European research landscape.
ERC Advanced Grants are awarded to outstanding scholars and scientists for projects that are associated with uncertainties due to their innovative approach, but which may open up ground-breaking new paths in their respective fields. Funding is granted to researchers who have worked consistently and successfully at the highest level for many years.
Stephan Schlemmer is professor of experimental physics at the University of Cologne’s Institute of Astrophysics. In his laboratories in Cologne, the colour spectra of molecules are recorded in high-precision measurements. These spectra are as clearly associated with the molecules as fingerprints can be uniquely assigned to a person. In this way, numerous molecules have already been found in space for the first time through laboratory investigations in Cologne. The ERC Advanced Grant for the ‘MissIons’ (= missing ions) project is being used to search for specific ionic molecules. These ions are missing keys to understanding the evolution of the interstellar medium, i.e., the space between stars. Thus, it is conceivable that building blocks of life are formed from precisely these ions in interstellar space.
Schlemmer’s team is developing experimental and theoretical methods that make these studies possible in the first place. One challenge is to make these highly volatile substances available in sufficient quantities for those colour analysis. Here, the working group has already made some major breakthroughs in the past. Another challenge is that the spectral fingerprints for these special ions consist of thousands of snippets that must first be assembled into an image. This painstaking work not only produces the template for observation with telescopes. Rather, the fingerprints can also be used to infer the structure of the molecules. Until now, this was impossible for the molecules in question, but the MissIons project will make it possible for the first time. The project thus connects the world of the smallest (molecules) with the world of the largest (outer space), both of which still pose great mysteries.
