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English Logo - Department of Physics - TU Dortmund
Physikgebäude (Neubau Otto-Hahn-Str. 4a) an der TU Dortmund © Nikolas Golsch​/​TU Dortmund
Interplay of cosmic matter

Collaborative Research Center in Astronomy to receive further funding

© SFB 1491
The IceCube laboratory under the magnetic field lines of the Milky Way
All hell is breaking loose in the sky: stars form and fade, charged particles, rays and neutrinos collide and influence each other. The interactions in space have been studied by the Collaborative Research Center (CRC) 1491 "Interplay of Cosmic Matter" since 2022. The researchers can now continue their work for another four years: The German Research Foundation has approved further funding for the CRC, in which Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB) is the host university and physicists from TU Dortmund University are involved. The CRC makes a significant contribution to the research strength of RUB and TU Dortmund University in the Ruhr Innovation Lab, which the two universities have joined forces to form as part of the Excellence Strategy.

Uncovering formation mechanisms

"While our understanding of the fundamental building blocks of matter is already well established, the specific interactions responsible for multi-messenger emissions from galaxies over a wide range of energies and particle types remain an important research question," says Bochum-based CRC spokesperson Prof. Julia Tjus. By combining studies of cosmic rays with particle physics experiments, the Collaborative Research Center team aims to uncover the formation mechanisms of high-energy particles, gamma rays and neutrinos. Computer-aided modeling will also shed light on the interaction of charged particles and turbulent electromagnetic fields at plasma level.

Questions about dark matter

As visible matter only makes up a fifth of the universe, understanding the nature of dark matter remains one of the greatest challenges of modern science. "Four years ago, we started working on a unified description of cosmic interacting matter and brought together scientists from the fields of particle, plasma and astrophysics to discuss three central questions," says Julia Tjus:

  1. What are the interactions between magnetized, turbulent astrophysical plasmas and cosmic rays, and what conclusions can be drawn about the origin of cosmic rays?
  2. How do precision measurements of particle interactions help us to understand the astrophysical signatures of cosmic rays?
  3. What connections exist between the signatures of visible and dark matter?

In the first funding phase, global structures were developed and tested using individual examples. In the second funding phase, the focus will be on quantifying and systematizing these framework concepts. "Building on the results of the past four years, we will continue to expand our approach to developing methods for bridging boundaries in order to answer our fundamental questions in the coming years," says Julia Tjus.

Excellent particle physics in the Ruhr Innovation Lab

The now extended CRC, together with the Cluster of Excellence "Color meets Flavor", which TU Dortmund University has acquired together with partners, is proof of the research strength of RUB and TU Dortmund University in physics. The teams from Bochum and Dortmund combine the fields of particle, hadron, astro and plasma physics in one of the Ruhr Innovation Lab 's four research focuses: the research focus "Matter in Terrestrial & Cosmic Laboratories" aims to close the gap between controlled laboratory measurements and high-energy cosmic observations and to develop an integrated perspective. This should enable new conclusions and insights to understand matter from the quantum to the ensemble level.

Several TU Dortmund University research groups involved in SFB

Several research groups from TU Dortmund University are involved in CRC 1491: Astroparticle physicists led by Professors Wolfgang Rhode - co-spokesperson of the CRC - and Christian Glaser as well as Dr. Dominik Elsässer, who use data from several large experiments such as IceCube in Antarctica, MAGIC on La Palma and in future CTAO also on La Palma and in Chile, as well as particle physicists led by Professors Johannes Albrecht and Kevin Kröninger and Dr. Felix Riehn, who are involved in the LHCb and ATLAS experiments at CERN in Switzerland and are also researching the modeling of hadron collisions. Within the CRC, the researchers cooperate closely with the Lamarr Institute in order to analyze the data from the experiments using machine learning and artificial intelligence methods.

To the Collaborative Research Center 1491

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