Atoms vibrate on circular paths – with an unexpected twist
An international team of researchers, including scientists from HZDR and Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society, for the first time directly observed how angular momentum is transferred and conserved within a crystal lattice. Using intense terahertz laser pulses, the researchers were able to selectively control these processes, which unveiled a surprising effect: during the angular momentum transfer, the direction of rotation reverses – caused by the rotational symmetry of the material. The results, published in Nature Physics (DOI: 10.1038/s41567-026-03274-8), provide new insights into the foundation of magnetism and open up possibilities for tailored control of quantum materials.
Conserved quantities such as energy, momentum, and angular momentum determine the fundamental laws of nature. In a closed system, these quantities are always conserved: they cannot be created or destroyed, only transformed or transferred. While angular momentum is familiar in everyday life through rotating carousels or riding a bicycle, it plays a central role at the quantum level – for example as the fundamental origin of magnetism.
A century-old question in physics
More than 100 years ago, Albert Einstein and Wander Johannes de Haas demonstrated in their famous experiment that changing the magnetization of a material induces a measurable mechanical rotation, revealing that magnetic and mechanical angular momentum are intrinsically linked. Since then, researchers have sought to understand how the resulting angular momentum is distributed inside a solid – in other words, how it is transferred through the crystal lattice, the regular arrangement of atoms.
Now, an international team of physicists from Berlin, Dresden, Jülich, and Eindhoven has succeeded in directly observing this process for the first time. The researchers show how angular momentum is transferred between different lattice vibrations – collective motions of atoms within the crystal. Their findings provide an important foundation for understanding how magnetism stabilizes and equilibrates in solids.
Tailored control of angular momentum with terahertz laser light
Moreover, the team succeeded in selectively controlling the rotational direction of atomic circular motions using ultra-strong laser pulses in the terahertz spectral range. These invisible laser pulses drive a specific lattice vibration into a circular trajectory, while a second ultrashort laser pulse probes another coupled vibration of the crystal. In doing so, the researchers observed a surprising effect: during the transition between these vibrations, the direction of angular momentum reverses.
This effect arises from the special rotational symmetry of the crystal lattice: certain rotational states are physically equivalent, even though they rotate in opposite directions. The experimental observation therefore represents a direct quantum-mechanical “fingerprint” of angular momentum conservation in solids.
For the quantum material investigated here, bismuth selenide, an unusual picture emerges: the angular momenta bound to lattice vibrations – so-called lattice angular momenta – can combine in such a way that a rotation with twice the frequency but opposite rotational direction is generated. Conceptually, this “1 + 1 = −1” behavior corresponds to a so-called Umklapp process, in which the direction of motion is effectively reversed by the symmetry of the crystal lattice. Such a process has now been experimentally demonstrated for lattice angular momentum for the first time.
“I find it extraordinarily elegant how the laws of physics are directly dictated by the symmetries of nature,” says Olga Minakova, doctoral researcher at the Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society and central experimental physicist of the study.
Sebastian Maehrlein, head of department at the Institute of Radiation Physics at HZDR, professor at TU Dresden, and leader of the study, adds:
“For me, these are exceptionally exciting results. We have discovered something fundamentally new that will hopefully make its way into the textbooks.”
In the long term, these findings pave the way for the targeted control of ultrafast processes in quantum materials and may provide new directions for future information technologies and novel memory devices.
Participating institutes:
Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society (Berlin), Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, TU Dresden, Forschungszentrum Jülich, Eindhoven University of Technology (Netherlands)
Publication:
O. Minakova, C. Paiva, M. Frenzel, M. S. Spencer, J. M. Urban, C. Ringkamp, M. Wolf, G. Mussler, D. M. Juraschek, S. F. Maehrlein: Observation of angular momentum transfer among crystal lattice modes, in Nature Physics, 2026. (DOI: 10.1038/s41567-026-03274-8)
Additional information:
Prof. Sebastian F. Maehrlein | Head High-field THz driven Phenomena
Institute of Radiation Physics at HZDR
Phone: +49 351 260 2240 | Email: s.maehrlein@hzdr.de
Media contact:
Simon Schmitt | Head
Communications and Media Relations at HZDR
Phone: +49 351 260 3400 | Mobile: +49 175 874 2865 | Email: s.schmitt@hzdr.de
The Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) performs – as an independent German research center – research in the fields of energy, health, and matter. We focus on answering the following questions:
• How can energy and resources be utilized in an efficient, safe, and sustainable way?
• How can malignant tumors be more precisely visualized, characterized, and more effectively treated?
• How do matter and materials behave under the influence of strong fields and in smallest dimensions?
To help answer these research questions, HZDR operates large-scale facilities, which are also used by visiting researchers: the Ion Beam Center, the Dresden High Magnetic Field Laboratory and the ELBE Center for High-Power Radiation Sources.
HZDR is a member of the Helmholtz Association and has six sites (Dresden, Freiberg, Görlitz, Grenoble, Leipzig, Schenefeld near Hamburg) with almost 1,500 members of staff, of whom about 700 are scientists, including 200 Ph.D. candidates.
Wissenschaftlicher Ansprechpartner:
Prof. Sebastian F. Maehrlein | Head High-field THz driven Phenomena
Institute of Radiation Physics at HZDR
Phone: +49 351 260 2240 | Email: s.maehrlein@hzdr.de
Originalpublikation:
O. Minakova, C. Paiva, M. Frenzel, M. S. Spencer, J. M. Urban, C. Ringkamp, M. Wolf, G. Mussler, D. M. Juraschek, S. F. Maehrlein: Observation of angular momentum transfer among crystal lattice modes, in Nature Physics, 2026. (DOI: 10.1038/s41567-026-03274-8)
Weitere Informationen:
https://www.hzdr.de/presse/pam
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