The Max Planck Institute for Physics (MPP) is a

physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...

institute in

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

that specializes in

high energy physics Particle physics or high energy physics is the study of fundamental particles and forces that constitute matter and radiation. The fundamental particles in the universe are classified in the Standard Model as fermions (matter particles) and b ...

and astroparticle physics. It is part of the

Max-Planck-Gesellschaft The Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science (german: Max-Planck-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Wissenschaften e. V.; abbreviated MPG) is a formally independent non-governmental and non-profit association of German research institutes. ...

and is also known as the

Werner Heisenberg Werner Karl Heisenberg () (5 December 1901 – 1 February 1976) was a German theoretical physicist and one of the main pioneers of the theory of quantum mechanics. He published his work in 1925 in a breakthrough paper. In the subsequent series ...

Institute, after its first director in its current location. The founding of the institute traces back to 1914, as an idea from

Fritz Haber Fritz Haber (; 9 December 186829 January 1934) was a German chemist who received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1918 for his invention of the Haber–Bosch process, a method used in industry to synthesize ammonia from nitrogen gas and hydrogen ...

Walther Nernst Walther Hermann Nernst (; 25 June 1864 – 18 November 1941) was a German chemist known for his work in thermodynamics, physical chemistry, electrochemistry, and solid state physics. His formulation of the Nernst heat theorem helped pave the wa ...

Max Planck Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck (, ; 23 April 1858 – 4 October 1947) was a German theoretical physicist whose discovery of energy quanta won him the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1918. Planck made many substantial contributions to theoretical p ...

Emil Warburg Emil Gabriel Warburg (; 9 March 1846 – 28 July 1931) was a German physicist who during his career was professor of physics at the Universities of Strassburg, Freiburg and Berlin. He was president of the Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft 1899� ...

Heinrich Rubens Heinrich Rubens (30 March 1865, Wiesbaden, Nassau, Germany – 17 July 1922, Berlin, Germany) was a German physicist. He is known for his measurements of the energy of black-body radiation which led Max Planck to the discovery of his radiation l ...

. On October 1, 1917, the institute was officially founded in Berlin as '' Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut für Physik'' (KWIP, Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physics) with

Albert Einstein Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...

as the first head director.Geschichte
" (in German). Max Planck Institute for Physics. Abbreviated version in English:

." Retrieved 2015-08-30. In October 1922,

Max von Laue Max Theodor Felix von Laue (; 9 October 1879 – 24 April 1960) was a German physicist who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1914 for his discovery of the diffraction of X-rays by crystals. In addition to his scientific endeavors with cont ...

succeeded Einstein as managing director. Einstein gave up his position as a director of the institute in April 1933. The Institute took part in the

German nuclear weapon project The Uranverein ( en, "Uranium Club") or Uranprojekt ( en, "Uranium Project") was the name given to the project in Germany to research nuclear technology, including nuclear weapons and nuclear reactors, during World War II. It went through seve ...

from 1939 to 1942. In June 1942,

took over as managing director. A year after the end of fighting in Europe in World War II, the institute was moved to

Göttingen Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a college town, university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the Capital (political), capital of Göttingen (district), the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, t ...

and renamed the Max Planck Institute for Physics, with Heisenberg continuing as managing director. In 1946,

Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker Carl Friedrich Freiherr von Weizsäcker (; 28 June 1912 – 28 April 2007) was a German physicist and philosopher. He was the longest-living member of the team which performed nuclear research in Germany during the Second World War, under ...

and

Karl Wirtz Karl Eugen Julius Wirtz (24 April 1910 – 12 February 1994) was a German nuclear physicist, born in Cologne. He was arrested by the allied British and American Armed Forces and incarcerated at Farm Hall for six months in 1945 under Operation ...

joined the faculty as the directors for theoretical and experimental physics, respectively. In 1955 the institute made the decision to move to Munich, and soon after began construction of its current building, designed by

Sep Ruf Sep Ruf (full name Franz Joseph Ruf; 9 March 1908, in Munich – 29 July 1982, in Munich) was a German architect and designer strongly associated with the Bauhaus group. He was one of the representatives of modern architecture in Germany af ...

. The institute moved into its current location on September 1, 1958, and took on the new name the Max Planck Institute for Physics and Astrophysics, still with Heisenberg as the managing director. In 1991, the institute was split into the Max Planck Institute for Physics, the

Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics The Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics (MPA) is a research institute located in Garching, just north of Munich, Bavaria, Germany. It is one of many scientific research institutes belonging to the Max Planck Society. The MPA is widely conside ...

and the

Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics The Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics is a Max Planck Institute, located in Garching, near Munich, Germany. In 1991 the Max Planck Institute for Physics and Astrophysics split up into the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Ph ...

Structure

There are three departments with multiple research groups: * Structure of matter **Innovative calculation methods in particle physics (

Giulia Zanderighi Giulia Zanderighi is an Italian-born theoretical physicist born in 1974. She is the first woman director at the Max Planck Institute for Physics. Education Giulia Zanderighi received her undergraduate degree from the University of Milan in 199 ...

) **Quantum field theory and scattering amplitudes (Johannes Henn) **String theory (

Dieter Lüst Dieter Lüst (born 21 September 1956 in Chicago) is a German physicist, full professor for mathematical physics at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich since 2004 and a director of the Max Planck Institute for Physics in Munich. His research ...

) ** ATLAS detector ( Siegfried Bethke) ** Belle II experiment (Hans-Günther Moser) **Gravitational theory (Angnis Schmidt-May) *New technologies **

AWAKE Wakefulness is a daily recurring brain state and state of consciousness in which an individual is conscious and engages in coherent cognitive and behavioral responses to the external world. Being awake is the opposite of being asleep, in which ...

– Plasma Wakefield Acceleration (Patric Muggli) ** ILC and CLIC: Linear Colliders (Frank Simon) *Astroparticle physics **Particle physics and cosmology ( Georgi Dvali) **Theoretical astroparticle physics (Georg G. Raffelt) ** CRESST experiment (Federica Petricca) ** GERDA and LEGEND: the nature of the neutrino ( Allen Caldwell) **

KATRIN Katrin is a feminine given name. It is a German and Swedish contracted form of Katherine. Katrin may refer to: Sports * Katrin Apel (born 1973), German biathlete * Katrin Beinroth (born 1981), German judoka *Katrin Borchert (born 1969), German- ...

and

TRISTAN Tristan (Latin/ Brythonic: ''Drustanus''; cy, Trystan), also known as Tristram or Tristain and similar names, is the hero of the legend of Tristan and Iseult. In the legend, he is tasked with escorting the Irish princess Iseult to wed ...

: Neutrinos and dark matter (Susanne Mertens) **MADMAX experiment: searching for axion dark matter (Béla Majorovits) **

MAGIC Magic or Magick most commonly refers to: * Magic (supernatural), beliefs and actions employed to influence supernatural beings and forces * Ceremonial magic, encompasses a wide variety of rituals of magic * Magical thinking, the belief that unrela ...

and CTA: Gamma ray telescopes (Masahiro Teshima)

Current and former directors

The current directorial board of the institute is * Siegfried Bethke * Allen Caldwell *

Giorgi Dvali Georgi (Gia) Dvali (Georgian: გიორგი (გია) დვალი; born May 30, 1964) is a Georgian theoretical physicist and science communicator in Georgia. He is a professor of theoretical physics at the Ludwig Maximilian Universi ...

* Johannes Henn *

(current managing director) * Masahiro Teshima *

Former directors of the institute include: *

Ludwig Biermann Ludwig Franz Benedikt Biermann (March 13, 1907 in Hamm – January 12, 1986 in München) was a German astronomer, obtaining his Ph.D. from Göttingen University in 1932. He made important contributions to astrophysics and plasma physics, di ...

Heinz Billing Heinz Billing (7 April 1914 – 4 January 2017) was a German physicist and computer scientist, widely considered a pioneer in the construction of computer systems and computer data storage, who built a prototype laser interferometric gravitatio ...

* Gerd Buschhorn *

Peter Debye Peter Joseph William Debye (; ; March 24, 1884 – November 2, 1966) was a Dutch-American physicist and physical chemist, and Nobel laureate in Chemistry. Biography Early life Born Petrus Josephus Wilhelmus Debije in Maastricht, Netherlands, D ...

Hans-Peter Dürr Hans-Peter Dürr (7 October 1929 – 18 May 2014) was a German physicist. He worked on nuclear physics, nuclear and quantum physics, elementary particles and gravitation, epistemology, and philosophy, and he advocated responsible scientific and ...

* Gerhard von Gierke *

Leon Van Hove Leon, Léon (French) or León (Spanish) may refer to: Places Europe * León, Spain, capital city of the Province of León * Province of León, Spain * Kingdom of León, an independent state in the Iberian Peninsula from 910 to 1230 and again f ...

* Norbert Schmitz * Leo Stodolsky *

References

External links

Homepage of the Max Planck Institute for Physics
Education in Munich

Physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...

Physics institutes 1917 establishments in Germany {{physics-org-stub