Welcome

This is the website of the Rotter group at the Institute for Theoretical Physics, Vienna University of Technology (TU Wien). Our main scientific interests are the propagation of waves through complex media, non-Hermitian physics and theoretical quantum optics.

News and latest research

Introducing the fingerprint matrix in Nature Physics

In a joint work with the team of Alexandre Aubry, from the Institute Langevin in Paris, we demonstrate how to detect and localize objects that are hidden from view inside a highly scattering medium. As laid out in the corresponding article published today in Nature Physics, the key ingredient is the “fingerprint matrix” of the object – see also the press release by TU Wien and a very nice News & Views piece by I. Starshynov.

New paper in Nature Photonics on the ultimate limit in extracting information by deep learning

In a new paper with Max, Lukas and Günther, recently published in Nature Photonics, we explored how artificial intelligence can extract the maximum possible information from distorted optical signals. Using neural networks trained on seemingly chaotic light patterns, we approached — and nearly reached — the theoretical limit of precision, which we showed to be defined by the Cramér–Rao bound. Many thanks go to our collaborators in France (Dorian Bouchet) and Scotland (Ilya Starshynov and Daniele Faccio) as well as to Oliver for creating the great feature image shown on the top left. Check here for TU Wien’s press release.