About

Our Mission: Accelerating Innovation, together.

Hi-Acts has established a sustainable, cross-industry innovation platform for pioneering applications of accelerator technologies. It aims to speed up the development of system solutions to pressing challenges facing society.

Currently, five leading Helmholtz Centers support this network. We invite additional research centers, industry companies, and other stakeholders to join us in pooling expertise and developing solutions together.
Industry and medical sectors can gain access to extensive know-how and technological capabilities through a simple request to the Hi-Acts team. Our team connects suitable partners for targeted solutions, promotes co-creation processes, and facilitates knowledge transfer.
With a funding of 13.2 million euros from the Helmholtz Association (over three years), Hi-Acts is being established and aims to grow sustainably through corporate engagement.

Our Team

Hi-Acts consists of a large team of experts from five major Helmholtz Research Centres, having many years of experience in the field of knowledge- and technology transfer. This is Hi-Acts!

Platform Management

Steering Committee

Technology Labs

Christine Leue

Head of Platform Management

Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY

Dr. Rajko Buchwald (parental leave)

Innovation Manager and Dpt. Head of Platform Management Hi-Acts

Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden Rossendorf HZDR

Johannes Blum

Innovation Manager

Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY

Jakob Peters

Innovation Manager

Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY

Dr. Martina Bauer

Innovation Manager Technology Transfer

GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung

Dr. Marc Thiry

Industrial Relations Officer

Helmholtz-Zentrum HEREON

Anna Anochin

Projektmanager Innovation

Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin für Materialien und Energie HZB

Cecilia Farias Marchant

Marketing and Communications Manager

Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY

Franziska Kleeberg

Communications and Marketing Manager

Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden Rossendorf HZDR

Lynn Mazur

Project Management Associate

Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY

Dr. Ilka Mahns

Head of Technology Transfer Office and Dept. Head of Innovation & Technology Transfer (ITT)

Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY

Robina Geupel

Innovation Manager

Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY

Dorit Teichmann

Innovation Manager

Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden Rossendorf HZDR

Participating Helmholtz Centres

Choose a location

Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY

Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY in Hamburg is one of the world’s leading centres for accelerator research. Its success in building complex facilities and operating high-tech instruments sustainably (e.g. European X-FEL, PETRA III) has attracted a broad community of users, comprising more than 3000 researchers from over 40 nations every year. As part of its ambitious innovation strategy, DESY has gathered extensive experience and expertise in implementing collaborative projects with industry. A holistic transfer project focusing on developing small, compact solutions for future applications in medicine and industry builds upon the pioneering work and academic records set by DESY in the field of laser plasma acceleration.

www.desy.de

The particle accelerator facility operated by GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt is in demand worldwide. Researchers come from all over the world to use the accelerated ions for experiments in fields ranging from particle, nuclear, atomic and plasma physics to materials research, biophysics and tumour therapy. As part of its transfer strategy, GSI promotes cooperation with partners in industry and applied research for the purpose of collaborative research and development projects, infrastructure utilisation, contract research and services. GSI has set up an innovation ecosystem so as to network with the relevant partners for the transfer, and it views the Hi-Acts innovation platform as an ideal partner for further expanding and professionalising the fields of infrastructure use and services associated with its accelerator facilities.

www.gsi.de

In addition to its outstanding expertise in the field of compact laser plasma accelerators and its particle accelerators, which are in continuous operation for research projects and commercial contracts, the Helmholtz Centre Dresden-Rossendorf HZDR also boasts a strong interdisciplinary profile in the fields of health, materials and energy research. The centre can draw on its experience in a large number of successful transfer projects and received the Saxon Transfer Award in 2021 for successfully establishing the manufacture of an accelerator-based radiopharmaceutical in a public-private partnership with a company. Furthermore, the transfer company and HZDR spin-off HZDR Innovation GmbH offers a large number of HZDR innovations in the high-tech field.

www.hzdr.de

The Helmholtz Centre Berlin HZB develops and optimises energy and quantum materials for solar cells, catalysts, batteries, solar fuels and microelectronic components. Strategic partners such as the National Metrology Institute (PTB) or the Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing (BAM) use their own facilities at HZB’s BESSY II synchrotron for a range of standardisation procedures. The BAMline specialises in the non-destructive characterisation of materials using various different methods. The PTB uses the Metrology Light Source to develop national standards for radiation in the spectral range from ultraviolet (UV) to hard X-rays. On the platform, the HZB also advocates standards and certificates for the industrial use of accelerator-based systems.

www.helmholtz-berlin.de

In connection with its Institute for Materials Research, the Helmholtz Centre Hereon in Geesthacht operates a central user access platform, the German Engineering Materials Science Centre (GEMS). GEMS offers a globally unique infrastructure for complementary research using photons and neutrons. Hereon will contribute this expertise and the infrastructure surrounding its instruments, in particular the diffraction and tomography beamlines at the PETRA III synchrotron light source at DESY, to the platform. Hi-Acts will allow Hereon to continue to develop its services for industrial users in the field of material analysis and development in a close dialogue with current and future users. A particularly valuable part of this is being able to incorporate new standards in the commercial service portfolio.

www.hereon.de

Technology Labs

Our Technology Labs for your Innovations

The Hi-Acts Technology Labs are teams of scientists working on a range of key topics that offer great potential for innovation. The aim is to build a direct bridge between science and industry and to reduce the “time-to-market”, i.e. to bring new developments to the market as quickly as possible. They do so by continuously driving forward the development of important core topics, thereby increasing the technology readiness level for various challenges. This means that Hi-Acts can implement the requirements and ideas of its network partners even more rapidly and precisely, at the highest scientific and technical level. Every project is actively supported by the transfer and innovation leaders of the Hi-Acts Team. They are responsible for connecting the various players, initiating joint activities and organising possible follow-up projects.

Five labs are currently doing research in the following core areas:

These are our Technology Labs

Compact Accelerator-driven Neutron Sources (CANS)

In addition to X-ray techniques, analytical methods based on neutron beams are becoming increasingly important in research and technology – in energy technology, for example, but also in medicine. The availability of such neutron radiation is limited, however, because it can only be produced at large-scale research facilities such as nuclear research reactors or accelerator-based spallation sources. A group of Helmholtz researchers is therefore working to develop compact accelerator-driven neutron sources (CANS) that are lighter and cheaper to operate and could therefore be used decentrally on company or hospital premises. The best way of achieving this is being studied primarily at one of the beamlines of the Ion Beam Centre (IBC) at the HZDR.