The objectives of the project include establishing correlative nano-FTIR, TERS, and TEPL spectroscopy, studying industrially relevant polymers, exploring organic conductors' conductivity, and investigating phonon polaritons in 2D materials. The project targets developing advanced near-field spectroscopy instrumentation and achieving vibrational strong coupling in nanoresonators and molecular vibrations.

This project aims at establishing s-SNOM as a platform technology for label-free ultrastructural pathology. s-SNOM is an emerging technique -- co-developed at nanoGUNE -- that beats the diffraction limit and allows for obtaining infrared images with nanoscale spatial resolution. Applied to ultrathin cell sections, s-SNOM will allow for an unprecedented view on the chemical composition of the interior of a cell that cannot be easily calculated nor measured. Thus, s-SNOM will provide a reference data set that will help to validate already existing medical application of infrared microscopy and may even lead to the discovery of new nano-IR biomarkers.