A physics student will probably always consider it rather special to get to grips with quantum mechanics. In this field you might just as well forget everything you already know. At least that’s how the Danish physicist, Amin Salami Dehkharghani, felt when he started.

"At atomic level, everything’s upside-down in relation to the world as we know it. But that’s what’s so fascinating about quantum mechanics; everything’s based on probabilities," he said.

During his PhD programme, he has immersed himself in a new corner of quantum mechanics, which seems even more exotic: How particles behave in a one-dimensional system.

"Normally, particles in a gas move in three dimensions, where they can easily pass by each other and are difficult to restrain. But when they’re caught in one dimension, they’re forced to go through each other and exist side by side," explains Amin Dehkharghani.

In principle, there’s nothing odd about particles being able to pass through each other. At atomic level, a fundamental element in quantum mechanics is that particles can exist as particles and waves simultaneously. With his new theoretical model, Amin Dehkharghani has contributed significantly to a deeper understanding of the interaction of particles, and how you can manipulate them in one dimension.

Read the full portrait (in danish), written by Filip Graugaard Esmarch on the Aarhus University Research Foundation website.