Mertig studied physics at TU Dresden. She remained there for her doctoral research, where she studied the influence of point defects on the galvanomagnetic properties (phenomena that occur when a current is passed through a conductor in a magnetic field) of metals.[1] She completed her doctorate in 1982 and was appointed an assistant professor. She worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Soviet Union.[2]
Research and career
Mertig was made a Fellow at the Max Planck Institute of Microstructure Physics in 2007.[3] Her research group study solid state theory. Specifically, she develops material specific descriptions of nanostructured systems. Mertig develops these descriptions using green functions, which can be used to describe thin films, surfaces or heterostructures. The computational effort required to perform these calculations scales with the numbers of atoms, making it possible to evaluate systems of a realistic size. She starts from the atomic structure of a system.[citation needed]
Mertig is an expert in spintronics, which make use of an electron's charge and spin degree of freedom, could transform future sensors and information technologies. Mertig performs first-principles electronic structure calculations usng density functional theory. She has used simulations to understand spin-dependent transport processes in magnetic, metallic and molecular devices. Her calculations can explain spintronic phenomena, including giant magnetoresistance, the spin Nernst Effect and the spin Hall effect.[4]
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