The new building for the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics is inaugurated in Garching

1986

The Max Planck Institute for Quantum Optics was founded in 1981 to study the interaction of light and matter, especially concentrating on laser chemistry, laser physics and laser plasma. It emerged from a Laser Research Group, which had been set up at the MPI of Plasma Physics in Garching, Munich, in 1976. The new building reinforced the MPG’ technological presence in Garching in the north of Munich. This process of expansion had begun as early as 1963, when the MPG set up the Sub-Institute of Extraterrestrial Physics and Astrophysics there. Since then, Garching has increasingly grown in importance: besides the MPG, many other renowned research establishments have set up shop here, including the Technische Universität München, the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München and the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft.