Department of Physics
Department of Physics Review 2013/14
Faculty of Natural Sciences
Department of Physics Review 2013/14
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Contents
Department of Physics Review 2013/14 5
Introduction
7
Department Information
101 Technical Development, Intellectual Property & Commercial Interactions
8 Academic, Research and Support staff
107 Prizes awarded
7 Teaching
112 Grants awarded
13 19 22 27 28
40 41 46 53 60 69 74 82 88 94
Undergraduate studies International exchange scheme Outreach Postgraduate studies Highlighted Postgraduate Case Studies Research in progress
115 Alumni 117 Juno 119 Artist in residence
Groups Astrophysics Condensed Matter Theory Experimental Solid State Physics High Energy Physics Photonics Plasma Physics /ISP Quantum Optics & Laser Science Space & Atmospheric Physics Theoretical Physics
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Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Introduction Head of Departments Statement The Physics Department has continued to thrive during 2013-14 and inside you will find an overview over the past two years across the considerable breadth of our activities. I took over as Head of Department in May 2014 from Jo Haigh and want to thank Jo on behalf of the department for her outstanding leadership which has left the department in fantastic shape going forward.
The department thrives as an environment where we can provide outstanding teaching delivered by world class researchers. We also have a mission to engage the public with the excitement of our work to try and encourage the next Professor Jordan Nash generation of physicists.
Head of the Department of Physics
Inside this report you will find an overview of the world leading research, which is going on within the nine research groups in the department. You will find a description of the activities of the staff members as well as a listing of a few of their key publications during this period. We have also listed the research grants which the department has received and which enable us to carry out our work, as well as the many awards and prizes which members of staff have received. We teach around 840 undergraduates and around 400 postgraduate students. Inside you will find an overview of our undergraduate programmes as well as an indication of the many destinations where our undergraduate students continue after graduation. We were also delighted to introduce summer student exchanges with MIT, UBC, SNU, and KAIST allowing some of our top undergraduates to gain research experience overseas.
Postgraduate degrees are available as both taught Masters programmes as well as PhD programmes. You will find inside an overview of the degree courses as well as the topics of projects for the degrees which were awarded during the period of this review. Our Centres for Doctoral Training (CDTs) have been a real success and allowed us to provide a great training programme across these multi-disciplinary centres. In addition, the report provides a summary of the destinations for our PG students. We have continued to provide opportunities for our students to interact with commercial partners through our Industry Club, and a particularly successful event is the annual postgraduate research symposium.
Outreach remains an important fundamental part of our mission and as part of this we were delighted to sponsor an artist in residence some of whose work you will find inside the report.
The department renewed its Athena SWAN silver award in 2012, and immediately began planning as to apply for an upgrade to a gold award. This involves representatives from across the department on our JUNO committee looking at how we can improve the workplace environment and improve the gender and racial imbalance in physics departments.
We have also been working to keep our graduates in contact with the work which is going on here by sponsoring events inviting alumni into the department to hear about our research.
The report inside will give you a sense of the strength of the department, which remains one of the top destinations worldwide for research in and studying physics, and which is in an excellent position to continue to attract the best and brightest students and researchers. Jordan Nash
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Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Department Information
Head of Department Professor Jordan Nash Tel: 020 7594 7500 Email:
[email protected]
Associate Head of Department Dr Kenny Weir Tel: 020 7594 7501 Email:
[email protected]
Operations Manager Linda Jones Tel: 020 7594 7502 Email:
[email protected]
Research Operations Manager Louise Hayward Tel: 020 7594 7679 Email:
[email protected]
Executive Assistant to Head of Department (Maternity Cover) Plum Garland Tel: 020 7594 7503 Email:
[email protected]
(Maternity Leave) Caroline Jackson Tel: 020 7594 7503 Email:
[email protected]
Senior Administrator Kalvinder Chana Tel: 020 7594 6113 Email:
[email protected]
Undergraduate Teaching
Postgraduate Teaching
Director of Undergraduate Studies Professor Angus Mackinnon Tel: 020 7594 7505 Email:
[email protected]
Admissions and Disabilities Officer Ms Mery Fajardo Tel: 020 7594 7513 Email:
[email protected]
Director of Postgraduate Studies Professor Lesley Cohen Tel: 020 7594 7598 Email:
[email protected]
Admissions Tutor (Undergraduate) Dr Bob Forsyth Tel: 020 7594 7761 Email:
[email protected]
Undergraduate Administrator Ms Stephanie Smallwood Tel: 020 7594 7511 Email:
[email protected]
Postgraduate Administrator Mrs Loli Sanchez Tel: 020 7594 7512 Email:
[email protected]
Senior Tutor Professor Danny Segal Tel: 020 7594 7779 Email:
[email protected]
Examinations Co-ordinator Dr Julia Sedgbeer Tel: 020 7594 7811 Email:
[email protected]
Undergraduate Education Manager Mr Derryck Stewart Tel: 020 7594 7561 Email:
[email protected] www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Examinations and Information Officer Mr Edward Charnley Tel: 020 7594 7508 Email:
[email protected]
Undergraduate Administrator Ms Geetika Tewari Tel: 020 7594 7510 Email:
[email protected]
Postgraduate Development Officer Dr Andrew Williamson Tel: 020 7594 7631 Email:
[email protected]
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Academic, Research and Support Staff Professors
Prof Thomas Anthopoulos, BEng, PhD
[Experimental Physics]
Prof Donal Bradley, BSc, PhD, ARCS, FRSA, CPhys, FInstP, FRS [Experimental Physics]
Prof Jeremy Chittenden, BSc, PhD, DIC,
CPhys, MInstP [Physics]
Prof Kim Christensen, PhD
[Theoretical Physics]
Prof Lesley Cohen, BSc, PhD [Solid State Physics]
Prof Carlo Contaldi, MSci, PhD [Theoretical Physics]
Prof Steven Cowley, BA, MA, PhD, FRS
[Plasma Physics]
Prof Michael Damzen, PhD
[Experimental Laser Physics]
Prof Steven Schwartz, BSc, PhD
Prof Ortwin Hess, PhD [Metamaterials]
Prof Daniel Segal, BSc, DPhil
[Quantum Optics]
[Laser Physics]
[Physics]
[Theoretical Physics]
Prof Edward Hinds, BA, DPhil, FRS Prof Timothy Horbury, BSc, PhD
Prof Christopher Hull, BA, PhD, FInstP, FRS [Physics]
Prof Misha Ivanov, MSc, PhD [Physics]
Prof Andrew Jaffe, BS, MS, PhD, MInstP, FRAS [Astrophysics and Cosmology]
Prof Myungshik Kim, BS, MSc, MBS, PhD, PGCHET [Theoretical Quantum Information]
Prof Paul Dauncey, BA, DPhil
Prof Sergey Lebedev, MS, PhD, FInstP, F.APS
[High Energy Physics]
[Experimental Particle Physics]
[Particle Physics]
[Plasma Physics]
[Space and Atmospheric Physics]
[Quantum Optics]
Prof Roland Smith, BSc, PhD
Prof Kellogg Stelle, AB, PhD, FInstP
Prof Timothy Sumner, BSc, DPhil, CPhys, FInstP, FRAS [Experimental Astrophysics]
Prof Adrian Sutton, BA, MSc, PhD, FRS
[Nanotechnology]
Prof Roy Taylor, BSc, PhD
[Ultrafast Physics and Technology]
Prof Richard Thompson, MA, DPhil [Physics]
Prof John Tisch, BSc, PhD
[Laser Physics]
Prof Peter Török, DPhil, DSc
Prof Gavin Davies, BSc, PhD
Prof Kenneth Long, BSc, DPhil
[Space Physics]
[Physics]
Prof Arkady Tseytlin, MS, PhD
[Physics]
Prof Tejinder Virdee,
Prof Michele Dougherty, BSc, PhD, FRS Prof Fay Dowker, BA, MA, PhD [Physics]
Prof Michael Duff, BSc, PhD, DIC, FInstP, FRS
Prof Angus Mackinnon, PhD Prof Joao Magueijo, BA, PhD Prof Stefan Maier, PhD
[Theoretical Physics]
[Nanophotonics]
[Physics]
[Laser Physics]
Prof Ulrik Egede, BSc, PhD Prof Michael Finnis, BSc, PhD
[Materials Theory and Simulation]
Prof Matthew Foulkes, PhD
[Physics]
Prof Leszek Frasinski, MSc, PhD, FInstP [Atomic and Molecular Physics]
Prof Paul French, PhD
[Physics]
Prof Jerome Gauntlett, BSc, PhD,FInstP
[Physics]
Prof Andrey Golutvin, PhD [ Physics]
Prof Jonathan Marangos, PhD, ARCS, DIC Prof Martin McCall, PhD
[Theoretical Optics]
Prof Raymond Murray, BSc, PhD [Solid State Physics]
Prof Zulfikar Najmudin, BA, PhD [
Physics]
Prof Jordan Nash, BSc, PhD
[Physics]
Prof Mark Neil, BA, MA, PhD
[Physics]
Prof Jenny Nelson, BA, PhD, FRS
[Physics]
Prof Sir John Pendry, MA, PhD, FRS
Prof Joanna Haigh, MA, MSc, DPhil, FInstP,
[Theoretical Solid State Physics]
[Physics]
CSci, CPhys, FInstP [Physics]
[Physics]
Prof Arttu Rajantie, BSc, MSc, PhD
FRMets, FRS, CBE [Atmospheric Physics]
Prof Geoffrey Hall, BSc, PhD, DIC, ARCS Prof Jonathan Halliwell, BSc, PhD Prof Amihay Hanany, BA, PhD [Theoretical Physics]
Prof Peter Haynes, BA, PhD
[Theory and Simulation of Materials]
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Prof Alan Heavens, PhD
[Astrostatistics]
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Prof Christopher Phillips, MA, PhD, DIC, Prof Martin Plenio, PhD (Dr. rer. nat)
[Physics]
[Theoretical Physics]
Prof Steven Rose, BA, DPhil, CPhys, FInstP [Plasma Physics]
Prof Terence Rudolph, BSc, PhD [Quantum Physics]
[Optical Physics]
Prof Ralf Toumi, BSc, PhD, ARCS [Atmospheric Physics]
[Physics]
PhD, FRS [Physics]
Prof Dimitri Vvedensky, PhD [Theoretical Solid State Physics]
Prof Daniel Waldram, BA, MA, PhD [Theoretical Physics]
Prof Stephen Warren, MA, PhD [Astrophysics]
Prof Jing Zhang, BSc, PhD, DIC, ARCS [Physics]
Readers
Dr Henrique Araujo, PhD Dr Oliver Buchmueller, PhD Dr Alasdair Campbell, BSc, MSc, PhD Dr David Colling, BSC, BA, PhD Dr Michael Coppins, BSc, PhD Dr Arnaud Czaja, PhD Dr Robert Forsyth, BSc, PhD Dr John Hassard, BSc, PhD Dr Ji-Seon Kim, PhD Dr Arish Mostofi, PhD Dr Ingo Mueller-Wodarg, MSc, PhD Dr Carl Paterson, BA, PhD Dr Juliet Pickering, BA, MA, PhD, DIC Dr Sergei Popov, MSc, PhD Dr Jürgen Pozimski, BSc, MSc, PhD Dr William Proud, BSc, PhD, FlnstP, CPhys,
CChem
Dr Benjamin Sauer, BA, PhD Dr Paul Stavrinou, BEng, PhD
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Academic, Research and Support Staff Dr Yvonne Unruh, MSc, PhD Dr Toby Wiseman, PhD
Senior Lecturers
Dr Will Branford, MSc, PhD Dr Helen Brindley, BSc, PhD Mr Christopher Carr, BSc Dr David Clements, BSc, PhD, DIC Dr Christopher Dunsby, MSci, PhD Dr Ned Ekins-Daukes, MSci, MSc, PhD Dr Timothy Evans, BA, PhD Dr Marina Galand, PhD Dr Robert Kingham, BSc, PhD Dr Derek Lee, BA, PhD Dr Florian Mintert, PhD Dr Subhanjoy Mohanty, PhD Dr Karl Sandeman, PhD Dr Julia Sedgbeer, PhD, DIC Dr Paul Tangney, BSc, PhD Dr Michael Tarbutt, MPhys, DPhil Dr Roberto Trotta, PhD Dr Yoshiyuki Uchida, BA, PhD Dr Morgan Wascko, BA, MSci, PhD Dr Kenneth Weir, BSc, PhD
Lecturers
Dr Vitali Averbukh, PhD Dr Simon Bland, MSci, PhD Dr Amanda Chatten, BSc, PhD Dr Daniel Eakins, PhD Dr Jonathan Eastwood, PhD Dr Vincenzo Giannini, PhD Dr Heather Graven, PhD Dr Jonathan Hudson, MPhys, DPhil Dr Stuart Mangles, MSci, PhD Dr Adam Masters, PhD Dr James McGinty, PhD Dr Daniel Mortlock, PhD Dr Rupert Oulton, MSci, PhD Dr Jaroslaw Pasternak, PhD Dr Mitesh Patel, PhD Dr Peiro Posocco, PhD Dr Jonathan Pritchard, PhD Dr Alex Tapper, PhD Dr Apostolos Voulgarakis, BSc, MSc, PhD
Research Fellows
Dr Raymond Beuselinck, BSc, PhD Dr Joachim Hamm, PhD Dr Worawut Khunsin, PhD Dr Jonathan Murray, PhD Dr Gary Perkins, PhD Dr David Raymond, BSc, MSc, PhD Dr Jacqueline Russell, BSc, PhD Dr Patrick Scott, PhD Dr Christopher Seez, PhD Dr Stuart Solin, PhD www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Outreach/Teaching
Dr Caroline Clewley - Teaching Fellow Dr Mark Richards - Teaching Fellow Dr Vijay Tymms - Teaching Fellow
Academic Leavers
Prof Roger Evans Dr Antonio Fernandez-Dominguez Mr Ali Seyyed Mozaffari-Chinjani Dr Yannick Sonnefraud Dr Kosmas Tsakmakidis
Honorary Associations
Senior Research Investigator & Distinguished Research Fellow Prof. Thomas Kibble, MA, PhD, FRS
Senior Research Investigators
Emeritus Prof Peter Cargill, BSc, PhD Dr Aboubaker Dangor, BSc, DSc Prof. Peter Dornan, BA, PhD, FRS Prof. Roger Evans, BSc, PhD, FInstP Emeritus Prof. Bruce Joyce, DSc, FRS Prof. Sir Peter Knight, BSc, DPhil, FRS Prof. Elliot Leader, BSc, MS, PhD Prof. Geoffrey New, MA, DPhil Prof. Michael Rowan-Robinson, BA, PhD,
FInstP, FRAS
Prof David Southwood, BA, DIC, PhD
Distinguished Research Fellows
Dr Trevor Bacon, BSc, PhD Emeritus Prof. Andre Balogh, MSc, DIC Emeritus Prof. Keith Barnham, PhD Emeritus Prof. David Caplin, MA, MSc, PhD Emeritus Prof Jean Patrick Connerade, PhD, ARCS, DIC
Dr Jack Connor, BSc, PhD Prof. Christopher Dainty, PhD Dr Michel Della Negra, BSc, PhD Prof. John Harries, BSc, PhD, CPhys, FInstP, FRMets
Emeritus Prof. Christopher Isham, BSc,
ARCS, PhD, FInstP
Emeritus Prof. Gareth Jones, BSc, PhD Dr Hugh Jones, BA, PhD Emeritus Prof Peter Meikle, PhD, FRAS Emeritus Prof. Gareth Parry, BSc, PhD,
DIC, FREng
Emeritus Prof. John Quenby, BSc, PhD,
DIC, ARCS
Emeritus Prof Raymond Rivers, BA, MA, PhD, FInstP
Prof. Robin Smith, MA, PhD, DIC Lady Anne Thorne, MA, DPhil Emeritus Prof. David Websdale, PhD,
ARCS
Honorary Research Fellows Dr Julian Lyubina, PhD Mr David Price, MA, DIC Dr Khadija Tahir, BSc, MSc, PhD Mrs Prudence Wormell, BSc Dr Wenyi Zhong, MSc, PhD
Honorary Lecturers
Dr Ken Bignell, BSc, PhD, ARCS Dr Anne Curtis, PhD Mr Edward Judd, HNC Mr Kevin Middleton, BSc, MSc Dr Matthew Owens, PhD Dr Alex Robinson, BA, MSc, PhD Dr Alex Schekochihin, PhD
Visiting Professors
Prof. John Allen, MA, PhD, DSc Dr Jezsef Baranyi, PhD Prof. Farhat Beg, PhD, MPhil, MSc, BSc Prof Anthony Bell, MA, PhD, MInstP, CPhys,
FRAS
Dr Seton Bennett, PhD, CBE Prof March Burchell, PhD Dr Jeremy Burroughes, BSc, PhD Dr Gilbert Collins, PhD Dr William Dorland, BS, PhD Prof. Sergei Dudarev, BS, PhD Dr Malcolm Dunlop, BSc, PhD Dr. Anthony Dunne, BSc, PhD, DIC, ARCS Prof. John Ellis, BA, PhD Dr Lyndon Evans, BSc, PhD Prof. Vladimir Fortov, MSc, PhD Prof. Patrick Gill, BSc, DPhil Dr Mark Glaser, MB BS, M.R.C.S.L.R.C.P, FFR (R.C.S.I), D.M.R.T, F.R.C.R
Dr Gianluca Gregori, PhD Dr Mikhail Gryaznevich, PhD Dr Edward Gumbrell, PhD Prof. Richard Harrison, PhD Prof. Timothy Hender, BSc, PhD Prof. Henry Hutchinson, BSc, PhD Prof Chan Joshi, PhD Prof. Gannady Kanel, PhD Prof. Karl Krushelnick, BSc, MA, PhD Prof. Michael Lockwood, PhD Prof. Leon Lucy, BSc, PhD Dr. Louis Lyons, BSc, DPhil Professor Kirpal Nandra, BA, PhD Dr Peter Norreys, BSc, MSc, PhD Dr Andrew Randewich, Cphys, FLnstP Prof. Sergey Razorenov, PhD Dr Peter Roberts, BSc, PhD Prof Carlos Silva, PhD Prof. David Smith, PhD, ARCS Prof. Nigel Smith, BSc, PhD Prof Paul Smith, PhD Dr Michael Tatarakis, BSc, MSc, PhD Prof. John Thompson, MA, PhD
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Academic, Research and Support Staff Prof Michael Thompson, MA, PhD Dr Adrian Tuck, BSc, PhD Prof. David Wark, BSc, MS, PhD, FRS Prof. Ronald Winter, FInstP, PhD
Visiting Readers
Dr Katherine Brown, PhD
Honorary Association Leavers Dr Almut Beige
Research
Research Associates
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Dr Pablo Albella-Echave Dr Yuriy Alexandrov Dr Diego Alonso-Alvarez Dr Hemmel Amrania Dr Brian Appelbe Dr Emma Arbabzadah Dr Paloma Arroyo-Huidobro Dr Morteza Aslaninejad Dr Dane Austin Dr Minas Bacharis Dr Robert Bainbridge Dr Alexey Bak Dr James Banks Dr Thomas Barillot Dr Piers Barnes Dr Daniela Bauer Dr Francesco Benini Dr Victoria Blackmore Dr Milan Bratko Dr Avraham Braun Dr Maria Broadbridge Dr Nicolas Bruneau Dr Aaron Bundock Dr Guy Burdiak Dr David Burn Dr Eoin Butler Dr Nelson Carreira-Lopes Dr Megha Chadha Dr David Chapman Dr Christopher Chen Dr Luke Chipperfield Dr Alexander Clark Dr Emiliano Cortes Dr Jian Cui Dr Alastair Currie Dr Robert Currie Dr Maria Dasi-Espuig Dr Konstantinos Daskalakis Dr Florent Deledalle Dr Carlo Di Franco Dr Zsolt Diveki Dr Adam Dobbs Dr Sean Donnellan
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Dr Nicholas Dover Dr Emil Drabek-Maunder Dr Nokuthula Dube Dr Anne Ducout Dr Astrid Eichhorn Dr John Estes Dr Hendrik Faber Dr Stephen Feeney Dr Noah Fitch Dr Cecilia Flori Dr Yan Francescato Dr Zsolt Gercsi Dr Steffen Gielen Dr Adam Gilbertson Dr Tom Griffin Dr Giulia Gubitosi Dr Anne Guilbert Dr Stina Guldbrand Dr Richard Hendricks Dr Heli Hietala Dr Edward Hill Dr Daniel Hollington Dr Rosalind Hopwood Dr Nicholas Hylton Dr David Jennings Dr Euihun Joung Dr Asher C Kaboth Dr Christos Kamperidis Dr Edmund Kelleher Dr Youngchan Kim Dr Paul Kinsler Dr Sunil Kumar Dr Ajit Kurup Dr Mikhail Kustov Dr Kwasi Kwakwa Dr Jean-Baptiste Lagrange Dr Guillaume Lepert Dr Yu-Hung Lien Dr Jongseok Lim Dr Anne-Marie Magnan Dr Robert Mahen Dr Robert Maher Dr Matthew Malek Dr Sarah Malik Dr Janusz Martyniak Dr Kazunobu Maruyoshi Dr Lorenzo Matteini Dr Michael McCann Dr Paul McFadden Dr Katalin Mecseki Dr Alexander Mellor Dr Nicolas-Pierre Niasse Dr Dorota Niedzialek Dr Alexander Nikitenko Dr Hannah Nissan Dr Robert A Nyman Dr Sang Soon Oh Dr William Okell Dr Olof Olsson-Sax
Dr Patrick Owen Dr Rhys Parfitt Dr Siddharth Patankar Dr Bjorn Penning Dr Ajay Perumal Dr Mark Pesaresi Dr Joao Piroto-Pereira-Duarte Dr Alexander Plato Dr Andreas Pusch Dr Susarla Raghuram Dr Mohsen Rahmani Dr Aliaksandra Rakovich Dr Duncan Rand Dr Alexander Richards Dr Tyler Roschuk Dr Matthew Ruffoni Dr James R Rufus Dr Matteo Scala Dr Benjamin Sherlock Dr Mark Sherlock Dr Yuri Shitov Dr Peter Spencer Dr Christian Struber Dr Minwon Suh Dr Suren Sukiasyan Dr Francisco Suzuki-Vidal Dr George Swadling Dr Matthew Taylor Dr Andrew Telford Dr Gabrielle Thomas Dr Alfredo Tomas-Alquezar Dr Stefan Truppe Dr Tommaso Tufarelli Dr Sachetan Tuladhar Dr Jeremy Turcaud Dr Arthur Turrell Dr Kirika Uchida Dr Melissa Uchida Dr Benoit Vanniere Dr Thomas Wall Dr Sean Warren Dr Peter Wass Dr Tobias Witting Dr Jorgen Wulff Dr Ying Yang Dr Japheth Yates Dr Karen Yates Dr Benjamin Yuen Dr Amelle Zair Dr Katharina Zeissler Dr Jan Zemen Dr Seth Zenz
Research Associate Leavers 2013/14 Dr Minas Bacharis Dr William Ball Dr Fouad Ballout
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Academic, Research and Support Staff
Dr Daniel Bedingham Dr Ian Bush Dr Laurence Carson Dr Bridgette Cooper Dr Aristomenis Donos Dr James Farley-Nicholls Dr Jarvist Frost Dr Marco Genoni Dr Hannes Guhl Dr Jaesuk Hwang Dr Stephane Kena-Cohen Dr Kiang Wei Kho Dr Thomas Kirchartz Dr Matthew Lilley Dr Jad Marrouche Dr Andrei Paul Mihai Dr Edward Mitchell Dr Beinn Muir Dr Ahsan Nazir Dr Thomas Siegel Dr Sarah Skoff Dr Ian Smallman Dr Benjamin Smith Dr Mark Tame Dr Stuart Thomas Dr Andre Trindade-Pereira Dr Nicholas Wardle Dr James Wilgeroth Mr Gary Wilkes Dr Thomas Zlosnik
Research Assistants Ms Paula Alvarez-Cartelle Mr Federico Armata Mr Jim Bailey Mr Dylan Banahene-Sabulsky Mr Iain Barr Miss Rachael Boddy Ms Francesca Bottacchi Mr Javier Cambiasso Mr Stefano Casasso Mr Lionel Chaudet Mr Kees de Vries Mr Frederik Dieleman Mr James Garvie-Cook Mr Joseph Goodwin Mr Samuele Grandi Mr Farhang Haddadfarshi Mr Moritz Hambach Mr Edward Harry Mr Vincent Jarlaud Mr Allan Johnson Mr Manoj Joshi Ms Paloma Matia-Hernando Mr Lukas Medisauskas Mr Luis Melgar-Del-Pozo Mr Thomas Nutz Mr Christopher Price Ms Maria Richter www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Mr Luca Rigovacca Mr James Semple Mr Peter Shadbolt Mr Lee Suttle Mr Quentin Thiburce Mr Sunil Varma Mr Albert Verdeny-Vilalta Mr Thomas White Mr Bjorn Witt Mr David Wood Miss Megumi Yoshida
Research Assistant Leavers 2013/14 Mr Michael Bloom
Mr Gregory Ciezarek Miss Caroline Clark Mr Konstantinos Daskalakis Mr Florent Deledalle Mr Stuart Higgins Mr Christopher Hutchison Mr Stephen Logan Mr Marco Ruberti Mr Matthew Streeter Mr Nikolay Vaklev Research Support Staff
Condensed Matter Theory Dr James Spencer – Computational Science Support Specialist
Experimental Solid State Dr Shrawan Jha – Research Engineer Dr Xuhua Wang - CPE Glove Box Facility Officer High Energy Physics Dr Saad Mishal Hamid Alsari - Electrical
Engineer
Mr Geoffrey Barber - Project Engineer Mr Simon Fayer - Computing System
Support/Administrator in Grid Computing
Dr Jonathan Fulcher – Data Acquisition System Computing Specialist
Mr Michael Huffman - Computing System Sup-
port/Administrator
Dr Gregory Michiel Iles - Electronics Engineer Dr Per Jonsson – Senior Instrument Manager Dr Andrew Rose - Electronic Engineer Mr Peter James Savage - Project Engineer Mr Trevor Edward Savidge - Project Engineer
Photonics Group Mr Ian Munro - Research Officer
Plasma Physics Mr Stephen Johnson – Hypersonis & High
Speed Impact Laboratory Supervisor
Space & Atmospheric Physics Dr Seyed Adeli – Instrument Engineer Dr Leah-Nani Soledad Alconcel - Scientific Dr Anthony Allen - Scientific Dr Richard John Bantges – Scientific Mr Maciej Bendyk – Instrumentation Engineer Dr Sujit Bhattacharya – Instrument FPGA
Designer
Mr Patrick Brown - Senior Research Officer Mr Emanuele Cupido - Research Officer Dr Peter Fox – Instrument Calibration Engineer Mr Stephen Kellock - Senior Research Officer Ms Helen O’Brien - Research Officer Mr Timothy Oddy - Spacecraft Operations Engineer
Mr Md Rashid – Software Developer Dr Adri Peter Slootweg - Research Officer Mr Lawrence Soung-Yee – Instrument Engineer
Dr Nathan Sparks - Community Support Scien-
tist
Research Support Leavers in 2013/14 Mr Alan Ashton-Smith - Project Administrator Mrs Piera Brambilla - Technician Dr Shrawan Jha - Res Engineer Administrative and Support Staff
Head of Department's Office Kalvinder Chana - Senior Administrator Louise Hayward – Research Operations Manager
Linda Jones - Operations Manager for Physics Caroline Jackson - Executive Assistant (maternity leave)
Victoria Garland – Executive Assistant (maternity cover)
Research Groups Cluster Office (Astrophysics, Plasma, Space & Atmospherics) Rachel Barker – Senior Group Administrator Sandie Bernor - Group Administrator Condensed Matter Theory & Experimental Solid State Physics Groups Carolyn Dale - Senior Group Administrator Juraci Didone - Administrative Assistant Bhavna Patel - Administrator
High Energy Physics Group Carol Barlow - Experiments Manager Paula Brown - Group Administrator Paula Consiglio – Assistant Group Administrator Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Academic, Research and Support Staff Institute of Shock Physics (ISP) Alice Moore – Programme Manager Ciara Mulholland - Senior Administrator for ISP Optics (Photonics & Quantum Optics Groups) Judith Baylis - Senior Group Administrator Marcia Salviato - Deputy Group Administrator Sanja Maricic - PA to the Centre for Cold Matter Prof Ed Hinds FRS
Theoretical Physics Group Graziela De Nadai-Sowrey - Group Administrator
DTC Dr Sophie Armstrong-Brown - Programme Manager
Ms Lisa Cheung – Administrative Assistant Dr Simon Foster – Outreach Officer Miss Miranda Smith - DTC Administrative Assistant
Student Administration Postgraduate Office Loli Sanchez Rey - Postgraduate Administrator Dr Andrew Williamson - Postgraduate Development Officer
Undergraduate Office Edward Charnley – Examinations and Informations Officer
Mery Fajardo - Admissions Administrator Amira Hussain – Undergraduate Administrator
and Year in Europe Coordinaot Derryck Stewart - Undergraduate Education Manager Geetika Tewari – Undergraduate Administrator
Facilities Paul Brown - Mechanical Instrumentation Workshop Manager
Vivienne Frater - Departmental Facilities Manager
Simon Graham - Maintenance Malcolm Hudson - Departmental Buildings Manager
Ranjana Poudel - Common Room Assistant Alice Powell - Common Room Assistant Neal Powell - Reprographics Meilin Sancho - Reprographics Harry Vine - Departmental Services Manager Outreach Anna Lal – Outreach Coordinator
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Teaching Laboratory Technicians Harish Dawda - 1st Year Laboratory Robert Whisker - 1st Year Laboratory Graham Axtell - 2nd Year Laboratory Paul Beaumont - 2nd Year Laboratory
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Geoffrey Green - 3rd Year Laboratory Lee Parker - 3rd Year Laboratory
Mechanical Instrumentation Workshop and Groups Technicians Trevor Beek (SPAT) Sofia Bekou (EXSS) David Bowler Stephen Cussell (EXSS) Jonathan Dyne (QOLS) Alan Finch (PLAS) Andrew Gregory (QOLS) Simon Johnson (PHOT / QOLS) Stephen Johnson (ISP) Kevin Ladhams (HEPH) Alan Last (SPAT) Stephen Maine Steven Nelson Melvyn Patmore (PHOT) Martin Pettifer David Pitman (ISP) Alan Raper Andrew Rochester Peter Ruthven (QOLS) James Stone (PHOT / QOLS) Brian Willey (QOLS) David Williams
Electronics Workshop Technicians Valerijus Gerulis Shahid Hanif Susan Parker Bandula Ratnasekara High Energy Physics Group Mechanical Workshop David Clark Ian Clark High Energy Physics Group Electronics Workshop Sarah Greenwood Vera Kasey Maria Khaleeq
Optical Mechanical Workshop Martin Kehoe
Research and Administrative Support Staff Leavers Mrs Sima Fulford - LCN Research Administrator
Dr Christine Thompson - Programme Director Ms Lilian Wanjohi - Senior Administrator Miss Hannah Wood - Outreach Coordinator
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Undergraduate Undergraduate Teaching
Director of Undergraduate Studies Prof. A. MacKinnon Email:
[email protected]
Senior Tutor Professor D. Segal Email:
[email protected]
Admissions Tutor Dr. R. Forsyth Email:
[email protected]
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Undergraduate In October 2013 we welcomed 250 new students, making the total number of undergraduates 844, one of the largest Physics departments in the country. This was the second cohort in which home students were paying fees of £9000 per annum. Students are enrolled onto one of six programmes leading to an MSci or BSc degree. Transfers are easy between most of the programmes in the early years.
All three of our MSci degrees are four-year programmes. The MSci in Physics is by far the most popular, while Physics with a Year in Europe and Physics with Theoretical Physics supply more specialist needs. We offer three-year BSc programmes in Physics and in
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Physics with Theoretical Physics. The four-year BSc in Physics and Music Performance, offered jointly with the Royal College of Music, is unique, and attracts small numbers of exceptional candidates. In the summer of 2014 the second cohort of students graduated on our new BSc in Physics with Science Education, offered jointly with Canterbury Christ Church University, which gives students a Physics degree as well as a teaching qualification in 3 years. From October 2015 we will also offer a 4 year MSci version of this programme.
would like it to be is higher than the national average. Many of our exceptional overseas students are female.
The basic structure of the degree programmes is two years of core physics and mathematics, followed by one or two years of advanced options in selected areas of physics. All students, including those on theoretical physics degrees, do about 6 hours/week of laboratory work during the first 2 years.
All programmes include a research project. Many students find that the project is the most Typically 12% of new students register for BSc degrees and the enjoyable part of their degree as they are then able to get to grips remainder for MSci. Just over 24% of our students are women, with a topic that may be at the which although short of where we frontier of research.
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
In the third year students can choose from a wide range of physics options and can also take a Humanities or Business School course. Students on the MSci degrees take advanced physics options in their final year, alongside their major research project.
Changes to our lecture courses are made regularly to ensure that they remain topical, but from October 2012 we have been rolling out a revised programme.
We understand that arriving in a class of 250 students can be daunting and impersonal, so alongside the lectures we have activities where students meet in smaller groups and are able to get to know each other better. Each student is a member of a group of about 20, who meet regularly for tutorials as well as laboratory and professional skills sessions. Two members of the academic staff are associated with each group and act as personal tutors, remaining with the group throughout their time at Imperial. On each course in years 1 and 2 students have a tutorial each week in addition to lectures. Tutors encourage discussion about other topics within physics to help www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
students see the wider relevance of their studies. We have exchange agreements with 14 universities in western Europe. In 2013, 24 students went abroad for a full year in Europe programme and we welcomed 35 visiting students to the department. Introduced for the first time in 2012, we have begun to set up an overseas summer research project scheme for under-graduate students in their third year who are on a four year integrated Masters degree. The project is eight weeks in length and fully funded through the international office, the Blackett Laboratory industry club on page 18.
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Undergraduate Teaching Awards
The high standard of our lecturing is regularly recognised in the College’s Teaching Awards. Nominations for these awards come from the students themselves. In 2014 ,the Faculty of Natural Sciences Awards for Teaching Excellence were awarded to: • • • • • • • • • • • •
Prof Steven Cowley Prof Matthew Foulkes Dr Subhanjoy Mohanty Prof Terry Rudolph Dr Richard Hendricks Dr Edward Hill Dr Alexander Richards Dr Francisco Suzuki Vidal Miss Giulia Ferlito Mr Peter T Fox Mr Jeremy Turcaud Mr John Wood
Many of our graduates continue their studies within the physics area either by direct entry into a PhD research programme, or a specialist MSc degree such as those discussed in the following section.
Other graduating students use The Department was also their physics skills in areas such recognised in the Student as the financial services industry Union’s “Student Academic Choice Awards”: Joachim Hamm (Best Supervision), Toby Wiseman(Best teaching for PGs). The department is keen to make sure its students have positive memories of their time at Imperial. It is gratifying, therefore, to see the results from the National Student Survey (NSS) continuing to improve, with notable progress on “overall satisfaction” and on “assessment and feedback”.
or information technology. Since a physics degree develops skills such as problem solving and communication as well as technical skills, our graduates are in heavy demand from a wide range of employers.
The Commemoration Day Reception late in October each year is the setting for our departmental prize giving. In 2014 28 students were awarded prizes.
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www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Undergraduate Destination Graduates Entered Employment 54 Further Study 67 Unemployed 9 Time Out / Unavailable for Work 12
Graph 1 – Destinations of 2013 graduates
Destinations
Graph 2 – Comparison with previous year
Graph 3 – Sector of employment entered www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Undergraduate What do Physics Undergraduates do?
Examples of employers and occupations for Physics graduates who entered employment: Examples of Employers: • AMEC • Aon • Applied Laser Engineer ing Ltd. • BAE Systems Detica • Bank of America Merrill Lynch • BlackRock • British Army • Codis Ltd • Deloitte • Dollar Finance Group • Dorset Software • EDF • Encraft • EY • Greenhill & Co • Growth Intelligence • Holland Park School • Home Office • IBM (GBS) • Imperial College London • JP Morgan • KPMG • Lockton • MBDA Missile Systems • Microsoft • MU Innovation Ltd • Newton Europe • Open GI Ltd • Precision Microdrives Ltd. • PwC • Ramboll • Renishaw plc • Rolls Royce plc • Royal Navy • Schlumberger • Siemens PLM Software • STFC Innovations Ltd • Teach First • TradeRisks Ltd • UBS
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Examples of Occupations: • Actuarial Analyst • Actuary • Analyst • Analyst - Penetration Tester • Associate - Accounting • Audit Associate • Business Consultant • Compliance Officer • Consultant/Engineer • Cyber Security Consultant • Developer • Development Engineer • Efficiency Consultant • Engineer • Event Technician • Finance Advisory Analyst • Financial Modelling Analyst • FX Options Trader • Geophysicist • Graduate Engineer • Graduate Optical Engineer • Graduate Safety Case Consultant • Graduate Software Developer • Investment Banking Analyst • IT Consultant • Officer in the British Army • Operations Director • PA to the CEO • Project Manager/Busi ness Analyst • Royal Naval Officer • Sales Engineer • Scientific Officer • Secretary • Software Developer • Software Engineer • Sub-editor for New Scientist magazine • Tax Associate • Teacher • Technology Consulting Analyst • Trainee Building Physics Consultant
Examples of courses for those Physics graduates who entered further study or training: • ACA • Astroparticle Physics Research • BBSRC Doctoral Training Program; Year 1: MRes in Systems and Synthetic Biology • Biomedical and Medical Imaging Doctoral Training Programme • Cancer Research • Japanese Language, Tokyo School of Japanese Language • Condensed Matter Physics Research • DPhil in Atmospheric, Oceanic and Planetary Physics • DPhil in Atomic and Laser Physics • DTC in Nanoscience • Economics, Finance & Management • Elementary Particle Physics Research • EngD in Non-destructive Evaluation • Graduate Diploma in Law • Masters in Management Science & Engineering • MBBS Medicine • MPhil in Scientific Computing • MPhil/PhD in Telecom munications • MRes/PhD in Controlled Quantum Dynamics • MRes Photonics Systems Development • MSc Aerospace Dynamics • MSc Epidemiology • MSc Applied Physics • MSc Astrophysics • MSc Biotechnology, Bio processing and Business Management • MSc Computational
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
Statistics and Machine Learning MSc Environmental Technology MSc Information Security MSc Integrative Neuro science MSc Nanotechnology MSc Philosophy of Science MSc Physics MSc Physics and Engineering in Medicine MSc Physics and Technology of Nuclear Reactors MSc Plasma Physics MSc Quantum Fields and Fundamental Forces MSc Space Technology and Planetary Exploration Optical Projection Tomography Research PGCE (Secondary Physics with Maths) PhD in Climate Science PhD in Condensed Matter Theory PhD in Controlled Quantum Dynamics PhD in High Energy Physics PhD in Low Carbon Technologies PhD in Meteorology PhD in Physics PhD in Space Plasmas Quantum Computing Research
Undergraduate
International summer research exchange scheme for undergraduate students
Introduced for the first time in 2012, the international summer research project exchange scheme for undergraduate students is designed to exchange students with some of our closely linked partner universities overseas. The exchange means that we also host students for the summer from MIT Boston, the University of Vancouver in British Columbia, and Seoul National University. In 2014 we also sent six students to join the KAIST one month summer workshop program. The following records some impressions by the students who were sent out in the summer of 2014. More details on the scheme can be found at the following link https://www.imperial.ac.uk/students/ global-opportunities/ug/studentexp/ .
contained making it ideal as a summer project. Living on campus meant that I had a ten minute walk to work every day and could buy a coffee on my way in. I worked in a room with other undergraduates and a friend from imperial was a few doors away from me making it a very pleasant working environment. The aim of the project was to statistically analyse images from the sky and try to determine the underlying brightness distribution of the resulting blurred image. The project involved accessing a super computer using a
Linux based system and writing up code in python. I had never used Linux before and only learnt C++ in Uni part of the challenge was to learn the two new languages and get used to them. The people I worked with were very friendly and helpful making this a very enjoyable and valuable experience. After that my job was to write up code that could simulate the sky and then apply a fitting algorithm on it to see whether it would come up with the original distribution. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to apply my code to
SNU We sent Kofi Mundy-Castle, Tim Harrington, and Andrew Warwick to Seoul National University. Here is a short description from Tim: Spending eight weeks in Seoul National University, South Korea, was a fantastic, once in a lifetime experience. It gave me the opportunity to live in a country surrounded by an interesting culture, working alongside accomplished physicists in an area of research I was interested in. I managed to meet lots of people in order to live like a true Seoulite while also travelling the country and exploring the vibrant, dynamic capital on weekends.
UBC: Thomas Whiting and Leon van Riesen-Haupt travelled to Vancouver. Here is part of Leon’s exchange description: After a nine hour flight and a long taxi ride to the student accommodation I arrived in my room and realised this would be my home for the next eight weeks. My project was in the Astrophysics group and was self-
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Undergraduate strengthened and refined my practical skills in handling technical equipment, which is a fundamental aspect of science that can sometimes be overshadowed by the mathematics and the formulae: theory would be pure speculation if there were no experimental devices able to test it. I am now very competent in using various kinds of data analysis software, also employed in several other fields of science, which I will almost certainly get to use again. The group held two weekly meetings: these trained me in summarising the progress that had been made and explaining it to an audience unfamiliar with the specifics of my experiment, in order for others to make suggestions on how to tackle any problems. They also allowed me to reflect upon other people’s difficulties, whilst becoming acquainted with what everyone was working on. At the end of my stay, I wrote a report detailing the research I carried out and I gave a power point presentation summarising the main results obtained: these enhanced my oral and written skills in presenting scientific work to an expert audience.
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This is a short description from Cyprian During my placement I joined Prof. Levitov’s group within the department of Condensed Matter Theory. My research centred on a variety of topics related to graphene. Every problem required different set of methods and techniques to be employed, which although challenging at first, was immensely educational. The main project focused on investigation of properties of a circular p-n junction, which arises due to the interplay of Fabry-Perot resonances and quantum tunnelling into the system from an STM tip. Together with Prof. Levitov we developed a model, which potentially, in addition to providing qualitative understanding, will also describe
experimental data quantitatively too. Aside of the research project to which I dedicated most of my time, I really enjoyed the summer at MIT. Together with fellow exchange students we went on several sightseeing excursions and I found a little bit of time to enjoy Cambridge and Boston as well, not to mention the variety of wonderful running routes alongside Charles river. Overall I found the summer research placement at MIT extremely useful and given another chance I would have applied for it again! KAIST Malik, Yasmin, Jonas Evaeus, Jan Piech, and Alexander Soloviev all travelled to KAIST for the summer Here is a short description from Yasmin:
Annyeonghaseyo! This summer I was lucky enough to complete a 4 week research placement, along with 5 other students from the physics department, at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST). The university is situated in Daejeon- the country’s fifth largest city, south of the capital city Seoul.
I was assigned to the optics laboratory, where I was given the task of investigating the propagation of ultrafast pulses in nonlinear and dispersive optical fibers. The finished product was a program I wrote in C++, which simulated the evolution of an initial pulse according to user-defined parameters, corresponding to the properties of the fiber. Aside from our placements, we partook in numerous excursions and cultural activities, ranging from all terrain vehicle and rafting in Muju, to ceramics painting in Icheon. We also took trips to Seoul, where we visited old and new attractions alike, for example the Changdeokgung and Gyeongbokgung palace as well as the Namsan Tower. We were even treated to a tour of Samsung Electronics’ flagship showroom. I thoroughly enjoyed my time in South Korea, and I would like to thank the international offices of both Imperial College and KAIST as they were extremely helpful over the course of the trip. I would definitely recommend doing an international research placement to any students that may be considering it for next summer.
Students from Imperial and elsewhere receiving their workshop graduation certificates.
Undergraduate
Photo of the Imperial College students on an evening out with other students at MIT. Rosanne and Matteo are on the back row and Cyprian is kneeling at the front.
actual data, however, my supervisor said he was still pleased about my progress and that I should contact him if I wanted to apply for a post grad at UBC. The exchange was also a wonderful cultural experience. Living in Vancouver for two months meant that I got a proper experience of the city and not just what a tourist would see. UBC itself was on first nation grounds and right next to the Pacific spirit forest. It is situated at the end of a peninsular west of downtown Vancouver meaning that it was almost completely surrounded by coast. The ride into the city took less than half an hour with the 24/7 bus service so it was easy to go sightseeing or just downtown with a few friends. All this meant that during the week there was always a lot to discover after work. I also rented a car and crossed the US
border twice; once to go camping in the North Cascade national park with a group of people I had met at UBC and once to go to Seattle for a week end with a group of other Imperial students.
MIT: Rosanna Nichols, Cyprian Lewandowski, and Matteo Sbroscia, travelled to MIT. Matteo has submitted the following description of his visit. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has been ranked 1st university in the world this year (2014): it has a history of accomplishments that has established its role in the advancement of science and it continues to stand out as one of the most exciting centres of scientific research in the world. As a consequence, it attracts scientists
from all over the world who represent the very best of their countries’ academic excellence. I had the privilege of working in an international environment, with nearly 10 different nationalities in my group alone: discussion about everyone’s habits and culture was a very enriching experience, and one which resulted in a friendly rivalry during the Football World Cup matches that we watched together. Our hall of residence was also rich in cultural diversity: there were 10 nationalities within our exchange group, plus American students enrolled at MIT with whom we socialised and discussed. The focus of my studies is mainly theoretical, as I am pursuing a degree in Theoretical Physics, which is what motivated me to undertake a summer internship in experimental physics. It
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Outreach
Interaction with Schools and the General Public
2014 Activities The department has a dedicated Outreach office, managed by a Senior Teaching Fellow, Dr Mark Richards and employing full-time two other members of staff (Hannah Woods replaced part way through by Vinita Hassard and Dr Simon Foster). Funding in support of these activities has been awarded by the Ogden Trust and the RCUK School University Partnership Initiative. Simon Foster trains and supports staff and students to participate in outreach and public engagement, as well as undertaking his own bespoke Outreach activities associated with the three EPSRC funded Centres for Doctoral Training.
During 2014 the department undertook numerous activities such as talks, workshops, and interactive demonstrations with schools, local societies, teacher groups, and other likeminded institutions (such as the Institute of Physics). We have attended HE fairs, science careers events and national science events (including the Expo Science Fair, Cheltenham science festival, Big Bang fair, Science Uncovered, and the Royal Society Summer Exhibition).
In 2014 Physics staff members presented many outreach and public understanding talks. These activities are listed at http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics/a bout/outreach.
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Engaging Young People
Insights Work Experience Programme: In 2014, the department ran its flagship Insights work experience scheme for the third year running. The scheme is designed for year 12 students in schools with little or no previous connection to the College, thereby widening access. It offers an opportunity for able students who attend such schools to obtain a glimpse into research as well as experiencing the life of an undergraduate. We received nearly 800 applications for the 2014 insights scheme, and recruited a cohort of 40 students. Open Days: The Department Open Days continue to be a great success; around 20% of our final student intake attended our open days. They are aimed at showcasing
recent research, providing an insight into physics courses, and examples of careers that can result from a physics degree. Throughout the year, special emphasis may be placed on attracting GCSE students (years 10-11), A-Level physics students (years 12-13), and girls through the Juno annual Women In Physics open day. In 2014, we welcomed approximately 1500 students in the department . Special Events:
Tutored sessions with the Amos Bursary. Led by Dr Mark Richards, A short course was prepared and delivered (by physics UG students) to recipients of the Baroness Amos Bursary – a charity that encourages state educated British young men of African and Caribbean heritage to realise their study and career ambitions, Primarily intended for students studying both A-level
Outreach mathematics and physics the aim was to show how the two subjects are intertwined whilst also preparing them for some of the more challenging aspects on the syllabus. This event was run twice in 2014. Teachers
Communicating Physics: Undergraduate students can nominate Communicating Physics, as one of their accredited option courses in either their second or third year. Students are placed in a London school for ½ day per week over a period of 10 weeks. The course is expanding year-on-year, and the number of participating schools has reached 20 (in 2013/2014).
accredited by the Institute of Physics and with Qualified Teacher Status.
Teachers Workshops: In 2011 a fully funded Teachers’ Workshop BSc Physics with Science was set-up aimed at helping nonEducation: With the aim of helping specialist science teachers, required to provide quality, specialist physics to teach physics but who may not teachers who can inspire the next have a physics degree. The event is generation, in 2012 the department designed to help improve a teachers’ launched the three year BSc Physics understanding of the subject, boosts with Science Education degree, the their confidence and provide them first of its kind in England and with resources to take back into the Wales. Students must have classroom, including motivational completed Communicating Physics material on current physics research. in their second year, and then spend All this is aimed at making physics a their third year carrying out a mixture more engaging subject for teacher of teaching practices and core and student alike. Over 50 (mainly physics. Students graduate with a state school) teachers attended physics degree that is fully 2014, potentially impacting on thousands of schoolchildren. INSPIRE: Simon Foster is the physics tutor for the College’s teacher training programme called INSPIRE. This is a scheme run in conjunction with Canterbury Christy church
(http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/inspire) giving hands on practical advice on how to teach the various modules of the physics syllabus/curriculum.
Public Debates and Lectures 2014
Fringe/Festival Festive Fringe. 11 Dec 201416:00 - 20:00 Shedding new light on Schrödinger's cat (live streamed lecture) Physics Nobel Laureate Professor Serge Haroche delivers the annual Schrödinger Lecture. 12 Nov 2014 Roberto Trotta – Book Launch Science Museum Lates Lecture-STEM in the Community (at home and abroad): The Physics Outreach team at Imperial College London hosted an event together with CADSTI and BFUWI. 08 Nov 2014. Event for schools 'The Universe' A talk about The Universe given to Primary School pupils by Arttu Rajantie, Professor of Theoretical Physics. 21 Oct 2014.
General Book Launch - 'The Edge of The Sky' by Dr Roberto Trotta: general public and 'children of all ages' 16 Oct 2014. 23
Outreach
Talk at NBC studios: Professor Jerome Gauntlett on “A Brief History of the Science of Stephen Hawking”, preceding screening for the film “The Theory of Everything” 2014. It was a ‘How to academy’ event.
School talk by Professor Jerome Gauntlett : Kings College School, Wimbledon, Mar 2014 The Higgs boson: what is it and why it matters?
Lecture The many facets of time: An evening exploring time as perceived through music, dance, psychology, and a talk by Nobel Prize winning physicist, Professor Brian Josephson: 01 Oct 2014.
Open days Undergraduate Open Day 20 Sep 2014.
Event for schools Year 11 Project STEM Summer School 21-25 Jul 2014.
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Event for schools Stand at a Science Fair: Professor Arttu www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Rajantie presents a Particle Physics and Cosmology Stand at a Science Fair. 21 Jul 2014.
Event for schoolsTalk- 'What does the Higgs Say?' Talk for GCSE and A-Level students by Arttu Rajantie, Professor of Theoretical Physics at Imperial College London. 09 Jul 2014. Event for schools Insights Work Experience 2014: 40 Year 12 students attended the Insights work experience placement in the Physics Department at Imperial College London. 30 Jun-11 Jul 2014.
Open days Physics Project Open Day for A Level Students: The Project Open Day is a great opportunity for current A-level students to gain a first-hand insight into studying physics at Imperial College London 20 Jun 2014.
Open days Physics Open Day for GCSE Students: The GCSE Open Day is a great opportunity for students who might be considering
studying Physics beyond year 11. 19 Jun 2014.
Lecture Firewalls around black holes: What would you experience if you jumped into a black hole? Public talk by Caltech physicist Sean Carroll and science writer Jennifer Ouellette. 05 Jun 2014. Event for schools Women in Physics This exciting event was aimed at Years 10, 11 and 12, students who were already studying or were considering studying A level physics. 04 Jun 2014 10:30 - 16:00. General Imperial Festival 2014: With demonstrations, talks, music, dance and more, Imperial's ground breaking research at the third Imperial Festival 09-10 May 2014 Event for schools High Energy Physics Masterclass: A particle physics masterclass for sixth form students and teachers: 02 Apr 2014 11:00 - 17:00.
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Outreach
Event for schools Beetles, Black Holes and Editing History On March 24th 2014, Professor McCall from the Physics Department at Imperial College presented to students at The Judd School. Event for schools The Solar System with Fruit and Veg Dr Roberto Trotta from the Physics Department at Imperial College London presented to students from Norland Place School. 05 Feb 2014. Event for schools Physics at Imperial: On January 28th, school students visited the Physics Department at Imperial College London to hear Dr Daniel Mortlock and Dr Robert Forsyth present. 28 Jan 2014.
Event for schools Schools Science Partnership Launch Event:, staff from the Physics Department at Imperial College London presented to students from three south London schools. 22 Jan 201415:45 - 17:15.
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Training Course Dr Vijay Tymms from the Physics Department at Imperial College presented to students from The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama. 12 Jan 2014.
Event for schools “What Does the Higgs Say?" On 12th December 2013, Professor Arttu Rajantie from the Physics Department at Imperial College London presented to students from Highdown School. 12 Dec 2013
Event for schools Space Weather and Solar Storms: On Friday 6th December 2013, Professor Schwartz from the Physics Department at Imperial College London presented to students from The Elmgreen School. 06 Dec 2013. Lecture RCSU Science Challenge Launch On 3rd December 2013, Dr Simon Foster from Imperial College London took part in the Royal
College of Science Union’s Science Challenge.
External Uncovering the Dark Side of the Universe On Tuesday 3rd December, Dr Roberto Trotta from Imperial College London.
ASTR has an established popular series of public debates, the first series in 2012 entitled “The Big Questions” followed by “The Sensual Universe” in 2013. ASTR has run small sci-fi workshops for writers yearly since 2010 – Science for Fiction. Approximately 30 people have attended each year. HEPP participates in the annual National Particle Physics Master Class. QOLS PG students present an annual Quantum Show (running since 2009) with talks and demonstrations on recent developments in quantum physics for a diverse public audience numbering around 350. Based on the success of the shows the students have produced a series of workshops for teachers and have repeated the show at a variety of schools within the London area, along with a number of music festivals. The students have also undertaken a women in science lecture series at four or five London schools in the 2012-13 period.
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Postgraduate
Rebecca Lane 26
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Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Postgraduate
Postgraduate Studies
Director of Postgraduate Studies Prof. S. Maier Email:
[email protected]
The Department of Physics at Imperial College is one of the largest Physics departments in the UK. The Department’s research covers a comprehensive range of topics in theoretical and experimental fields and has a flourishing postgraduate research and taught MSc community. We offer seven Master’s level taught postgraduate courses, as well as the extended Masters in Physics as a two year full time course. Our first students in this extended Masters graduated recently. A new element in our one year MSc in Physics are two streams dedicated to Shock Physics, and to Nanophotonics. Three of our masters courses are associated with EPSRC Centres for Doctoral Training (CDTs), the areas of which are Controlled Quantum Dynamics, Plastic Electronics and Theory and Simulation of Materials. The CDT courses can lead directly to PhD studies and were successfully renewed this year.
PhD research fields extend from astronomy, space and plasma physics to high energy, theoretical and atomic physics, and condensed matter theory. Solid state physics, plastic electronics, laser physics, applied optics and photonics, nanophotonics/plasmonics and metamaterials as well as quantum information are all
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
areas where there are close collaborations with industry, as well as providing opportunities to study fundamental underlying principles. The Department has had a successful year in attracting the best students worldwide via the Imperial College PhD Scholarship scheme (six students funded) and the joint Imperial / National University of Singapore (NUS) PhD programme, where two students have joint.
There are many examples of international and industrial collaboration involving our research groups and we are also very strongly involved in interdisciplinary research centres around the College. We are directly linked to the Thomas Young Centre (TYC), the Shock Institute, the Centre for Plastic Electronics (CPE), the Institute of Chemical Biology, the Centre for Plasmonics and Metamaterials and the Grantham Institute for Climate change – all of which are centres of interdisciplinary research within the Imperial College campus. Many groups are involved in research using large scale facilities. The Department has extensive internal facilities and a tremendous range of research topics available to postgraduate research students.
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Postgraduate Highlighted Postgraduate Case Studies
Rebecca Lane Group: HEPP Supervisor: Dr D Colling
Rebecca’s Ph.D research focussed on analysing proton-proton collision data from the world’s largest particle accelerator: the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). The data was taken by the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) detector throughout the years of 2011 and 2012 and analysed in different ways to probe the properties of the Higgs boson discovered at the LHC. The Higgs boson is observed via the final states it decays into, and Rebecca’s work was to study the final state of two tau leptons. Only by observing the Higgs boson in all of its predicted decays and making precision measurements of their relative decay rates can we ensure that this discovered particle is the Higgs boson predicted by the Standard Model of Particle Physics.
During Rebecca’s Ph.D, she spent two years based at CERN near Geneva. She worked as part of a group of researchers from many institutes across the world to develop an analysis to study the Higgs in the final state of two taus in the context of the Standard Model, while also developing interpretations of the data in other possible new-physics models. She participated in two papers incorporating the data taken during run 1 of the LHC - one of which documents the first evidence of the Higgs in the final state of the two taus with consistency with the Standard Model, and the other which interprets the data in the context of the Minimally Supersymmetric Standard Model - a popular beyond the Standard Model theory which is a subset of Supersymmetry and has not so far been discovered. Recently Rebecca 28
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gave a talk at the internationally renowned Moriond QCD and High Energy Interactions conference in La Thuile, Italy, summarising the latest results in Higgs decays in all fermionic final states.
Oliver Pike Supervisor: Prof Steven Rose Group: Plasma
Ben Dive Supervisors: Daniel Burgarth, Florian Mintert Group: CQD CDT
Ben Dive's project looked at the ability to manipulate quantum systems in the presence of a noisy environment. He specifically looked in ways in which the dynamics of a qubit and its environment can be replicated by one which is well controlled and isolated from its environment. He showed that in some cases the addition of classical probability was sufficient to do this, and presented a poster on this at the QUICC summer school in Exeter. In addition, he came up with a way to solve the problem in a general case using only a small ancilla space and well behaved Hamiltonians. The project was done jointly with Aberystwyth University, so he had the pleasant experience of spending half of summer working by the sea in Wales. His current PhD is expanding upon the work he did over summer, and he is preparing some of the results for publication.
Oliver Pike has been a PhD student in the Plasma Physics Group at Imperial College for the last three years, funded by an EPSRC studentship with a CASE top-up award from AWE Aldermaston. His work focuses on theoretical aspects of high energy density plasma physics and he has published several first author papers in the area of relativistic effects in plasmas. One of his most notable pieces of work explained how it may now be possible to use ultra-highpower lasers to study fundamental quantum physics in the laboratory. Oliver was the lead author on a recent Nature Photonics paper that showed theoretically how the elusive Breit-Wheeler two-photon pairproduction process could be studied in the laboratory, some 80 years after it was first proposed. This process is the "simplest" method by which light can be transformed into matter, but has proven remarkably difficult to demonstrate experimentally due to the very extreme conditions required. The paper received an astonishing amount of publicity in the scientific and popular press. Oliver has since been working closely with AWE on practical designs for an experiment that can be undertaken on their large ORION laser facility, hopefully in 2015. Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Postgraduate
Highlighted Postgraduate Case Studies
Mitesh Patel Supervisors: Dr D Balint (Mech Eng), Dr MR Wenman (Materials) & Prof A Sutton Group: TSM CDT
Nuclear power is a reliable and clean source of energy that offers low CO2 emissions. As the industry progresses, it is crucial that nuclear reactor technology continues to become safer. During the MSc I modelled a diffusion mechanism that is responsible for the embrittlement of nuclear fuel cladding. This involved the classical field theory of the interaction between the diffusing species and continuum fracture using Green tensors and singular integral equations. In my current PhD research, I am using conformal mapping to describe the concentration profiles ahead of elliptical voids in the component. This work builds on another PhD project in which many-body quantum mechanical simulations were used to identify the role of the diffusing species within the cladding material. I work at the boundary between condensed matter physics and engineering, interfacing theoretical and computational methods; I am supervised by Daniel Balint (Mechanics of Materials, Mechanical Engineering), Mark Wenman (Centre for Nuclear Engineering) and Adrian Sutton (Condensed Matter Theory, Physics). We are applying fundamental physics to a problem of major industrial importance and we work in close collaboration with Rolls-Royce. www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Joe Goodwin Supervisors: Prof Danny Segal and Prof Richard Thompson – Controlled Quantum Dynamics CDT
Joe's research has centred on the development of experimental techniques for the cooling and manipulation of calcium ions in a Penning ion trap. In particular, he provided the first demonstration of resolved-sideband laser cooling in a Penning trap, allowing the ions to be cooled to their motional quantum ground state. This important result opens the door to a wide range of new techniques that have previously been limited to radiofrequency ion traps. Coupled with the intrinsically low heating rate of the Penning trap this will provide an environment of unparalleled isolation in which to study a range of sensitive phenomena in quantum thermodynamics and quantum information.
Joe has also conducted theoretical research into novel schemes for generating many-qubit entanglement in ion Coulomb crystal lattices. Of special interest is the application to small error-correctable quantum memories in a Penning trap, where symmetries of the crystal can be exploited to greatly reduce the complexity of the protocols necessary to produce the entangled state.
The results of his work have been published in two papers in leading international journals, with a further two papers currently in peer review.
He has recently been awarded an EPSRC Doctoral Prize Fellowship and is currently a research associate in the Quantum Optics and Laser Science group at Imperial College."
Michel Buck Supervisor: Prof F Dowker Group: THEO
Michel Buck's thesis was in the area of the causal set approach to quantum gravity. The focus was investigating a privileged state, the SorkinJohnston (SJ) state, for scalar quantum field theory derived from the causal structure of spacetime. In a causal diamond in 2 dimensional flat space, he found that for the massless scalar field the SJ state approximates the state between two perfect mirrors positioned at the spacelike corners of the diamond. In deSitter spacetime, which is of great interest to cosmologists both because of inflation and the acceleration of the expansion of the universe today, the SJ state depends on the spacetime dimension, mass of the field, and on the choice of subregion, differring in many cases from the usual Bunch-Davies vacuum. This may have implications for early universe cosmology, indicating a physical role for certain deSitter invariant “alpha” states. Michel published 4 papers before graduating and in November 2014 he took up a postdoctoral research position in the Department of Physics at Northeastern University, Boston MA, USA. Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Postgraduate Highlighted Postgraduate Case Studies
Nipol Chaemjumrus Nipol Chaemjumrus came to the MSc in Quantum Fields and Fundamental Forces from Thailand on a prestigious Queen Sirikit Scholarship. He did exceptionally well, coming first in the QFFF examinations and in consequence was awarded the Salam prize for this accomplishment, shared with the student who came second. His MSc Dissertation was entitled “Non-Geometric Flux and Double Field Theory”, supervised by Professor Chris Hull. He is now working on his PhD at Imperial, supervised by Professor Chris Hull and building on the work he did in his MSc project.
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the slope efficiency, the output power, and the output wavelength under various temperatures. Experimental results revealed that, in contrary to most other lasers, Alexandrite laser can have an enhanced performance at temperatures higher than the room temperature, which can be explained by the vibronic nature of its laser crystal. The results also provided some preliminary data on the optimal operating temperatures for Wenjun Guo different laser operation modes, Wenjun Guo obtained a BSc in contributing to the development of a Optical Science and Technology diode- pumped Alexandrite laser from Sun Yat-sen University, China, system with a higher wall-plug before starting his postgraduate efficiency that is especially suitable study in MSc in Optics and for the space-borne lidar Photonics at Imperial. His MSc applications. Currently, Wenjun is a project was on characterising the temperature-dependent performance PhD candidate in the Francis Crick Institute and the Photonics Group of of diode-pumped Alexandrite laser Imperial College London, working under the supervision of Prof. Mike with Dr. Peter Thorpe, Prof. Paul Damzen. During the project, he first French, and Dr. Chris Dunsby, on designed a temperature-controlling investigating the role of the protein laser crystal holder, which had a temperature-tuning range from 20°C Rdh54 in the mitotic checkpoint using the optical technique FLIM to 150°CWenjun with anGuo active cooling FRET. capability, and was then utilised to characterise the performance of diode-pumped Alexandrite laser in terms of the threshold pump power,
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Postgraduate PhD Degrees awarded in the Department in 2012 Group
Astrophysics
(M) (F) 2
Condensed Matter Theory
6
Experimental Solid State High Energy Physics Photonics
5
1
12
2
3
Quantum Optics & Laser Science
1
Plasma Physics Space & Atmospheric Physics Totals
1
5
Quantum Optics & Laser Science - MPHIL only
Theoretical Physics
1
6
1
4
3
8
52
9
Astrophysics
W. Ball (M) “Observations and Modelling of Total and Spectral Solar Irradiance” Supervisor: Dr Y Unruh
M. March (F) “Advanced Statistical Methods for Astrophysical Probes of Cosmology” Supervisors: Prof A Jaffe & Dr R Trotta H. Patel (M) “The Nature and Evolution of Far-IR Luminous Galaxies” Supervisor: Dr D Clements
Condensed Matter Theory
P.W. Avraam (M) “LinearScaling First-Principles Calculations of Entire Semiconductor Nanorods” www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Supervisor: Prof P Haynes
P. Expert (M) “An Odyssey with complexity and network science: From the brain to social systems” Supervisors: Prof K Christensen & Prof H Jensen
J. S. Gill (M) “Morphology and vascular transport in the human placenta” Supervisor: Prof D Vvedensky Y. Luo (M) “Transformation optics applied to plasmonics” Supervisor: Prof Sir J Pendry A. Pusch (M) “Self-induced transparency solitons in nanophotonic waveguides” Supervisor: Prof O Hess
S. Wuestner (M) “Gain and Plasmon Dynamics in Active Nanoplasmonic Metamaterials” Supervisor: Prof O Hess
Experimental Solid State Physics W. Elder (M) “Semi-empirical modelling of SiGe heterostructures” Supervisor: Prof J Zhang
M. Faist (M) “Spectroscopy of the charge transfer state and device studies of polymer:fullerene photovoltaic blends” Supervisors: Prof J Nelson & Prof J De Mello J. Frost (M)“Computational Modelling and Design of Conjugated Molecular Electronic Materials” Supervisor: Prof J Nelson
L. Hirst (F) “A spectroscopic study of strain-balanced InGaAs/GaAsP quantum well structures as absorber materials for hot carrier solar cells” Supervisor: Dr N Ekins-Daukes
PhD Thesis Awarded
R. Ward (M) “Modelling of Silicon-Germanium Alloy Heterostructures using Double Group Formulation of k.p Theory” Supervisors: Dr P Stavrinou & Prof J Zhang H. Yoon (M) “Highly localised surface plasmon polaritons in active metallo-organic multilayer structures” Supervisors: Dr P Stavrinou & Prof S Maier & Prof DDC Bradley
High Energy Physics
C. Blanks (M) “V production ratios at LHCb and the alignment of its RICH detectors” Supervisor: Prof U Egede
P.N. Schaack (M) “Measurement of the decay BS¿¿¿¿ at LHCb” Supervisor: Prof A Golutvin
M. Cutajar (M) “Search for supersymmetric neutral Higgs bosons decaying to ¿ pairs in the e+¿-jet final state with calibration using Z¿¿¿ events at CMS” Supervisor: Dr DJ Colling
M.J. Easton (M) “RFQ Design for Pamela Injector”
Z. P. Hatherell (F) “Searching for SUSY in events with Jets and Missing Transverse Energy using \alpha_{T} with the CMS Detector at the LHC” Supervisor: Prof J Nash
R.J. Nandi (M) “A Search for Supersymmetry in Events with Photons and Jets from Proton-Proton Collisions at \sqrt{s} = 7 TeV with the CMS Detector” Supervisors: Dr J Hays & Dr C Seez
G. Ball (M) “Cross section studies of the Z and neutral supersymmetric Higgs bosons decaying to tau leptons at CMS” Supervisor: Dr DJ Colling
J.E. Dobson (M) “Neutrino Induced Charged Current ¿+ Production at the T2K Near Detector” Supervisors: Dr Y Uchida & Dr C Andreopoulos
A.E. Guneratne Bryer (M) “A Search for Supersymmetry with Same-Sign Tau and Lepton Final States at the CMS Experiment” Supervisor: Prof O Buchmueller
P. Masliah (M) “Study of muon neutrino disappearance in the T2K experiment” Supervisor: Dr M Wascko
A. Alekou (F) “Ionisation Cooling Lattices for the Neutrino Factory” Supervisor: Dr J Pasternak
A. Currie (M) “Direct searches for WIMP dark matter with ZEPLIN-III” Supervisor: Dr HdOP Araujo
Supervisor: Dr J Pozimski
A.G. Sparrow (M) “Measurement of the Polarisation of the W Boson and Application to Supersymmetry Searches at the Large Hadron Collider” Supervisors: Dr A Tapper & Prof T Virdee
T. Whyntie (M) “Constraining the supersymmetric parameter space with early data from the Compact Muon Solenoid experiment” Supervisor: Prof G Hall
Optics - Photonics
A. Favaro (M) “Recent Advances in Classical Electromagnetic Theory” Supervisors: Prof M McCall Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
31
Postgraduate E. Kelleher (M) “Advancements in modelocked fibre lasers and fibre supercontinua” Supervisor: Prof JR Taylor P. Ramirez Hernandez (M) “Extended Depth of Field” Supervisor: Prof P Török
G. Thomas (F) “High power modelocking using a nonlinear mirror” Supervisor: Prof M Damzen
Optics - Quantum Optics and Laser Science MPHIL
S. Begley (M) “Toward implementing conditional quantum logic on-chip using the Kerr nonlinearity” Supervisor: Prof E Hinds
Optics - Quantum Optics and Laser Science S. Donnellan (M) “Towards Sideband Cooling of a Single 40Ca+ Ion in a Penning Trap” Supervisors: Prof RC Thompson & Prof D Segal H. W. Doyle (M) “Creating and Probing Warm Dense Matter and High Energy Density Blast Waves” Supervisor: Prof R Smith
D. Herrera-Marti (M) “Implementation of FaultTolerant Quantum Devices” Supervisors: Dr S Barrett & Prof T Rudolph
I. R. Hill (M) “Development of an Apparatus for a Strontium Optical Lattice Frequency Standard” Supervisors: Dr E Curtis & Dr BE Sauer M Kohnen (M) “Detecting Atoms with Integrated Optics and Frequency-Synthesised Light” Supervisor: Prof EA Hinds
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Plasma Physics
J. Bissell (M) “Magnetised Transport and Instability in Laser Produced Plasmas” Supervisor: Dr RJ Kingham
D. J. Moulton (M) “Numerical Modelling of H-mode Plasmas on JET” Supervisors: Prof W Fundamenski & Prof S Rose N-P. Niasse (M) “Development of a Pseudo Non-LTE model for Z-pinch simulations” Supervisor: Prof JP Chittenden
C. Palmer (M) “Approaching the radiation pressure regime of proton acceleration with high intensity lasers” Supervisors: Prof R Evans & Prof Z Najmudin
A. Rehman (F) “Optical Probing of high-intensity laser propagation through plasmas” Supervisors: Dr B Dangor & Prof Z Najmudin G. Swadling (M) “An experimental investigation of the azimuthal structures formed during the ablation phase of wire array z-pinches” Supervisors: Prof SV Lebedev C. Willis (M) “Dust in Stationary and Flowing Plasmas” Supervisor: Dr M Coppins
Space & Atmospheric Physics
R. Beeby (M) “Validation of the far-infrared foreignbroadened water vapour continuum from airborne field campaign measurements” Supervisor: Dr J Pickering C.H.J. Cheung (M) “A Study of Stratosphere-Troposphere Coupling with an Aquaplanet Model” Supervisors: Dr A Czaja & Prof JD Haigh
PhD Thesis Awarded
C. Dancel (M) “An analysis of the hydrological cycle and poleward heat transports simulated by two climate models” Supervisor: Dr AC Czaja
A. Flint (F) “Model Sensitivities and Stratosphere - Troposphere Interactions” Supervisor: Prof JD Haigh E-M. Giannakopoulou (F) “Land - Boundary Layer - Sea Interactions in the Middle East” Supervisor: Prof R Toumi
G. Torri (M) “Counting gauge invariant operators in supersymmetric theories using Hilbert series” Supervisor: Prof A Hanany
PhD Degrees awarded in the Department in 2013
N. Sparks (M) “Measurement and analysis of local urban CO2 emissions” Supervisor: Prof R Toumi
Group Condensed Matter Theory
R.H. White (F) “New Bias Correction Methods for Simulating Precipitation and Runoff in the Weather Research and Forecasting Model” Supervisor: Prof R Toumi
Controlled Quantum Dynamics
Theoretical Physics
B. Hoare (M) “The S-matrix of the Pohlmeyer-reduced AdS5 x S5 superstring” Supervisor: Prof A TSeytlin Y. Iwashita (M) “Quantum aspects of Pohlmeyerreduced AdS5xS5 superstring” Supervisor: Prof A TSeytlin
Experimental Solid State Grantham Institute
High Energy Physics Photonics
Quantum Optics & Laser Science Plasma Physics
J.J. Noller (M) “Disformal Gravity” Supervisor: Prof J Magueijo
Plasma Institute of Shock Physics
T. Pugh (M) “Chiral Supergravities” Supervisor: Prof K Stelle W. Rubens (M) “On The Black Hole / Qubit Correspondence” Supervisor: Prof MJ Duff
D.B. Thomas (M) “A Change is as Good as a Test: Observational Tests of Extensions to the Concordance Cosmological Model” Supervisor: Dr C Contaldi
Space & Atmospheric Physics Theoretical Physics
C. Strickland-Constable (M) “Generalised Geometry of Supergravity” Supervisor: Prof DJ Waldram
Theoretical Physics – MPHIL only Totals
(M) (F) 1 2
1
9 1 9
1
12
10
2
1 1
1 2
2
4 1 1
52 9
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Postgraduate Condensed Matter Theory
E. Barkhudarov (M) “Renormalization Group Analysis of Equilibrium and Non-Equilibrium Charged Systems” Supervisor: Prof D Vvdensky
Controlled Quantum Dynamics CDT
S Jevtic (F) “Large Consequences of Quantum Coherence in small systems” Supervisor: Prof T Rudolph M. Pusey (M) “Is quantum steering spooky?” Supervisor: Prof T Rudolph
M.P. Woods (M) “Orthogonal Polynomials and Open Quantum Systems” Supervisors: Prof M Plenio & Prof M Kim Experimental Solid State Physics
N. Chan (M) “Solar electricity from concentrator photovoltaic systems” Supervisors: Dr N EkinsDaukes & Dr H Brindley & Dr B Chaudhuri
F. Colleaux (M) “Novel Solution-Processable Dielectrics for Organic and Graphene Transistors” Supervisors: Prof DDC Bradley & Prof T Anthopoulos R. Fernandez Garcia (M) “Simulation and characterization of optical nanoantennas for field enhancement and waveguide coupling” Supervisor: Prof S Maier S. Foster (M) “On the influence of physical and chemical structure on charge transport in disordered
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
organic semiconducting materials and devices” Supervisor: Prof J Nelson
D. James (M) “Developing Structural Probes for Designed Molecular Architectures” Supervisor: Dr J-S Kim
J. McGurk (M) “Analysing Gain for Organic Laser Applications” Supervisors: Dr P Stavrinou & Prof DDC Bradley R. Stanley (M) “A structural and spectroscopic investigation of polyfluorene copolymers in solution and the solid-state” Supervisor: Dr A Campbell
M. Taylor (M) “Resolving spin physics in self-assembled InAs/GaAs quantum dots” Supervisor: Prof R Murray I. Usman (M) “Investigating Inhomogeneous FM at SC/FM Interfaces Using Point-Contact Andreev Spectroscopy” Supervisor: Prof L Cohen
Grantham Institute
E.L. Thompson (F) “Modelling North Atlantic Storms in a Changing Climate” Supervisors: Prof W Distaso & Prof B Hoskins
High Energy Physics
P. Guzowski (M) “Reconstruction of neutrino induced neutral current neutral pion events with the T2K ND280 Tracker and ECAL” Supervisor: Dr M Wascko
S. Ives (F) “Study of the kaon contribution to the T2K neutrino beam using neutrino
PhD Thesis Awarded
interactions in the Near Detector” Supervisor: Dr Y Uchida
Particle Physics Detectors” Supervisor: Prof G Hall
N. Wardle (M) “Observation of a new particle in the search for the Standard Model Higgs boson at the CMS detector” Supervisors: Prof G Davies & Dr J Hays
M. Jarvis (M) “Measurement of the electron charge asymmetry in inclusive W production in pp collisions at ¿s = 7 TeV in the CMS experiment” Supervisor: Prof T Virdee
E. Mitchell (M) “Development of a miniaturised particle radiation monitor for Earth orbit” Supervisor: Dr HdOP Araujo
C. Parkinson (M) “The angular analysis of the B0 to K*0¿+¿- decay at LHCb” Supervisors: Dr U Egede & Dr M Patel S Rogerson (M) “A search for supersymmetry using the ¿T variable with the CMS detector and the impact of experimental searches for supersymmetry on supersymmetric parameter space” Supervisors: Dr D Collin & Prof O Buchmueller
M. Scott (M) “Measuring Charged Current Neutrino Interactions in the Electromagnetic Calorimeters of the ND280 Detector” Supervisor: Dr Y Uchida A. Shires (M) “Exploring b to s electroweak penguin decays at LHCb” Supervisor: Prof U Egede S. Short (F) “Study of neutrino-induced neutral current neutral pion production in the T2K near detector” Supervisors: Dr M Wascko & Prof J Nash P. Stejskal (M) “Radiation Effects in Optical Link Components for Future
Optics - Photonics
I. E. Kepiro (F) “Highresolution retinal imaging with a compact adaptive optics ophthalmoscope” Supervisor: Dr C Paterson A. Thompson (M) “Developing endoscopic instrumentation and techniques for in vivo fluorescence lifetime imaging and spectroscopy” Supervisors: Prof M Neil & Dr C Dunsby & Prof PW French & Dr D Elson
Optics - Quantum Optics and Laser Science M. Ahmadi (M) “Resource theory of asymmetry and some of its applications” Supervisor: Prof T Rudolph
N. Bulleid (M) “Slow, cold beams of polar molecules for precision measurements” Supervisors: Dr MR Tarbutt & Prof B Sauer J. Cerrillo Moreno (M) “Laser Cooling of Quantum Systems” Supervisor: Prof M Plenio
C. Hutchison (M) “High-order harmonic generation in laser ablation plumes” Supervisors: Prof L Frazinski & Prof J Marangos G. Lepert (M) “Integrated optics for coupled-cavity quantum electrodynamics” Supervisor: Prof EA Hinds
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Postgraduate S. Mavadia (M) “Motional Sideband Spectra and Coulomb Crystals in a Penning Trap” Supervisors: Prof RC Thompson & Prof D Segal
S.I. Olsson Robbie (M) “High Energy Density Physics In Cluster Media” Supervisor: Prof R Smith M. Oppermann (M) “Resolving Strong Field Dynamics in Cation States of CO2 via Optimised Molecular Alignment” Supervisor: Prof J Marangos M. Siano (M) “Measuring Ultrafast Chemical Dynamics with New Light Sources” Supervisors: Prof J Tisch & Prof J Marangos
I. Smallman (M) “A New Measurement of the Electron Electric Dipole Moment Using Ytterbium Fluoride” Supervisors: Prof B Sauer & Dr J Hudson
R.J. Squibb (M) “Probing molecular structure and dynamics with coherent extreme ultraviolet and X-ray pulses” Supervisor: Prof L Frasinski S. Truppe (M) “New physics with cold molecules: precise microwave spectroscopy of CH and the development of a microwave trap” Supervisor: Dr MR Tarbutt
Plasma Physics
C. R. D Brown (M) “Spectroscopic Studies on Warm and Hot Dense Matter” Supervisor: Prof S Rose G.C. Burdiak (M) “An investigation of cylindrical liner z-pinches as drivers for converging strong shock experiments” Supervisor: Prof S Lebedev 34
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N. Dover (M) “Exploring novel regimes for ion acceleration driven by intense laser radiation” Supervisors: Dr S Mangles & Prof Z Najmudin E. Khoory (M) “Experimental Study of Plasma Implosion Dynamics in a Two-Stage Wire Array Z-Pinch Configuration” Supervisor: Prof S Lebedev
H.T. Kim (M) “Physics and Computational Simulations of Plasma Burn-through for Tokamak Start-up” Supervisors: Prof W Fundamensky & Prof S Rose R.D. Lloyd (M) “Collisional Particle In Cell Modelling Of The Propagation Of Fast Electrons In Solid Density Plasma” Supervisors: Prof R Evans & Dr R Kingham
L. Pickworth (F) “Experimental investigation of supersonic plasma jets colliding with thin metallic foils” Supervisors: Dr S Bland & Prof S Lebedev
J.W. Skidmore (M) “Experimental study of pulsed power driven radiative shockwaves in noble gases” Supervisors: & Prof S Lebedev & Dr S Bland A. E. Turrell (M) “Processes driving non-Maxwellian distributions in high energy density plasmas” Supervisors: Dr M Sherlock & Prof S Rose S.W. Vickers (M) “Particle in Cell and Hybrid Simulations of the Z Double-Post-Hole Convolute Cathode Plasma Evolution and Dynamics” Supervisors: Prof J Chittenden
B.E.R. Williams (M) “Theory and modelling of fast electron
PhDs Awarded
transport in laser-plasma interactions” Supervisor: Dr R Kingham
Type II and M Theory” Supervisor: Prof D Waldram S. Orani (M) “Cosmological Perturbations from Hilltop Potentials” Supervisor: Dr A Rajantie
Plasma Institute of Shock Physics W. Neal (M) “The Role of Particle Size in the Shock Compaction of Brittle Granular Materials” Supervisor: Dr B Proud
Space & Atmospheric Physics
R-K Seong (M) “Brane Tilings and Quiver Gauge Theories” Supervisor: Prof A Hanany Theoretical Physics - MPHil
C. Ansell (F) “Evaluating mineral dust aerosol retrieval and its direct radiative effect with a view towards improving forecasts in the UK Met Office NWP model” Supervisors: Prof R Toumi & Dr H Brindley
M Szmigiel (M) “Massless preheating with full Einstein gravity” Supervisor: Dr A Rajantie
K.P. Chan (M) “Analysis of Outgoing Longwave Radiation (OLR) in different timescales over Africa and Atlantic Ocean” Supervisor: Prof J Harries J. Farley Nicholls (M) “Modelling of the Caspian Sea” Supervisor: Prof R Toumi
U. Hausmann (F) “The signature of mesoscale eddies on sea surface temperature and its associated heat transport” Supervisor: Dr A Czaja
Theoretical Physics
D. Benincasa (M) “The Action of a Causal Set” Supervisor: Prof F Dowker
C.N. Clark (F) “Data Analysis And Modelling For Observations Of Polarisation Of The Microwave Sky” Supervisor: Dr C Contaldi A.J. Coimbra (M) “Generalised Geometries for
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Postgraduate MSc in Physics
Achilleas Athanasiou Fragkoulis Analyses of CMS data for the H→invisible group. Supervisor: David Colling
Franziska Beck Theory and simulation of sideband cooling of ions in a Penning trap Supervisor: Richard Thompson Kieran Brophy Atmospheric signals of carbon release from thawing permafrost Supervisor: Heather Graven
Christian Fuchs Low-dimensional transport phenomena in solution processed metal oxide heterostructures Supervisor: Thomas Anthopoulos Yuan Gao Spin properties of un-doped, p-doped and n-doped quantum dots ensemble Supervisor: Ray Murray
Deniz Koksal Study of a directional analysis on the recoil spectra induced by astrophysical neutrino backgrounds on the future generation of dark matter experiments Supervisor: Henrique Araujo Richard Laithwaite Magnetosphere-atmosphere coupling at Saturn: Response of thermosphere and ionosphere to disturbed magnetic storm conditions Supervisor: Ingo MuellerWodarg Immanuel Lorang Principles of seismicoceanography applied to ocean model data Supervisor: Ralf Toumi
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Junos Lukan Simulating x-ray generation in laser wakefield accelerators Supervisor: Stuart Mangles Jarand Narbuvold Theory and simulation of electron transmission Supervisor: Arash Mostofi
Matthew Parker Comparing methods of fabricating bowtie-nanoantennas to change the optical properties of molecules Supervisor: Stefan Maier Jens Petersen Path length distribution in random directed acyclic graphs Supervisor: Tim Evans
Daven Raithatha Interactions of the interplanetary cosmic rays environment with space based gravitational wave detectors Supervisor: Peter Wass
Anna Clare Sales Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) studies for the Solar Orbiter instrument boom Supervisor: Tim Horbury
Ao Shi Kelvin probe force microscopy and its application in graphene characterisation Supervisor: Lesley Cohen Malcolm Simpson Resolved sideband cooling of a single ion to the quantum mechanical ground state in a Penning Trap Supervisor: Richard Thompson
Panagiota Theodoulou Impact of restricted radiative emission from compressively strained quantum wells on the photonic coupling Supervisor:Diego Alonso Alvarez
PGT Research Projects
Kevin van der Meij The solar wind at 0.3 AU new observations from the NASA Messenger spacecraft Supervisor: Robert Forsyth
Chenhao Cui Automated chemical classification of single cereal grains using NIR spectroscopy Supervisor: Kenny Weir
Renjie Yun Many-body Green's function theory of Penning ionisation widths for sub-Kelvin atommolecule collisions Supervisor: Vitali Averbukh
Biniyam Erkihun Characterisation of the electromagnetic field In nanostructures Supervisor: Stefan Maier
Maxime Dubois Fluorescence super resolution microscopy and conical diffraction Supervisor: Martin McCall
Samual White Using symbolic regression to data mine the laws of physics Supervisor: Jony Hudson
MSc in Physics with Shock Physics
Stefan Heufelder Optimisation of the optical imaging system and methods for image analysis in symmetric Taylor impact experiments Supervisor: David Chapman Lukas Schickhofer Blast biomechanics of the human head Supervisor: Mazdak Ghajari (Aeronautics)
MSc in Physics with Extended Research
Luc Sagnières The Influence of local ionization on ionospheric densities in Titan’s upper atmosphere Supervisor: Marina Galand
MSc in Optics and Photonics
Mathilde Barré Establishment of a model and characterization of performance of the solar simulator of SIMDIA space environment simulation chamber Supervisor: Jenny Nelson Hao Chen Exploring a new method to produce plasmonic bowtie nanoantennas Supervisor: Stefan Maier
Gabriel Geraci Simulations of Young’s interference in plasmonic structures Supervisor: Stefan Maier Wenjun Guo Temperature-control and characterisation of a diodepumped alexandrite laser Supervisor: Mike Damzen
Yichuan Huang Adaptive spatial laser control with liquid lens Supervisor: Mike Damzen
Wentao Huang Phase Object Imaging: A comparison between interferometry and moiré deflectometry Supervisor: Stuart Mangles Koppány Körmöczi Trade-Off analysis of 3D fullspace electromagnetic cloaks using inhomogeneous, anisotropic, non-magnetic materials in respect of effciency and feasibility Supervisor: John Pendry
Asilatun Nisa Mohd Azmi “Digistain" Mid-Infrared chemical imaging for cancer diagnosis; trialling a new technology Supervisor: Chris Philips Michael Ramamonjisoa 3D imaging using a synthetic
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
35
Postgraduate aperture LIDAR Supervisor: Chris Dunsby
Fransessca Shirley A comprehensive comparison of metal and dielectric nanostructures for enhanced scattering in solar cells Supervisor: Nicholas EkinsDaukes Chengze Song Study of methods separating Brillouin signal Supervisor: Peter Török Christos Theodorakis Photoreflectance spectroscopy for the optical characterisation of InGaAs quantum wells Supervisor: Nicholas EkinsDaukes
Zizhen Xue Hong-Ou-Mandel effect from spontaneous parametric down converted photons Supervisor: Danny Segal Lydia Zajiczek An optical interferometer for investigating the coherence properties of a photon BoseEinstein condensate Supervisor: Robert Nyman Daoqin Zha Phase object imaging: Comparing interferometry with wave front sensing Supervisor: Stuart Mangles
Xiangnan Zhou Design of an optimised optical projection tomography instrument Supervisors :Paul French/ James McGinty Daniel Owton Modelling a radiation shield for an infra-red detector Supervisor: Kenny Weir
MRes in Photonics
Thorin Duffin Tetra-Pixel compressive sensing Polarimetry Supervisor: Peter Török
Rebecca Feeney Barry Investigation of the implementation of laser-scanning light sheet formation for the OPM system Supervisor: Chris Dunsby Thomas Watson Characterisation of a microscope stage plate-insert designed for optical projection tomography on a commercially available microscope Supervisor: James McGinty
MSc in Quantum Fields and Fundamental Forces Marc Arene Instability of extreme Reissner-Nordström black holes Supervisor: Toby Wiseman
Paul Boes Closure and stability in quantum measure theory Supervisor: Fay Dowker Christopher Bray Dust grain charging In tokamak plasmas Supervisor: Michael Coppins
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Mohamad Husni Wan Mokhtar An introduction to loop quantum gravity with application to cosmology Supervisor: Joao Magueijo
Mohammed Hakeem Five dimensional SUSY gauge theories in the context of M theory Supervisor: Amihay Hanany
Shane Keane Arrival time in quantum mechanics Supervisor: Jonathan Halliwell
Maximilian Zimmermann Towards a covariant classification of nilpotent four-qubit states Supervisor: Mike Duff
Dong Woon Kim Double field theory Supervisor: Chris Hull
MRes in Controlled Quantum Dynamics
Martyna Kostacinska Primordial non-Gaussianities in Horava-Lifshitz gravity Supervisor: Joao Magueijo
Katerina Apostolidou Cooling complex molecules for quantum interferometry and measurements of parity violation in chiral molecules Supervisor: Michael Tabutt
Sangmin Lee The Bethe/Gauge correspondence and geometric representation theory Supervisor: Amihay Hanany
Luisa Lucie-Smith Reheating of the universe and gravitational wave production Supervisor: Arttu Rajantie Samuel McMillen Causal set phenomenology in Friedmann-Robertson-Walker spacetime Supervisor: Fay Dowker Paul Plant The AdS-CFT correspondence: A review Supervisor: Dan Waldram
Clement Delcamp Entanglement on spin networks in loop quantum gravity Supervisor: Joao Magueijo
Omar Fernando Sosa Rodriguez Causal set theory as a discrete model for classical spacetime Supervisor: Fay Dowker
Nipol Chaemjumrus Non-geometric flux and double field theory Supervisor: Chris Hull
tion Supervisor: Arttu Rajantie
arrival problem Supervisor: Jonathan Halliwell
Sonny Campbell Models of non-singular gravitational collapse Supervisor: Joao Magueijo
Stylianos Gregoriou Time in quantum mechanics and aspects of the time-of-
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Masters Projects List
Edward Gillman Defect formation in quantum phase transitions Supervisor: Arttu Rajantie
Daniel Goldwater Examining the noise spectra of levitated nanospheres: Towards an experimental test of collapse theories Supervisor: Myunkshik Kim
Yannick Seis Entangling qubits using global pulses Supervisor: Terry Rudolph
Stephen Stopyra Higgs dynamics during infla-
Benjamin Dive Quantum control of open systems Supervisor: Daniel Burgarth
Pavel Hrmo Sideband cooling to the motional ground state of an ion in a Penning trap Supervisor: Danny Segal
Jieyi Liu Configurations of ion coulomb crystals in a Penning trap Supervisor: Danny Segal Maximilian Lock Developing new relativistic quantum technologies Supervisor: Myunkshik Kim
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Postgraduate Joseph Munns Towards noise suppression in a broadband quantum memory in warm caesium vapour Supervisor: Myunkshik Kim Jonathan Richens Reversible dynamics is generalised probabilistic theories Supervisor: Terry Rudolph
John Selby A process theory approach to modal quantum theory Supervisor: Terry Rudolph
Jimmy Stammers Characterisation of a compact single-beam tetrahedral MOT Supervisor: Ed Hinds James Tarlton Magnetic field generation and stabilisation for 43Ca+ clock qubits Supervisor: Danny Segal Andrew Tranter Quantum computation for electronic structure theory Supervisor: Florian Mintert
MRes in Plastic Electronic Materials
Andika Asyuda Hybrid solar cells based upon mesostructured inorganicorganic nanocomposites Supervisor: Saif Haque Iain Andrews Room temperature MASER – search for new masing materials Supervisor: Martin Heeney Philip Bridges Charge and ionic transport in organic-inorganic perovskite semiconductors Supervisor: Jenny Nelson
Nathan Cheetham Supramolecular manipulation of organic blends for stimulated emission Supervisor: Paul Stavrinou
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Tony Chiu Enhancing OPV performance by light and thermal process engineering Supervisor: Joao Cabral Satyajit Das Electron transport in lowdimensional solutionprocessed metal oxide semiconductors Supervisor: Thomas Anthopoulos
Matthew Dyson Excitation and charge transfer among conjugated (macro) molecules Supervisor: Natalie Stingelin Alexander Giovannitti A new transport materials platform for bioelectronics Supervisor: Iain McCulloch
Iain Hamilton Fabricating efficient nanostructured OLED lighting and display devices Supervisor: Ji-Seon Kim
Faldo Maldini Zaitul Scanning-probe patterning of electronic and photonic properties in molecular semiconductors Supervisor: Donal Bradley Jameel Marafie Synthesis and colour tuning of organometallic complexes and polymers Supervisor: Charlotte Williams
Madeleine Morris Using organic-inorganic systems to probe performance enhancement of solar energy systems due to the piezoelectric effect Supervisor: James Durrant Jason Rohr Multifunctional mesostructured semiconductor films for hybrid and all-inorganic optoelectronics Supervisor: Saif Haque
Masters Projects List
Prospero Taroni Junior Conductive polymers and polymer nanocomposites for flexible thermoelectrics “NANOFLEXTE”. Supervisor: Nathalie Stingelin
Vadim Nemytov Nanocrystals by design: combining the power of atomistic force fields and linear scaling density functional theory Supervisor: Paul Tangney
Yiren Xia Energy transfer and supramolecular manipulation of organic blends Supervisor: Paul Stavrinou
Farnaz Ostovari Modelling damage in environmental barrier coatings on woven SiC/SiC composite substrates Supervisor: Daniel Balint
Gwen Wyatt-Moon Plastic nanoelectronics by sticky-tape lithography Supervisor: Thomas Anthopoulos
MSc in Theory and Simulation of Materials Amanda Diez Modelling damage tolerant structural ceramic systems Supervisor: Ferri Aliabadi
Premyuda Ontawong Atomistic-to-continuum theory of martensitic transformations Supervisor: Dimitri Vvedensky
Mitesh Patel Stress-driven transport of hydrogen in zirconium alloy cladding of nuclear fuel rods Supervisor: Daniel Balint
Andrew Pearce Theory and simulation of selfassembled nanoplasmonic metamaterials and devices Supervisor: Alexei Kornyshev
Peter Fox Nanoplasmonics and metamaterials at the classical/ quantum boundary Supervisor: Ortwin Hess
Elisabeth Rice Tight-binding approach to the simulation of the electronic and optical properties of porous conjugated molecular materials Supervisor: Jenny Nelson
Frederike Jaeger Flow of fluids through disordered media with application to membranes: from the molecular to the continuum through the micro scale Supervisor: Omar Matar
Jacqueline Tan Making materials Liquid: designing “room temperature” molten salts Supervisor: Patricia Hunt
Christopher Knight Multi-scale analysis of liquefaction phenomena in soils Supervisor: Catherine O’Sullivan
Andrew McMahon The behaviour of charged species in hybrid organic metal halide perovskite photovoltaics Supervisor: Nicholas Harrison
Markus Tautschnig Scale Formation: Developing a theoretical model of the dynamics of sweet/sour corrosion scales Supervisor: Nicholas Harrison
Nicola Molinari Towards a predictive model of elastomer materials Supervisor: Arash Mostofi Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Postgraduate
Destinations
Table 1 - There were 87 known destinations of the 2013 postgraduates (Home & EU students
Destination Graduates Entered Employment 21 Further Study 57 Unemployed 4 Time Out / Unavailable for Work 5 Destinations of 2013 postgraduates
Comparison with previous years
Sector of employment entered
38
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Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
What do Physics Postgraduates do? Examples of employers and occupations for Physics taught-course postgraduates who entered employment: Examples of Employers: • Bloomberg New Energy Finance • M & C Saatchi Mobile • Royal United Services Institute Examples of Occupations: • Media Analyst • Renewable Energy Analyst • Research Intern
Examples of courses for those Physics taughtcourse postgraduates who entered further study or training: • EngD in Optics and Photonics Technologies (HeriotWatt University) • MRes Controlled Quantum Dynamics (Imperial) • MSc Photonics (Imperial) • MSc Physics (Ecole Centrale Lyon & Universite Aix Marseille) • MSc Shock Physics (Imperial) • MSc Theoretical Physics (Utrecht University) • PhD in Atmospheric Physics (Imperial) • PhD in Materials (Imperial) • PhD in Mathematical Physics (Durham University) • PhD in Mathematics (University of Cambridge) • PhD in Optical Engineering (Heriot-Watt University) • PhD in Particle Physics (Imperial) • PhD in Physics (Imperial) • PhD in Physics (University of Glasgow) • PhD in Theoretical Physics (University of Southampton) • Theoretical Physics Research (University of Bremen)
Examples of employers and occupations for Physics research postgraduates who entered employment: Examples of Employers: • AWE plc. • Brunel University • Carallon • Dalcour Maclaren • Element Energy • Element Six Ltd • IIT • Imperial College London • ISAGRI • Palantir Technologies • Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics • Permasense • TU Dortmund www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
• University of Birmingham • Velocix
Examples of Occupations: • Business Informatics Developer • CAD Draughtsman • Consultant • Engineer • Outsourcing Manager • Plasma Physicist • Post-Doctoral Fellow • Post-Doctoral Research Associate • Research Associate • Research Fellow • Research Scientist • Software Developer • Software Test Developer
Examples of courses for those Physics research postgraduates who entered further study or training: • Biomedical Engineering Research (Imperial) • CDT in Controlled Quantum Dynamics (Imperial) • MPhil/PhD in Physics: Nanophotonics and Metamaterials (University of Southampton) • MRes Controlled Quantum Dynamics (Imperial) • PhD in Chemistry (Imperial) • PhD in Controlled Quantum Dynamics (Imperial) • PhD in Controlled Quantum Dynamics (University of Bristol) • PhD in Plastic Electronics (Imperial) • PhD in Photonics (Imperial) • PhD in Physics (Imperial) • PhD in Physics (University of Cambridge) • PhD in Theory and Simulation of Materials (Imperial)
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Research
Research Groups Astrophysics Condensed Matter Theory Experimental Solid State Physics High Energy Physics Photonics Plasma Physics Quantum Optics & Laser Science Space and Atmospheric Physics Theoretical Physics Research Centres Centre for Cold Matter The Laser Consortium Institute of Shock Physics Centre for Plastic Electronics
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Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Astrophysics
The Astrophysics group studies the Sun, the birth of stars in the Milky Way, the formation and evolution of galaxies over cosmic time, the cosmic microwave background, and the nature of dark matter. The sophisticated use of statistics in interpreting astronomical data is a common theme in the group’s activities.
SUN, STARS AND PLANETS Unruh, Mohanty, The radiation of the parent star and its variability is crucial to the habitability of exoplanets. Unruh works on solar and stellar magnetic activity and the its effect on the radiation emitted by the star. This is relevant to the influence of the Sun on climate change on the Earth, and to the habitability of extrasolar planets. Thousands of planets have been discovered around other stars in recent years, and it now seems likely that every star has one or more planets around it. Mohanty's research focuses on understanding how these planets are formed out of the disks of gas and dust surrounding newborn stars; how this process is linked to the formation of the stars themselves; and how stellar properties influence the characteristics - in particular, the habitability - of the orbiting planets. GALAXY AND QUASAR FORMATION AND EVOLUTION Clements, Warren, Mortlock, Pritchard
How did the population of galaxies that we see around us, including spiral galaxies, elliptical galaxies, quasars and galaxy clusters, come about? When did the first galaxies
The all-sky map of the cosmic microwave background radiation provided by the Planck satellite
form, and what processes dominated their formation and led to the evolution of the universe we see today? We use data across the electromagnetic spectrum to answer these questions, using telescopes such as UKIRT, Herschel, JCMT, the SMA, and ALMA, with an emphasis on the highest redshifts observable, z>6. Pritchard is leading activities to predict the 21cm radio signature of neutral hydrogen from the first billion years to study the nature and evolution of the first stars and galaxies. COSMOLOGY Heavens, Jaffe, Mortlock, Pritchard
We aim to develop and apply new, principled statistical methods to the inference of cosmological
A schematic of the recently discovered planetary system Kepler-62, compared to our own Solar System. Kepler-62 hosts two super-Earths inside the habitable zone. [Credt: NASA] www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
[Credit: ESA]
parameters and model selection, focussing on the cosmic microwave background, weak gravitational lensing, large-scale structure and 21cm radiation, with scientific goals which include neutrino masses, measurement of dark energy properties and testing of Einstein gravity. The group has strong involvement in current and future cosmology experiments including Planck, PolarBear, Euclid and the Square Kilometer Array. DARK MATTER Trotta, Scott
Decades of studies have led to the conclusion that 80% of the matter in the Universe is made of a new type of particle, and the experimental hunt for this dark matter is now in a crucial phase. The question of the nature of dark matter is one of the most important in all physics. Our work aims to put constraints on the physical parameters of theoretical models for dark matter (such as Supersymmetry) by combining four complementary probes: cosmology, direct detection, indirect detection and colliders. Our group has developed the worldleading “global fits” approach to the problem, allowing us to explore in a statistically convergent way theoretical parameter spaces previously inaccessible to detailed numerical study.
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Research Dr David Clements
Professor Alan Heavens
Astrophysics
the low-redshift Universe. Heavens A.F., Jimenez R., Verde L., arXiV:1409.6217 (Phys. Rev. Lett., in press). 2 citations 4. 3D cosmic shear: cosmology from CFHTLenS. Kitching T., Heavens A., et al, MNRAS, 442, 1326 (2014). 7 citations
Professor Andrew Jaffe
The incredible success of the Herschel mission, and especially its deep, cosmological surveys, has continued to shed light on the role that dusty galaxies play in the formation of large scale structure and the history of galaxy formation. Multiwavelength followup observation campaigns are underway to determine the nature of the reddest, and thus potentially most distant, objects seen in these surveys. The first fruit of this work was the discovery of HFLS3, a massive, rapidly star forming dusty galaxy at the unprecedented redshift of 6.34. Finding such an object just 880 million years after the Big Bang is wholly unexpected in current cosmological models. As well as seeking individual high redshift sources, we have been cross-matching Herschel and Planck data to look for groups or clusters of star forming galaxies at somewhat lower redshifts. The first results of this work have uncovered four candidate galaxy clusters whose constituent galaxies are forming stars at a very high rate, and which lie at significantly higher redshifts than conventional optical/IR or X-ray observation can easily detect clusters. We appear to be detecting these objects during a formative but otherwise inaccessible phase in their formation and evolution. Riechers, D.A., Bradford, C.M., Clements, D.L., et al., 2013, Nature, 496, 329 Clements, D.L., Braglia, F.G., Hyde, A.K., et al., 2014, MNRAS, 439, 1193
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The first Planck cosmology results were published in 2014, showing that primordial non-gaussianity in the map is constrained to be very close to zero, in agreement with the standard inflation model for the early Universe. The robustness of the result was shown using a statistical technique partly developed and applied by us. A key observable in cosmology is the sound horizon (the ‘BAO’ scale), which leaves an imprint in the clustering of galaxies. We have determined the length of this standard ruler, for the first time in a model-independent way, not even assuming General Relativity. The Universe still looks like the standard LCDM model and the number of neutrino species is constrained almost model-independently to be 3.5 ± 0.3. Published in PRL.
We applied our method of 3D weak lensing analysis to the leading survey (CFHTLenS). Results show for the first time hints of baryon feedback or suppression of power on small scales due to non-zero neutrino masses. 1. Planck 2013 results. XXIV. Constraints on primordial non-Gaussianity. Ade P.A.R. et al, A&A, 571, 24 (2014). 300 citations
2. Planck 2013 results. I. Overview of products and scientific results. Ade P.A.R. et al, A&A, 571, 1 (2014). 500 citations
3. Standard rulers, candles, and clocks from
Our work has concentrated on the analysis and interpretation of data from the cosmic microwave background (CMB). In particular, we have a team (Jaffe along with PDRAs Ducout and Feeney) dedicated to working with data from the Planck Satellite which has released two rounds of cosmological results and is poised for completion in 2016. We have been involved in all aspects of the analysis, from detailed examination of the optical properties of the instrument to the use of Planck data to limit the largescale topology of the Universe on scales of billions of parsecs. We also apply this expertise to groundand balloon-based CMB experiments such as EBEX and PolarBear. The latter was the first to directly detect anisotropy in the polarization of the CMB from gravitational lensing of structures along the line of sight; this will prove a strong test of instrumental properties, astrophysical sources of microwave emission, and, eventually, of cosmological parameters that will inform us about the possibilities of an early epoch of cosmic inflation responsible for both the large-scale geometrical structure of the observable Universe and the Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research small-scale structures within it.
1. Planck 2013 results. XVI. Cosmological parameters, Planck Collaboration, Astronomy & Astrophysics, Volume 571, id.A16, 201 2. Planck 2013 results. XXVI. Background geometry and topology of the Universe, Planck Collaboration, Astronomy & Astrophysics, Volume 571, id.A26, 2014 3. A Measurement of the Cosmic Microwave Background B-Mode Polarization Power Spectrum at Sub-Degree Scales with POLARBEAR, Polarbear Collaboration, Astrophysical Journal, 794:171, 2014
Dr Subhanjoy Mohanty
habitable zone of red dwarf stars. The latter two projects are in collaboration with colleagues at the University of Florida and IAS at Princeton, respectively; the research is supported by both STFC funds and a Royal Society International Exchange grant.
which they have not previously been used, including the assessment of the total power emitted by the Sun ([4], relevant in particular for climate science) and the search for the origin of the most energetic cosmic rays [5].
2. Dead, Undead and Zombie Zones in Protostellar Disks as a Function of Stellar Mass: Mohanty, S., Ercolano, B. \& Turner, N., Astrophysical Journal, 764, 65 (2013)
2. 'Finding the most distant quasars using Bayesian selection methods’ Mortlock, D.J., 2014, Statistical Science, 29, 50
1. Protoplanetary Disk Masses from Stars to Brown Dwarfs: Mohanty, S., Greaves, J., Mortlock, D. et al., Astrophysical Journal, 773, 168 (2013)
Dr Daniel Mortlock
Ground and space-based missions have uncovered thousands of exoplanets around other stars in the last few years. My work focusses on how these planets form out of the primordial disks of gas and dust around young stars, and how the properties of the host star influence planetary characteristics (particularly habitability). Highlights over the last year include determining average disk masses (which ultimate set the planetary masses), from dust emission, for a broad range of stellar types (reference [1]), and building a theory of how magnetohydrodynamical processes affect the disk structure and evolution (reference [2]). Ongoing work includes devising a semi-analytic model for forming super-Earth size planets very close to the host star (which empirically seems to be the dominant mode of planet formation), and constructing a model of X-ray and UV-driven photoevaporation of terrestrial planetary atmospheres within the www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Astrophysics
1. 'The multi-wavelength spectral energy distribution of the z = 7.1 quasar ULAS J1120+0641’ Barnett, R., Warren, S.J., Banerji, M., McMahon, R.G., Hewett, P.C., Mortlock, D.J, Simpson, C. & Venemans, B.P., 2014, A&A, submitted
3. Paper 2 of SJW
4. 'Assessing the relationship between spectral solar irradiance and stratospheric ozone using Bayesian Inference’ Ball, W.T., Mortlock, D.J., Haigh, J.D. & Egerton, J., 2014, Journal of Space Weather and Space Climate, 4, A25
5. 'A Bayesian self-clustering analysis of the highest energy cosmic rays detected by the Pierre Auger Observatory’ Khanin, A. & Mortlock, D.J., 2014, MNRAS, 444, 1591
Dr Jonathan Pritchard
The main theme of my research has been to increase our understanding of conditions in the first billion years after the Big Bang during which the first generations of stars ionised the hydrogen in the Universe. The main route to doing this has been to analyse follow-up observations [1,2,] of the quasar ULAS J1120+0641, the most distant known to date and hence the earliest bright astronomical source available for study [3]. I have been involved in theoretical efforts to understand the population of quasars in the early Universe and in interpreting the signatures of the cosmological ionisation process as revealed in their spectra. I have also applied Bayesian inference techniques to several areas of astrophysics in
This last year has been a critical phase in the design of the Square Kilometer Array, reviewing an initial baseline design for its scientific suitability and updating the 10 year old science case. I have played a leading role in both aspects of this – speaking at Science Working Group meetings at SKA-HQ in Manchester to review the baseline design and, in my role as co-chair of the Epoch of Reionization SWG, leading the Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Research rewrite of epoch of reionization/ cosmic dawn sections of the SKA science case and co-writing four chapters. This connects to my new role as a member of the UK-SKA science committee to promote involvement in SKA science within the UK. Alongside this, with my student Catherine Watkinson, I have completed two papers demonstrating the importance of 1-point statistics of the 21cm signal for determining the reionization topology and the impact of small absorbing systems. Finally, I completed part of a review on atomic physics in the early universe covering topics from the CMB & recombination to the 21cm signal and reionization.
1. J.R. Pritchard et al. “Cosmology from the EoR/Cosmic Dawn”. PoS, in press (2014). Glover, S. C. O., Chluba, J., Furlanetto, S. R., Pritchard, J. R., & Savin, D. W. (2014).
2. Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Physics in the Early Universe: From Recombination to Reionization. In E. Arimondo, P. R. Berman, & C. C. Lin (Eds.), Unknown Book (Vol. 63, pp. 135-270). ELSEVIER ACADEMIC PRESS INC. doi:10.1016/B978-0-12-8001295.00003-1 3. Watkinson, C. A., & Pritchard, J. R. (2014). Distinguishing models of reionization using future radio observations of 21-cm 1-point statistics. MONTHLY NOTICES OF THE ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY, 443(4), 3090-3106. doi:10.1093/mnras/stu1384
Dr Roberto Trotta
Dr Yvonne Unruh
My work in astroparticle dark matter phenomenology continues to be focused on identifying and characterizing dark matter using the "global fits" approach, i.e. a combination of all available observational data. To this aim, I am an Associated Scientist with the Fermi LAT gamma-ray telescope, a Short Term Associate of ATLAS and an Associated Scientist with the XENON dark matter detector. My research has recently produced the first statistically convergent fits to a 15-dimensional Minimal Supersymmetric Scenario [3]. In cosmology, I have been collaborating with David van Dyk (Maths) to improve cosmological parameter extraction techniques from supernovae type Ia data [4]. I have also an ongoing collaboration aimed at the systematic classification of single-field inflationary models in the light of the most recent Cosmic Microwave Background data [1-2].
2. The best inflationary models after Planck, J. Martin, C. Ringeval, R. Trotta, V. Vennin, JCAP 1403 (2014) 039.
3. Profile likelihood maps of a 15-dimensional MSSM, C. Strege, G. Bertone, G. J. Besjes, www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
S. Caron, R. Ruiz de Austri, A. Strubig, R. Trotta, JHEP 09(2014)081
4. The efficiency on next-generation Gibbstype samplers: An illustration using a hierarchical model in cosmology X. Jiao, D. van Dyk, R. Trotta and H. Shariff, Proc. 2014 ICSA and KISS Joint App. Stat. Symp., submitted, Springer (2015)
1. Compatibility of BICEP2 and Planck in light of inflation, J. Martin, C. Ringeval, R. Trotta, V. Vennin (2014), Phys.Rev.D90:063501,2014
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Astrophysics
Solar and stellar surface magnetic fields and their evolution are the cause of much of solar and stellar variability on time scales of a few hours to months and even decades. The emergent magnetic surface flux forms dark spots as well as bright points that contribute to the changing solar and stellar emission. The wavelength dependence of their emission is still an outstanding question, though much progress has been made in the case of the Sun where we are now able to model the wavelength dependent irradiance changes to a high degree of accuracy which is needed for modelling the Earth's (upper) atmospheric response (e.g., Ball et al, 2014). Comparable stellar variability is usually considered as `noise' and presents a nuisance in the detection and characterisation of exoplanets. The importance of including stellar variability in the exoplanet modelling so as to minimise spurious detections and allow the characterisation of exoplanets around more variable stars was
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research presented in Haywood et al. (2014) where we were able to use simultaneous radial-velocity and photometric data to estimate the radial-velocity variations due to magnetic activity. 1. W T Ball, N A Krivova, Y C Unruh, J D Haigh, S K Solanki 2014, Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences 71, 4086, A New SATIRE-S Spectral Solar Irradiance Reconstruction for Solar Cycles 21--23 and Its Implications for Stratospheric Ozone 2. R D Haywood et al 2014, MNRAS 443, 2517, Planets and stellar activity: hide and seek in the CoRoT-7 system
Professor Stephen Warren
stretched by the redshift beyond optical wavelengths. These are some of the most distant objects known. Daniel Mortlock and I recently found the first quasar at redshift z>7, the most distant quasar known, which provides crucial information on conditions in the Universe when it was only a few percent old.
Astrophysics
1. Skrzypek N, Warren S, et al., 2015, Photometric brown-dwarf classification. I. A method to identify and accurately classify large samples of brown dwarfs without spectroscopy, A&A, 54, 7 2. Mortlock D, Warren S, et al., 2011, A luminous quasar at a redshift of z = 7.085, Nature, 474, 616
I am an observational astronomer mostly interested in using telescopes to find things that are hard to find, either because they are rare or faint. Over the past 7 years I have been particularly interested in using a new wide-area deep survey at near-infrared wavelengths (0.92.3micron) to find brown dwarfs and distant quasars. Brown dwarfs are collapsed clouds of gas where the mass is too low for the central temperature to get high enough to ignite hydrogen. These are some of the closest objects to Earth. Nathalie Skrzypek and I have developed a new method for finding brown dwarfs that has produced the largest sample yet of these objects, over 1000. The near-infrared is also useful for finding very distant quasars where the light has been www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
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Condensed Matter Theory
The Condensed Matter Theory group studies properties, processes and emergent behaviour in solids, liquids,nanomaterials, metamaterials, and less obvious aggregates such as ant colonies and heart muscles.Our research draws on many areas of physics including quantum and classical mechanics, electromagnetism, statistical mechanics, quantum optics, and thermodynamics.
MATERIALS PHYSICS Prof Mike Finnis, Prof Matthew Foulkes, Prof Peter Haynes, Dr Arash Mostofi, Prof Adrian Sutton, Dr Paul Tangney, Prof Dimitri Vvedensky
Materials have played a central role in the development of civilisation from the Bronze Age to the Semiconductor Age. We aim to understand and predict the properties of materials and the processes by which they grow or transform. We also provide guidance for experimental research, help to interpret observations, and seek ways to enhance materials’ properties. Our theoretical work is often helped by simulations, which include accurate quantum mechanical calculations, atomistic and more coarsely-grained approaches, and continuum models. We specialise in spanning time and length scales by coupling methods to achieve a consistent understanding all the way from electrons and atoms to the macroscopic continuum. Much of the software that we use is developed inhouse and used by researchers around the world COMPLEXITY AND NETWORKS Prof Kim Christensen
Through data-driven research and modelling, we investigate the properties of systems whose complex behaviour emerges from large numbers of interacting components. For example, why are ant societies, whose elaborate highlyorganised macroscopic (colony-level) properties emerge from microscopic interactions between ants, so successful? Organs such as the brain and the heart function through the collective behaviour of complex networks. Understanding how their behaviour emerges can help us to identify and
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KNbO3 is a ferroelectric. It is almost cubic, but it spontaneously polarizes by moving each Nb (yellow) slightly towards three of its six O neighbours (red). The electron density is shown as contours and isosurfaces.
treat medical conditionsthat arise when these networks malfunction. For example, simple models can help explain how age-related changes in a heart muscle’s underlying network causes atrial fibrillation. CORRELATED QUANTUM SYSTEMS Dr Derek Lee, Prof Angus MacKinnon
Using theoretical techniques from quantum field theory and computer simulations, we study the cooperative collective behaviour of nanoscale quantum systems. Specific systems of interest include dissipationless phases of matter, which may be useful for quantum information processing, and the dynamics of nanoscale mechanical systems driven far from equilibrium. Our work continually throws up fundamental questions relating to quantum mechanics and how thermodynamics may be adapted to
nanometer length scales.
METAMATERIALS Prof Sir John Pendry, Prof Ortwin Hess
Metamaterials are artificial solids designed to guide electromagnetic fields or acoustic waves. The properties of conventional materials are determined by chemical composition and how the atoms are arranged. Metamaterials, on the other hand, consist of arrays of specially-engineered units organised on much larger length scales. They can be designed to manipulate photons and electrons in ways that cannot be achieved with conventional materials. This has inspired scientists to conceive perfect lenses, new lasers, 'invisibility cloaks’ and opened the door to slow and stopped broadband light.
Metamaterials are lattices of metamolecules, such as “split-ring resonators” (left). A layered metamaterial can slow a light packet while spatially separating its colours to make a “trapped rainbow” (right).
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research Professor Kim Christensen
Condensed Matter Theory
in social science that contain important information on the society.
Universality in ant behaviour: Christensen, K.; Papavassiliou, D.; de Figueiredo, A.; Franks, N.R.; Sendova-Franks, A.B. J.R.Soc. Interface 12: 20140985 (2014); http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsif.2014.0985 Quantitative projections of a quality measure: Performance of a complex task: Christensen, K.; Kleppe, G.; Vold, M.; Frette, V. Physics A, 415, 503-513 (2014).
Professor Mike Finnis Universal relationships between city size and pace of life have inspired a unified theory of urban living but individual variation within societies poses a challenge for planning and prediction. Controlled experiments are essential. We demonstrate a universal relationship in ant societies: average ant speed is higher for longer activity events. This suggest that activity duration is already specified when the ant begins to move and this approach may inform the engineering and control of artificial social systems. We are convinced that our main conclusion that the duration of an activity event is determined before it commences is likely to be applicable as a general principle of animal behaviour across taxa including humans. Complex data series that arise during interaction between humans and advanced technology in a controlled and realistic setting have been explored. The purpose is to obtain quantitative measures that reflect quality in task performance: on a ship simulator, nine crews have solved the same exercise, and detailed maneuvering histories have been logged. Quantitative measures of task performance have been constructed and the crews differ significantly under these objective measures. Our approach may be useful for other qualitative concepts www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
of biased Monte Carlo `flat histogram’ methods, which addresses the problem of calculating the configurational free energy of oxides bearing a high concentration of charged point defects. Ongoing research is aimed at understanding the growth mechanism of oxide films and how it can be controlled (ref.4) . A new insight from this work is the need to understand grain boundary electrical conductivity, since it is of the same importance for the growth rate as ionic conductivity.
1. Rogal, J., et al., Perspectives on point defect thermodynamics. Physica Status Solidi B, 2014. 251: p. 97-129. 2. Sarsam, J., M.W. Finnis, and P. Tangney, Atomistic force field for alumina fit to density functional theory. Journal of Chemical Physics, 2013. 139(20): p. 204704-1-11.
We have developed further the theme of calculating hightemperature properties of materials, linking macroscopic thermodynamic properties with quantities that can be calculated at the atomic scale using density functional theory, empirical interatomic potentials (e.g. ref.2) or a combination of the two. Within an ongoing project for understanding the stability of ceramics at high temperature I derived (ref.1) the relation between parameters of the standard CALPHAD formulation of free energy (the Compound Energy Formalism) and the energies that can be calculated with the defectcentric approach of our crystal chemistry/physics communities. This will facilitate the translation of calculated total energies into phase diagram calcuations. A new tool for free energy calculation was described in ref. [3], an application
3.Horton, R.M., et al., New Methods for Calculating the Free Energy of Charged Defects in Solid Electrolytes. Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter, 2013. 25: p. 395001-1-9
4. Heuer, A.H., et al., On the growth of Al2O3 scales. Acta Materialia, 2013. 61: p. 66706683.
Professor Matthew Foulkes
Compressed hydrogen gas solidifies at high pressure to form a crystal of H2 molecules. As the pressure is increased the crystal undergoes several phase transitions, but hydrogen atoms scatter X-rays so weakly that the structures of the Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Research new phases are unknown. Eventually, at high enough pressure, hydrogen is thought to become not only a metallic atomic solid (believed present in large quantities in the interiors of Saturn and Jupiter) but also a high-temperature superconductor. Investigating the phase diagram of solid hydrogen was the focus of much of our work this year. We started by using density functional theory to calculate the low-temperature phase diagram [1], but concluded that the results were too inaccurate to be useful. This led us to combine quantum Monte Carlo simulations with a fully anharmonic study of zero-point fluctuations [2]. Attempts to create metallic H on Earth have not yet succeeded for sure, but our highly accurate results support recent experimental hints that success is close. Other work has included the development (with undergraduates Nick Blunt and Tom Rogers) of a new finite-temperature quantum Monte Carlo method [3] and a detailed study [4] of the formation of protective oxide scales on alloys of aluminium. Sam Azadi and W.M.C. Foulkes, Fate of density functional theory in the study of highpressure solid hydrogen, Phys. Rev. B 88 014115 (2013). Sam Azadi, Bartomeu Monserrat, W.M.C. Foulkes, and R.J. Needs, Dissociation of high-pressure solid molecular hydrogen: A quantum Monte Carlo and anharmonic vibrational study, Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 165501 (2014).
N. S. Blunt, T. W. Rogers, J. S. Spencer, and W. M. C. Foulkes, Density-matrix quantum Monte Carlo method, Phys. Rev. B, 89, 245124 (2014).
A.H. Heuer, T. Nakagawa, M.Z. Azar, D.B. Hovis, J.L. Smialek, B. Gleeson, N.D.M. Hine, H. Guhl, H.-S. Lee, P. Tangney, W.M.C. Foulkes, and M.W. Finnis, On the growth of Al2O3 scales, Acta Mater. 61, 6670 (2013).
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Condensed Matter Theory
Dr Vincenzo Giannini
Graphene sandwiches as a platform for broadband molecular spectroscopy. ACS Photonics, 1 (5), 437–443, 2014. Loss mitigation in plasmonic solar cells: aluminium nanoparticles for broadband photocurrent enhancements in GaAs photodiodes. Scientific reports, 3, 2013.
Professor Peter Haynes
We are interested in several aspects of plasmons in metal nanoparticles and their interaction with graphene. Particularly, we are exploring the possibility of use graphene as a plasmon wave-guide for sensing proposes or metal nanoparticles that allow better solar cells efficiency. As well as we are studying the strong light localization possible with hyperbolic metamaterials and the appearance of a low-loss surface phonon polariton (SPhP) modes in polar dielectric crystals, a very promising alternative to conventional, metal-based plasmonic systems for the realization of nanophotonic components. Recently, with professor Ortwin Hess, we also started a new research line in quantum plamonics where our main focus is clearly to define the transition between the classical and quantum world in plasmonics. As well as we are looking for possible new analytical approaches to the light scattering formulation in plasmonics.
Sub-diffraction, Volume-confined Polaritons in the Natural Hyperbolic Material, Hexagonal Boron Nitride. Nature Communications, 5, 5221. 2014.
Low-loss, extreme subdiffraction photon confinement via silicon carbide localized surface phonon polariton resonators. Nano letters 13 (8), 3690-3697, 2013.
We work on the development and application of computational methods for first-principles quantummechanical simulations of condensed matter, mostly using the ONETEP code that we develop. This software is distributed commercially by BIOVIA (part of Dassault Systèmes) and employs an implementation of density-functional theory (DFT) where the computational effort scales only linearly with system size. The ONETEP collaboration includes Dr Arash Mostofi, also in CMTH, Dr Chris Skylaris at Southampton, Dr Nicholas Hine (former group member) and Prof. Mike Payne, both at Cambridge. Highlights over the past year involve two students in the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Theory and Simulation of Materials. Tim Zuehlsdorff has implemented time-dependent DFT within ONETEP [1] to calculate the energies of neutral excitations, functionality that is already being applied to the search for chromophores for a roomtemperature MASER, exciton transport in chlorophyll complexes [2] Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research
and inorganic nanoparticles. Niccolò Corsini has been using ONETEP to study structural phase transformations in nanoparticles under pressure [3]. Both projects are part of a wider effort by my group to develop the capability to perform large-scale theoretical spectroscopy: the computational simulation of experimental spectra such as electron energy-loss spectroscopy [4]. Linear-scaling time-dependent densityfunctional theory in the linear response formalism, Tim J. Zuehlsdorff, Nicholas D. M. Hine, James S. Spencer, Nicholas M. Harrison, D. Jason Riley and Peter D. Haynes, J. Chem. Phys. 139, 064104 (2013)
Toward ab initio Optical Spectroscopy of the Fenna-Matthews-Olson Complex, Daniel J. Cole, Alex W. Chin, Nicholas D. M. Hine, Peter D. Haynes and Mike C. Payne, J. Phys. Chem. Lett. 4, 4206-4212 (2013)
Simulations of Nanocrystals Under Pressure: Combining Electronic Enthalpy and LinearScaling Density-Functional Theory, Niccolò R. C. Corsini, Andrea Greco, Nicholas D. M. Hine, Carla Molteni and Peter D. Haynes, J. Chem. Phys. 139, 084117 (2013) Mapping functional groups on oxidised multiwalled carbon nanotubes at the nanometre scale, A. E. Goode, N. D. M. Hine, S. Chen, S. D. Bergin, M. S. P. Shaffer, M. P. Ryan, P. D. Haynes, A. E. Porter and D. W. McComb, Chem. Commun. 50, 6744-6747 (2014)
Professor Ortwin Hess
Condensed Matter Theory
Physics and Physics World) and Nature Communications. The aspect of gain and lasing in nanoplasmonics has become an increasingly strong activity in the team and a collaboration with Rupert Oulton and Stefan Maier has led to a joint paper in Nature Physics. We have continued to advance our internationally leading work on extreme chirality (supported by a new Leverhulme grant) and active nanoplasmonic metamaterials and started to explore opportunities of controlling quantum emitters with metamaterials (perspective in Science). Joint work with Chris Phillips and Ned Ekins-Dukes within the semiconductor quantum ratchets project is progressing well, while collaborations with Richard Craster (Maths), Stefan Maier and John Pendry on the one hand and Jeremy Baumberg and colleagues from Cambridge on the other hand have led to awards of two new EPSRC Programme Grants in the mathematics of metamaterials and on nano-photonics to controlled nano-chemistry, respectively.
Pickering, T., Hamm, J.M., Page, A.F., Wuestner, S. & Hess, O. (2014). Cavity-Free Plasmonic Nanolasing Enabled by Dispersionless Stopped Light. Nature Communications 5, 4972.
Sidropoulos, T. P.H., Roder, R., Geburt, S., Hess, O., Maier, S.A., Ronning, C., & Oulton, R.F. (2014). Ultrafast Pleasmonic Nanowire Lasers Near the Surface Plasmon Frequency. Nature Physics 10, 870.
Tsakmakidis, K. L., Pickering, T. W., Hamm, J. M., Page, A. F. & Hess, O. (2014). Completely Stopped and Dispersionless Light in Plasmonic Waveguides. Phys. Rev. Lett., 112, 167401.
Our pioneering work on stopped light and stopped-light lasing has lead to two well-received publications in Physical Review Letters (with associated highlight articles in www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Hess, O. and Tsakmakidis, K. L. (2013). Metamaterials with Quantum Gain, Science 339, 654-655.
Dr Derek Lee
Superfluid helium has long been a testing ground for the physics of Bose-Einstein condensation and superfluidity. Nevertheless, it continues to come up with surprises that challenge our understanding. Recent experiments [1] on thin helium films on graphite appear contradict all textbook descriptions. Since this is found near the solidification of the film, a tantalising candidate for this new phase of matter is the elusive supersolid –dissipationless mass flow in a crystal, originally proposed for bulk helium but recently refuted by new evidence. In a theoretical collaboration involving Imperial, Royal Holloway University of London and Rutgers, we are developing a theory of a spatially modulated superfluid where both superfluidity and broken translational symmetry coexist, described by a non-Abelian order parameter. The strange behaviour may be connected to the fact that the system is close to a quantum phase transition to a solid. Quantum criticality is an important area of research in condensed matter physics. Indeed, the rich physics behind the cuprate superconductors may be tied to its proximity to a quantum transition to a magnetic insulator. This helium system is Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Research cleaner than any solid state system, and may shed light quantum criticality from a new setting.
Condensed Matter Theory
Dr Arash Mostofi
J. Nyeki, A. Phillis, A.F. Ho, D.K.K. Lee, P. Coleman, J. Parpai, B. Cowan, J. Saunders, Superfluid response and quantum criticality of two-dimensional 4He on a triangular lattice, submitted for publication (2014).
1. “Does water dope carbon nanotubes?” R. A. Bell, M. C. Payne and A. A. Mostofi, J. Chem. Phys. 141, 164703 (2014)
Professor Angus MacKinnon
Nano-Electro-Mechanical-Systems, NEMS, represent an important class of potentially useful nano-devices, as well as a test system for understanding the more fundamental aspects of the transition between classical and quantum behaviour. Our work continues in collaboration with Muhammad Tahir, Concordia University, Canada, Udo Schwingenschlögl, KAUST, Saudi Arabia, and Lev Kantorovitch, King’s College. We have extended our non-equilibrium Green’s function approach to systems driven by an external electric field and have developed a methodology for dealing with systems subject to a general time dependent potential. Current work includes the study of shot noise, especially in the quantum shuttle system. 1. Novel spectral features of nanoelectromechanical systems: Tahir, M, MacKinnon, A, and Schwingenshlögl, U: Scientific Reports, Volume 4, Article Number: 4035
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research interests include: transport properties of nanowires and carbon nanotube networks; surfaces, interfaces and defects in perovskite oxide materials; and the structure and function of elastomer seals and polymer desalination membranes.
Our research is dedicated to the application and development of theory and computational simulation tools for solving problems in materials. We are motivated by problems related to energy, environment and advanced technology. We work predominantly at the atomistic length-scale, either using quantum mechanics or simpler models of interatomic bonding to describe systems of interacting electrons and nuclei. Such theory and simulation is invaluable for understanding the structure of matter and providing microscopic insight into the behaviour of materials. The stateof-the-art computational tools that are developed in our group are shared with the wider community, either through commercial, academic or open-source license, to benefit the pursuit and dissemination of knowledge in this field. In collaboration with colleagues at universities including Cambridge and Southampton, and the scientific software company BIOVIA, we continue to develop the linear-scaling density-functional theory code ONETEP (www.onetep.org); and in collaboration with colleagues at Oxford, EPFL (Switzerland), Rutgers (New Jersey), and San Sebastian, we continue to enhance the Wannier90 code (www.wannier.org) for computing maximally-localized Wannier functions. Our current
2. “Accelerated simulations of aromatic polymers”, R. J. Broadbent, J. Spencer, A. A. Mostofi and A. P. Sutton, Molecular Simulation 112, 2672 (2014)
3. “Improving the conductance of carbon nanotube networks through resonant momentum exchange”, R. A. Bell, M. C. Payne and A. A. Mostofi, Phys. Rev. B 89, 245426 (2014) An updated version of
4. “A first principles study of As doping at a disordered Si-SiO2 interface”, F. Corsetti and A. A. Mostofi, J. Phys.: Condens. Matter 26, 055002 (2014)
Professor Sir John Pendry FRS
Metal surfaces support electron density waves known as surface plasmons which can couple to externally incident light waves. Since the surface plasmons have wavelengths of the order of a few tens of nanometres or less, they can be focussed into extremely small areas. This extreme concentration has the potential for single molecule sensing, enhanced optical non linearity at low power input and many other applications where an Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research intense concentration of optical energy is needed. Surface plasmon properties are extremely sensitive to surface structure, particularly to singular features such as two touching curved surfaces. We use the technique of transformation optics, developed here in London, to explore relationships between geometrically distinct structures, but which can be mapped into one another by coordinate transformations that preserve all the spectral properties. Apparently complex systems can be related to simpler ones and their spectra solved analytically. Furthermore it has often proved to be the case that the simpler system is highly symmetric enabling the spectrum to be classified by the symmetry representations. We call this ‘hidden symmetry’ and it has given powerful insight into systems which previously were thought to be just a complex mathematical mess Kraft M, Pendry JB, Maier SA, et al., 2014, Transformation optics and hidden symmetries, Physical Review B, Vol:89, ISSN:1098-0121
Luo Y, Fernandez-Dominguez AI, Wiener A, et al., 2013, Surface Plasmons and Nonlocality: A Simple Model, Physical Review Letters, Vol:111, ISSN:0031-9007 Pendry JB, Fernandez-Dominguez AI, Luo Y, et al., 2013, Capturing photons with transformation optics, Nature Physics, Vol:9, ISSN:1745-2473, Pages:518-522
Zhao R, Luo Y, Fernandez-Dominguez AI, et al., 2013, Description of van der Waals Interactions Using Transformation Optics, Physical Review Letters, Vol:111, ISSN:00319007
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Condensed Matter Theory
Professor Adrian Sutton FRS
a project with Element Six on modelling the dynamics of very small cracks in diamond composites.
[1] “A dynamic discrete dislocation plasticity method for the simulation of plastic relaxation under shock loading”, B Gurrutxaga-Lerma, D S Balint, D Dini, D E Eakins, A P Sutton, Proc. R. Soc. A 469, 20130141 (2013).
I am a theoretical and computational materials physicist working with a wide range of colleagues across Imperial College and industrial collaborators. Some of our most exciting recent work has concerned fundamental aspects of dislocation dynamics in metals. They include the first truly elastodynamic simulations of dislocation generation and motion under shock-loading [1,2], and the first theory of the temperature-independent contribution to the mobility of highly mobile dislocations in some metals [3]. We have also shown there is a previously unrecognised intermediate length scale associated with dislocations that move by a kink mechanism, between atomistic and the continuum scales [4]. With RollsRoyce we have two research projects underway on fundamental aspects of delayed hydride cracking in Zr-alloys and cold-dwell fatigue in Ti-alloys. We are working on the molecular structure of polyamide membranes with BP-ICAM for filtration applications. We have two projects with Baker-Hughes modelling the absorption and trapping of gases under high pressure in oil well elastomer seals, which can lead to rupture when they are decompressed. We are developing the first molecular theory for the viscoelastic properties of aligned polyethylene. There is also
[2] “Dynamic discrete dislocation plasticity”, B Gurrutxaga-Lerma, D S Balint, D Dini, D E Eakins, A P Sutton, Advances in Applied Mechanics, in the press [3] “The classical mobility of highly mobile crystal defects”, T D Swinburne, S L Dudarev and A P Sutton, Phys. Rev. Lett., (2014) in the press.
[4] “Theory and simulation of the diffusion of kinks on dislocations in bcc metals”, T D Swinburne, S L Dudarev, S P Fitzgerald, M R Gilbert and A P Sutton, Phys. Rev. B 87, 064108 (2013).
Dr Paul Tangney
Our work combines methods of electronic structure theory with computationally-efficient atomistic models of bonding, known as force fields. Accurate physically-motivated force fields are constructed using data from density functional theory (DFT) calculations [1]. These force fields are used to simulate bulk and nanostructured materials at finite temperatures on time- and lengthscales far beyond the reach of DFT simulations. Most of our work is on
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Research technologically-important oxides. One example is alumina, where we have studied defect structures and diffusion mechanisms with a view to better understanding the growth of oxide layers on superalloys [2] . Force fields can generate realistic structures and the electronic properties of these structures can then be calculated with DFT.
We are also interested in the nanoscale statistical mechanics of multiferroic perovskites, the simplest of which are BaTiO3 and SrTiO3. With force fields we can reach a new understanding of the mechanism of the ferroelectric phase transition[3] - an issue that has been debated for half a century; we can go further by using advanced statistical techniques to elucidate the complex process by which ferroelectric domains nucleate, grow, and coalesce. Controlling this process is key to improving the performance of ferroelectric memory (FeRAM) devices. 1. “Atomistic force field for alumina fit to density functional theory”, J. Sarsam, M. W. Finnis, and P. Tangney, J. Chem. Phys. 139, 204704 (2013).
2. “On the growth of Al2O3 scales”, A.H. Heuer, T. Nakagawa, M.Z. Azara, D.B. Hovisa, J.L. Smialek, B. Gleeson, N.D.M. Hine, H. Guhl, H.-S. Lee, P. Tangney, W.M.C. Foulkes, M.W. Finnis, Acta Materialia 61, 6670 (2013). 3. “Multiscale Theory and Simulation of Barium Titanate”, J. J. Fallon, Ph.D. Thesis, Imperial College London, 2014.
Condensed Matter Theory
Professor Dimitri Vvedensky
transients of V-groove quantum wires formed during metalorganic vapor-phase epitaxy,' Applied Physics Letters 103, 042103 (2013).
Statistical physics of the human placenta. In collaboration with Dr Carolyn Salafia, we have been analysing the statistical properties of the human placenta at scales ranging from the morphology of the placenta [4], to the network statistics of the vasculature, and finally to diffusional oxygen transport from the maternal to the fetal blood. Our goal is to obtain sufficient statistics on relevant placental characteristics to obtain clinically significant results.
Graphene growth kinetics. In collaboration with Lev Kanotorovich (KCL), Ian Ford (UCL), and Joel Posthuma de Boer (Physics-CDT), we are developing approaches to the kinetics of grapheme growth. Our work has included the first comprehensive review of theoretical and experimental work in this area [1], an optimization algorithm for rate models [2], and a phase-field model for describing the growth kinetics of graphene.
J. S. Gill, M. P. Woods, C. M. Salafia, and D. D. Vvedensky, `Probability distributions for measures of placental shape and morphology,' Physiological Measurement 35, 483–500 (2014).
H. Tetlow, J. Posthuma de Boer, I. Ford, D. D. Vvedensky, J. Coraux, and L. Kantorovich, Growth of epitaxial graphene: Theory and experiment, Physics Reports 542, 195–295 (2014).. J. Posthuma de Boer, I. J. Ford, L. Kantorovich, and D. D. Vvedensky, Epitaxial graphene on transition metals: Optimization of rate theories, Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter 26, 185008 (2014).
Inverted pyramidal quantum dots. In collaboration with Emauele Pelucchi’s group (Cork), reaction-diffusion equations have been used to model the fabrication of quantum dots (QDs) on GaAs(111) surfaces patterned with inverted pyramids using metalorganic vaporphase epitaxy. Patterning provides pre-determined sites for QDs and endows the rates of all surface processes with a facetdependence. The rates of these processes are determined from systematic experiments [3], and the resulting theory accounts for the measured concentration, temperature, and time-dependence of QD formation.
V. Dimastrodonato, E. Pelucchi, P. A. Zestanakis, and D. D. Vvedensky, `Morphological, compositional, and geometrical 52
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Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Experimental Solid State Physics EXSS is a large group comprising 19 members of staff, 40 research staff and over 50 PhD students. Research spans all areas of solid state physics and main themes are highlighted below. The group has strong links with other centres within Imperial College including the Energy Futures Lab and the Grantham Institute for Climate Change.
Plastic Electronics T.D. Anthopoulos, D.D.C Bradley, A.J. Campbell, J.S Kim, J. Nelson and P.N. Stavrinou
Organic semiconductors (conjugated polymers and small molecules) are finding increasing applications in light emission, displays, energy conversion, sensors engineering and healthcare. Experimental and theoretical programme.
Plastic electronics on flexible substrates
Energy and efficient energy use
Solar Cell Research P. Barnes, K.W.J. Barnham, D.D.C. Bradley, A.J. Chatten, N.J. EkinsDaukes, J. Nelson and C.C.Phillips
The two main drivers in solar cell research are the development of lowercost materials and improving efficiencies.Organic photovoltaic materials such as conjugated polymers, fullerenes and nanoparticles can have efficiencies around 10% they are relatively cheap and are readily processed from solution. Inorganic semiconductors can achieve efficiencies of 40%, particularly under “many suns” illumination, and are well suited to satellite applications or terrestrial light concentrators.
Materials for Energy Efficient Refrigeration K. Sandeman, L .F. Cohen and A. D. Caplin
Nanoscience and Technology
Frustrated Magnetic Nanostructures W. R. Branford and L. F. Cohen Arrays of magnetic nanostructured honeycomb lattices impose frustration on the magnetic order resulting in monopole defects according to “spin ice” rules.
Magnetic monopole defects
Nanostructured Narrow Gap Semiconductors L.F. Cohen and S.A. Solin Narrow gap semiconductors such as InAs exhibit high electron mobilities and low surface depletion making them ideal candidates for high sensitivity, ultra high resolution, ballistic nanosensors. Quantum Dots R. Oulton, N.J. Ekins-Daukes and R. Murray
QDs have applications in lasers, optical amplifiers, micro-lasers, qubits, single photon sources for quantum cryptography and tunnel junctions for efficient tandem solar cells. Mid-infrared Imaging for Cancer detection C.C. Phillips Mid-IR radiation is absorbed by exciting localised vibrations in chemical
bonds in a way that gives each biomolecule an easily recognisable spectral “fingerprint”. If we image a slice of human tissue at the right wavelengths, we can “see” chemicals (e.g. the acids in DNA). Clinical trials are showing that this technique detects cancer earlier and with greater confidence.
Nanophotonics, Plasmonics and Metamaterials S. Maier, R. Oulton, L.F. Cohen, P.N. Stavrinou, C.C. Phillips and D.D.C. Bradley
Here we utilise metallic nanostructures in to break the diffraction limit of light. Examples include ultrafast nanoscale plasmon lasers, highly sensitive biodetectors, quantum plasmonics and optical nanoantennas for use in nonlinear nanooptics. Nanophotonic structures are also fascinating materials for combination with graphene for novel optoelectronic devices. At mid-infrared frequencies, we have developed the concept of quantum metamaterials based on highly doped semiconductors for novel sub-resolution imaging applications.
Utilising magnetic magnetocaloric materials offers a route to efficient refrigeration which avoids the use of environmentally damaging chemicals.
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Dotonic molecule
Bow-Tie Plasmonic antennae
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Research Professor Thomas Anthopoulos
My research programs are centered on understanding the physical properties of functional electronic materials and applying this fundamental understanding to develop improved materials and devices for application in electronics, displays, lighting, energy generation & harvesting and different sensor technologies. I am also interested in innovative manufacturing technologies for large-area nano-electronics where device –and ultimately system– performance is determined by key device dimensions rather than strictly by the physical properties of the active material(s) used. Ultimate aim is the development of advanced device concepts and their application in future generations of ubiquitous large-area optoelectronics. Current research interests falls into three broad themes:
Theme 1: Functional materials and novel fabrication paradigms
Theme 2: Devices and circuits for opto/electronics and energy harvesting applications
Theme 3: Bottom-up fabrication technologies for nano-scale opto/electronics
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www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Dr Piers Barnes
Solution processed semiconductors offer the prospect of cheap solar power, but the stability of the materials is often limited. We have accelerated aging in photovoltaic devices based on low processing cost materials such as CH3NH3PbI3 perovskites, conjugated polymers, and dye sensitised solar cells (DSSCs) by using high intensity light sources to expose devices to the equivalent of a year’s flux of photons on the time scale of a few days.[1] Our approach enables us to assess the extent of photo-degradation and mechanisms for change in behaviour in these the materials. DCCS proved to be the most stable but can suffer from electrolyte sealing issues. To overcome this we are exploring routes to improve the performance of solid-state DSSCs using lateral transport of holes through dye monolayers attached to surfaces. This ‘molecular wiring’ phenomenon also has potential applications in batteries, solar fuel photoelectrodes, and molecular scale electronic devices. We have developed a new method to experimentally measure the reorganisation energy of charge hopping in these molecular monolayers which shows excellent agreement with our theoretical calculations.[2] This allows us to predict the mobility of holes for different molecules and environments, suggesting interesting new possibilities for the design of organic electronic devices.[3]
Experimental Solid State Physics “Three organic or hybrid photovoltaic technologies are compared with respect to performance and stability under the harsh regime of concentrated light. Although all three technologies show surprisingly high (and linear) photocurrents, and better than expected stability, no golden apples are awarded.”[1]
[1] Performance and Stability of Lead Perovskite/TiO2, Polymer/PCBM, and Dye Sensitized Solar Cells at Light Intensities up to 70 Suns, Law C, Miseikis L, Dimitrov S, Shakya-Tuladhar P, Li X, Barnes PRF, Durrant J, O'Regan BC, 2014, ADVANCED MATERIALS, Vol: 26, Pages: 6268-6273, ISSN: 0935-9648 [2] The reorganization energy of intermolecular hole hopping between dyes anchored to surfaces, Moia D, Vaissier V, Lopez-Duarte I, Torres T, Nazeeruddin MK, O'Regan BC, Nelson J, Barnes PRF, 2014, CHEMICAL SCIENCE, Vol: 5, Pages: 281290, ISSN: 2041-652z
[3] Effect of Molecular Fluctuations on Hole Diffusion within Dye Monolayers, Vaissier V, Mosconi E, Moia D, Pastore M, Frost JM, De Angelis F, Barnes PRF, Nelson J, 2014, CHEMISTRY OF MATERIALS, Vol: 26, Pages: 4731-4740, ISSN: 0897-4756
Professor Donal Bradley FRS
Understanding the unique properties of molecular electronic materials and using that knowledge to develop novel technologies for application in the displays and lighting, energy, electronics, analysis and communications sectors is at the core of the field of plastic electronics (http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/plasticelectr
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research
onics). Our work spans fundamental studies of electronic and photophysical properties and the development of efficient device structures including organic light emitting diodes, lasers, transistors and photodiodes/solar cells. In addition to molecular materials (conjugated polymers, small molecules, fullerenes, CuSCN, etc) we also work with solution processed metal oxides (MoOX, ZnO, ZrO2, etc) and combined (‘hybrid’) devices are of increasing interest. In addition, photonic structures incorporating conformational metamaterials, microcavities and plasmonic metals are of strong interest. Close collaborations exist with Paul Stavrinou, Thomas Anthopoulos, JiSeon Kim and Jenny Nelson in Physics and with colleagues from our Chemistry and Materials Departments. We participate in the EPSRC Centres for Innovative Manufacturing in Large Area Electronics (http://www-large-areaelectronics.eng.cam. ac.uk/) and Doctoral Training in Plastic Electronic Materials (http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/plasticel ectronics/pecdt). Strong and growing international collaborations exist with colleagues in Switzerland (ETH), China (Nanjing Tech, CIAC, NJUPT), Korea (SNU, KAIST), Brazil (CSEM) and Hong Kong (HKBU) and we are supported by EPSRC, Unilever, Sumitomo Chemicals, CDT and Molecular Vision. 1. “Location, Location, Location - strategic positioning of 2,1,3-benzo-thiadiazole units within trigonal quaterfluorene-truxene star-shaped structures” C.R. Belton, A.L. Kanibolotsky, J. Kirkpatrick, C. Orofino, S.E.T. Elmasly, P.N. Stavrinou, P.J. Skabara and D.D.C. Bradley Adv.Funct.Mater. 23 (2013), 2792-2804. DOI: 10.1002/adfm.201202644 2. “Ultrastrongly coupled exciton-polaritons in metalclad organic semiconductor microcavities” S. Kéna-Cohen, S.A. Maier and D.D.C. Bradley, Adv.Opt.Mater. 1 (2013), 827-833. DOI: 10.1002/adom.201300256
3 “Interplay Between Solid State Microstructure and Photophysics for Poly (9,9-dioctylfluorene) within Oriented Polyethylene Hosts” A. Perevedentsev, S. Aksel, K. Feldmann, P. Smith, P.N. Stavrinou and
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
D.D.C. Bradley, J. Poly. Sci. Polym. Phys. (2014), at press. DOI: 10.1002/polb.23601 4. “High-efficiency, solution-processed, multilayer phosphorescent organic light emitting diodes with a copper thiocyanate hole injection/transport layer” A. Perumal, H. Faber, N. Yaacobi-Gross, P. Pattanasattayavong, C. Burgess, S. Jha, M.A. McLachlan, P.N. Stavrinou, T.D. Anthopoulos and D.D.C. Bradley, Adv. Mater. (2014), at press. DOI: 10.1002/adma.201403914
Dr Will Branford
Experimental Solid State Physics
Anthopoulos (EXSS)[4] and crystals from Oak Ridge. We also began a collaboration with Lesley Cohen (EXSS) and Peter Petrov (Materials), producing magnetic Skyrmion crystals in bulk form. We are now using these bulk samples to develop thin film growth of these Skyrmionic materials. 1. Dynamic interaction between domain walls and nanowire vertices. Burn, D.M., M. Chadha, S.K. Walton, and W.R. Branford, Physical Review B. 90: p. 144414 (2014).
2. The non-random walk of chiral magnetic charge carriers in artificial spin ice. Zeissler, K., S.K. Walton, S. Ladak, D.E. Read, T. Tyliszczak, L.F. Cohen, and W.R. Branford, Scientific Reports. 3: p. 1252 (2013).
We have ongoing work engineering arrays of ferromagnetic nanobars to induce a type of magnetic frustration known as the Ice rules and characterizing their magnetic and transport properties. The Ice rules initially described the residual disorder in ice at zero temperature. They also describe the local ordering principle of the spins in spin ice materials and "artificial spin ice" nanoarrays. In the last year we explored how we can use the properties of ferromagnetic domain walls to direct magnetic charges move through these artificial spin ice structures.[1] To do this we developed new methods of imaging this magnetic charge flow (including central facilities work at Advanced Light Source (Berkeley),[2] Paul Scherrer Institute (Switzerland) and Diamond (UK) and collaboration with Solveig Felton (Queens, Belfast).[3] We have explored the interplay between structure and magnetotransport properties in graphene and other Dirac cone materials, including graphene device structures from Thomas
3. MALTS: A Tool to Simulate Lorentz Transmission Electron Microscopy From Micromagnetic Simulations. Walton, S.K., K. Zeissler, W.R. Branford, and S. Felton, Ieee Transactions On Magnetics. 49(8): p. 47954800 (2013).
4. Observation of wrinkle induced potential drops in biased chemically derived graphene thin film networks. Ladak, S., J.M. Ball, D. Moseley, G. Eda, W.R. Branford, M. Chhowalla, T.D. Anthopoulos, and L.F. Cohen, Carbon. 64: p. 35-44 (2013).
Dr Alasdair Campbell
Working with Matthew Fuchter in the Department of Chemistry, strong progress has been made in the novel field of organic chiral photonics and optoelectronics. Using a helically-shaped molecular semiconductor known as a helicene which comes in both left-and righthanded spiral forms we were able to create organic light emitting diodes
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Research and organic phototransistors which emit and detect circularly-polarised (CP) light [1, 2]. Such devices have application in protein detection, CP based tomography, optical spintronics and quantum computing, and displays, and a patent from this work has led to further funding and an industrial collaboration [3]. We also have strong activity in the POLARIC (printed organic largearea realisation of integrated circuits) EC FP7 project, which has involved printing high performance organic transistors and complementary circuits. As well as ultra-thin contact printed dielectric dielectrics [4], we have successfully created high-frequency nanoscale self-aligned transistors and circuits using a combination of nanoimprintlithography and conventional photolithography. Work has also been conducted in the area of hybrid inorganic-organic light emitting diodes and transistors, involving the creation of inverted and conventional devices using transition metal oxide and hybrid hole and electron injection layers. New activity has also begun on organic bioelectronic sensors and transistors. 1. Induction of Circularly Polarized Electroluminescence from an Achiral LightEmitting Polymer via a Chiral Small-Molecule Dopant Y. Yang, R. Correa da Costa, D. M. Smilgies, A. J. Campbell and M. J. Fuchter Advanced Materials, 25, 2624 (2013) 2. Circularly polarized light detection by a chiral organic semiconductor transistor Y. Yang, R. Correa da Costa, M. J. Fuchter and A. J. Campbell Nature Photonics, 7, 634 (2013) 3. “Electroluminescent Compositions” Fuchter, M. J.; Campbell, A. J., Yang, Y. PCT/GB2013/052007
4. High-Performance Flexible Bottom-Gate Organic Field-Effect Transistors with Gravure Printed Thin Organic Dielectric, N. L. Vaklev, R. Müller, B. V. O. Muir, D. T. James, R. Pretot, P. van der Schaaf, J. Genoe, J.-S. Kim, J. H. G. Steinke and A. J. Campbell Advanced Materials Interfaces, 1300123 (2014) 56
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Professor Lesley Cohen
Experimental Solid State Physics
2. A Raman spectroscopic study of the carbon deposition mechanism on Ni/CGO electrodes during CO/CO2 electrolysis: Duboviks, V.; Maher, R. C.; Kishimoto, M.; et al., PHYSICAL CHEMISTRY CHEMICAL PHYSICS Volume: 16 Issue: 26 13063 (2014) 3. Influence of Cu substrate topography on the growth morphology of chemical vapour deposited graphene: Xiao, Ye; Kim, HoKwon, Mattevi, Cecilia; et al., CARBON 65 7 (2013) 4. Andreev spectroscopy of CrO2 thin films on TiO2 and Al2O3: Yates, K. A.; Anwar, M. S.; Aarts, J.; et al. EPL Volume: 103 Issue: 6 Article Number 67005 (2013)
Our work on CVD graphene materials characterisation and integration with plasmonic structures has become an active area in the group and we are working with Rupert Oulton and Stefan Maier to develop our interests in graphene photoconductivity detectors and dynamics of photoinduced carriers. Our interests in materials for energy applications continue: We have studied the vortex pinning properties in single crystals superconducting pnictides, in collaboration with colleagues at UFRJ in Brazil, and the magnetotransport properties of the parent compounds; Raman spectroscopy of solid oxide fuel cell electrodes together with colleagues in the Energy Futures Laboratory; and the entropy change contribution in La0.7Ca0.3MnO3 for solid state magnetic cooling applications. One of the most interesting areas has been to understand the potential influence of Andreev bound states in the electrical conductance spectra generated at a superconducting ferromagnet interface. This work was performed in collaboration with Matthias Eschrig and colleagues at Royal Holloway.
1. Spontaneous magnetization above TC in polycrystalline La0.7Ca0.3MnO3 and La0.7Ba0.3MnO3: Turcaud, J. A.; Pereira, A. M.; Sandeman, K. G.; et al., PHYSICAL REVIEW B Volume: 90 Issue: 2 024410 (2014)
Dr Nicholas Ekins-Daukes
One of the first ever demonstrations of a hot carrier photovoltaic device was demonstrated in the group, showing a hot carrier photocurrent at a device cooled to 10K. Research is on-going in collaboration with Sharp Laboratories Oxford to demonstrate a hot carrier photovoltaic device at higher working temperature and with a broader absorption profile. A new milestone for multi-junction solar cell development was passed in a collaborative project with the University of Tokyo where a 1.15eV band-edge using aggressively strain-balanced GaAsP/InGaAs quantum well was demonstrated. Further research has shown that radiative transport within a 4J structure will lead to efficiencies in excess of 50%. Further, we have discovered remarkable microsecond minority carrier lifetimes present in lateral GaAsP/InGaAs quantum wire solar cells in collaboration with the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems in Freiburg. Our research
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research on the application of metal nanoparticles to promote scattering has been conducted in collaboration with Stefan Maier and Vincenzo Giannini and recently demonstrated that aluminium nanoparticles offer low loss scattering across most of the solar spectrum. 1 Hirst, L. C., Walters, R. J., Führer, M. F., & Ekins-Daukes, N. J. (2014). Experimental demonstration of hot-carrier photo-current in an InGaAs quantum well solar cell. Applied Physics Letters, 104(23), 231115. doi:10.1063/1.4883648 2 Toprasertpong, K., Fujii, H., Thomas, T., Führer, M. Alonso-Álvarez, D. Farrell, D.J. Watanabe, K. Okada, Y. Ekins-Daukes, N.J. Sugiyama, M. and Nakano Y. (2014) Absorption Threshold Extended to 1.15 eV Using InGaAs/GaAsP Quantum Wells for Over-50%-efficient Lattice-matched Quadjunction Solar Cells Progress in Photovoltaics, in press .
3 Alonso-Alvarez, D., Thomas, T., Fuhrer, M., Hylton, N. P., Ekins-Daukes, N. J., Lackner, D., et al. (2014). InGaAs/GaAsP strain balanced multi-quantum wires grown on misoriented GaAs substrates for high efficiency solar cells. Applied Physics Letters, 105(8), 083124. 4 Hylton, N. P., Li, X. F., Giannini, V., Lee, K. H., Ekins-Daukes, N. J., Loo, J., et al. (2013). Loss mitigation in plasmonic solar cells: aluminium nanoparticles for broadband photocurrent enhancements in GaAs photodiodes. Scientific Reports, 3, 2874.
Dr Ji-Seon Kim
techniques continues to improve the performance of devices, further research is required to gain crucial insights into the fundamental relationships between nanostructures of materials and their optoelectronic properties to inform future design strategies. To achieve this goal, our principal research has been focused on two main themes, Nanoscale Functional Materials and Nanometrology; (a) to facilitate the rational design of functional materials, device architectures and fabrication methods via increased understanding and control of the nanostructures and fundamental properties of these materials; (b) to develop advanced structural nanoimaging techniques that have the unique capability to probe nonperiodic structures with high chemical sensitivity and high spatial resolution. Our research benefits from strong collaborative links to Physics, Chemistry, Engineering, Materialsbased groups at Imperial under the Centre for Plastic Electronics and the Centre for Doctoral Training in Plastic Electronic Materials (http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/plasticel ectronics/pecdt), as well as local/international universities and industrial organisations, which include SNU, KAIST, POSTECH, UNIST, BNU, Ewha (Korea), Technion (Israel), CDT/ Sumitomo Chemicals (UK/ Japan), Samsung Electronics (Korea) and NPL (UK).
1. “Controlling Microstructure of Pentacene Derivatives by Solution Processing – Impact of Structural Anisotropy on Optoelectronic Properties”, James, D. T., Frost, J. M., Wade, J., et al., ACS Nano 7(9) (2013) 7983-7991, DOI: 10.1021/nn203397m
Plastic Electronics enables electronic devices to be printed onto a range of surfaces for large area, flexible and low-cost applications. While innovation in new organic semiconductors and hybrid materials as well as solution-processing www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
2. “Performance Enhancement of Fullerene Based Solar Cells by Light Processing”, Li Z., Wong H. C., Huang Z., et al., Nature Comm. 4 (2013) 2227, DOI:10.1038/ncomms3227
3. “Germanium- and Silicon-Substituted Donor–Acceptor Type Copolymers: Effect of the Bridging Heteroatom on Molecular Packing and Photovoltaic Device Performance”, Kim J. S., Fei Z., Wood S., et al., Adv. Energy Mater. (2014), 1400527, DOI:
Experimental Solid State Physics
10.1002/aenm.201400527
4. “Highly efficient inverted polymer lightemitting diodes using surface modifications of ZnO layer”, Lee B. R., Jung E. D., Park J. S., et al., Nature Comm. 5 (2014) 4840, DOI: 10.1002/admi.201300123
Professor Stefan Maier
Our work in nanophotonics advanced substantially over the last year with a big push towards active materials for optoelectronic control on the nanoscale. Together with researchers of the Naval Research Laboratory and the University of Manchester, we demonstrated a new class of materials for highconfinement and enhancement of radiation at mid-infrared frequencies, based on hexagonal boron nitride [1]. Furthermore we demonstrated gigantic enhancement of higher harmonic generation in hybrid plasmonic nanoantennas based on indium tin oxide decorated with gold nanoantennas [2]. We also showed Bose-Einstein condensation at room temperature in an organic material, an important step towards practical polariton lasers[3]. Lastly, in research led by our colleague Rupert Oulton, we demonstrated ultrafast lasing modulation in a plasmonic nanolaser based on zinc oxide nanowires coupled to surface plasmon polaritons in a silver thin film [4]. 1. Caldwell, J.D., Kretinin, A.V., Chen, Y., Giannini, V., Fogler, M.M., Francescato, Y., Ellis, C.T., Tischler, J.G., Woods, C.R., Giles, A.J., Hong, M., Watanabe, K., Taniguchi, T., Maier, S.A., & Novoselov, K.S., Subdiffractional, volume-confined polaritons in the natural hyperbolic material hexagonal
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Research boron nitride, Nature Communications 5, 5221 (2014) doi:/ 10.1038/ncomms6221
2. Aouani, H., Rahmani, M., Navarro-Cía, M., & Maier, S.A., Third-harmonic-upconversion enhancement from a single semiconductor nanoparticle coupled to a plasmonic antenna, Nature Nanotechnology 9, 290 (2014)
3. Daskalakis, K.S., Maier, S.A., Murray, R., & Kéna-Cohen, S., Nonlinear interactions in an organic polariton condensate, Nature Materials 13, 271 (2014) 4. Sidiropoulos, T.P.H., Röder, R., Geburt, S., Hess, O., Maier, S.A., Ronning, C., & Oulton, R.F., Ultrafast plasmonic nanowire lasers near the surface plasmon frequency, Nature Physics (2014) doi:/ 10.1038/NPHYS3103
Professor Ray Murray
studies of strong light matter coupling3 using optical cavities, paving the way for electrically driven room temperature (RT) polariton laser devices. Cavity polaritons form a macroscopic condensate in the ground state. We have demonstrated an organic polariton condensate at room temperature in a microcavity4. At threshold we observe the spontaneous formation of a linearly polarized condensate which exhibits a superlinear power dependence, long-range order and a powerdependent blueshift: a clear signature of Frenkel polariton interactions. 1 Matthew W. Taylor, Peter Spencer, Edmund Clarke, Edmund Harbord and Ray Murray “Resolving Zeeman splitting in quantum dot ensembles” App.Phys.Lett. 102 171909 (2013)
2 F.S.F. Brossard, B.P.L. Reid, C.C.S. Chan, X. L. Xu, J. P. Griffiths, D.A. Williams, R. Murray, and R.A. Taylor “Confocal microphotoluminescence mapping of coupled and detuned states in photonic molecules” Optics Express 21 16934 (2013)
QDs are contenders for quantum computation schemes and accessing spin information to/from quantum dots (QDs) is crucial. We have developed methods of determining the polarisation states and g-factors for QD ensembles1 using circularly polarised light. In conjunction with the Oxford and Hitachi Cambridge we have studied the coupling of cavities defined by the local modulation of the waveguide width using confocal photo-luminescence microscopy2. We are able to spatially map the profile of the antisymmetric (antibonding) and symmetric (bonding) modes of a pair of strongly coupled cavities (photonic molecule) and follow the coupled cavity system from the strong coupling to the weak coupling regime in the presence of structural disorder. GaN and its alloys have large exciton binding energies which makes them ideal candidates for 58
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3 K. S. Daskalakis,P. S. Eldridge, G. Christmann, E. Trichas, R. Murray, E. Iliopoulos,E. Monroy, N. T. Pelekanos,J. J. Baumberg and P. G. Savvidis “All-dielectric GaN microcavity: Strong coupling and lasing at room temperature.” App.Phys.Lett. 102 101113 (2013) 4 K. S. Daskalakis, S. A. Maier, R. Murray and S. Kéna-Cohen “Nonlinear interactions in an organic polariton condensate” Nature
Professor Jenny Nelson
Reducing the cost of solar electricity is key to building an affordable and secure future energy supply. We study
Experimental Solid State Physics
the physics, chemistry, materials science and device engineering of new, solution processible materials for solar cells. These include organic semiconductors such as conjugated polymers and small molecules, hybrid inorganic:organic materials and dye sensitised and perovskite materials. We study the factors controlling current generation and charge recombination in organic and hybrid solar cells, such as the role of trap states, doping and interface recombination using detailed analysis to determine the practical and theoretical limits to device performance. We use a wide range of characterisation techniques to study how the chemical and physical structure of materials control the processes of light absorption, charge generation and charge transport, and how these processes influence photovoltaic device performance. We are particularly interested in charge transport and photo-induced charge separation. We have also developed methods to simulate the physical structure of materials, and the resulting electronic and optoelectronic properties. Our long term aim is the rational design of functional electronic materials. Together with the Grantham Institute for Climate Change, we also research the potential of new PV (and other) materials technologies to contribute to carbon emissions reductions.
Representative publications: Mark A. Faist et al., “Understanding the Reduced Efficiencies of Organic Solar Cells Employing Fullerene Multiadducts as Acceptors” Advanced Energy Materials 3, 744-752 (2013). Neha Bansal et al., “Influence of Crystallinity and Energetics on Charge Separation in Polymer–Inorganic Nanocomposite Films for Solar Cells” Scientific Reports 3, Article number: 1531 (2013) Anne A. Y. Guilbert et al. , “Influence of Bridging Atom and Side Chains on the Structure and Crystallinity of Cyclopentadithiophene–Benzothiadiazole Polymers” Chem. Mater.26, 1226–1233 (2014). Florian Steiner et al.“Distinguishing the influence of structural and energetic disorder on electron transport in fullerene multi-
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research adducts”, Mater. Horiz. 2, 113-119 (2015). D. A. Vithanage et al., “Visualizing charge separation in bulk heterojunction organic solar cells”, Nature Communications 4, 2334 (2013).
Dr Rupert Oulton
in the form of metallic nano-particles that scatter light more strongly than atoms or molecules3. This leads to diverse optical methods from coupling light into photonic microchips4 to characterizing aberrations in optical systems. 1. Sidiropoulos, T. P. H., Hess, O., Maier, S. A. & Oulton, R. F. Ultrafast plasmonic nanowire lasers near the surface plasmon frequency. Nat. Phys. 10, 870–876 (2014).
2. Lafone, L., Sidiropoulos, T. P. H. & Oulton, R. F. Silicon-based metal-loaded plasmonic waveguides for low-loss nanofocusing. Opt. Lett. 39, 4356–4359 (2014).
My research involves engineering the interaction of light and matter. The stark difference in characteristic length scales of photons and electrons makes optical interactions extremely weak despite light being our primary means of experiencing the world around us. However, the characteristic wavelength light can be matched with that of electrons in materials with metal optics. Metal surfaces support excitations, called surface plasmons, that can be squeezed into spaces just tens of nanometres in size where lightmatter interaction are greatly accelerated. While this technique can be used to make brighter and more efficient light sources, Dr. Oulton is currently using this concept to create ultrafast lasers capable of turning on and off within a few hundred femtoseconds1. The approach also strengthens the weakest non-linear optics effects. Metal-optics, or plasmonics, allows light focussing down to the nanometre scale2, far beyond the diffraction limit of conventional optics. This boosts light’s intensity to enhance non-linear response. The concept is also used in reverse: artificial material states are created www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
3. Gennaro, S. D. et al. Spectral interferometric microscopy reveals absorption by individual optical nanoantennas from extinction phase. Nat. Commun. 5, 1–8 (2014).
4. Sidiropoulos, T. P. H. et al. Compact Optical Antenna Coupler for Silicon Photonics Characterized by Third-Harmonic Generation. ACS Photonics 1, 912–916 (2014).
Professor Chris Phillips
Experimental Solid State Physics
absorption that lies at the heart of the idea1. In a similar vein, we make quantum metamaterial “superlenses”, using quantum theory to design structures where light beams propagate without spreading by diffraction2. To test them we have developed a new s-SNOM microscope, capable of mapping IR spectra at a resolution of 100th of a wavelength, and we are using it to measure chemical distributions within single cells for the first time3. Our “Digistain” IR imaging method for earlier cancer detection is undergoing clinical trials in Charing Cross Hospital, and work with Southampton and Bath promises a new form of coherent radiation emitter, that uses a quantum-optical effect known as “Rabi flopping” in an asymmetric nanostructure, to generate tunable THz beams. 1. Megumi Yoshida1, Hemmel Amrania1, Daniel J. Farrell2, Ben Browne, Edward Yoxall1, Nicholas J. Ekins-Daukes1 and Chris C. Phillips1 “Progress towards Realizing Intermediate Band Solar Cell – Sequential Absorption of Photons in a Quantum Well Intermediate Band Solar Cell”. IEEE Journal of Photovoltaics, Vol 4, (2), 634-638 (March 2014). 2. A. O. Bak, V. Giannini, S. A. Maier, and C. C.Phillips, “Super-resolution with a positive epsilon multi-quantum-well super-lens” Appl. Phys. Letts. 103, 261110 (2013)August 2013.
We with the help of a new EPSRC grant we have assembled a team to put our “Quantum Ratchet” Solar cell idea to the test. Our modelling has shown conversion efficiencies exceeding 60 % are possible, and now we are exploring practical implementations, with collaborators in Japan, the US, Diamond, Sheffield and Sharp labs. Mostly they use nanostructured semiconductor devices based on GaAs/AlGaAs and the nitrides. The race is on to be the first to convincingly demonstrate the sequential photon
3. Edward Yoxall,, Miguel Navarro-C, Mohsen Rahmani, Stefan A. Maier, and Chris C. Phillips, “Widely tuneable scattering-type scanning near-field optical microscopy using pulsed quantum cascade lasers” Appl. Phys. Letts. 103, 213110 (2013). 4. Nathan Shammah, Chris C. Phillips, and Simone De Liberato”Terahertz emission from AC Stark-split asymmetric intersubband transitions” PHYSICAL REVIEW B 89, 235309 (2014).
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High Energy Physics
The High Energy Physics Group has activity across a broad front in exploiting particle physics experiments at existing facilities as well as designing detectors and accelerators for future experiments. These investigate the fundamental particles and the forces between them, with a primary aim to address basic questions such as the origin of mass and the charge-parity (CP) asymmetry between matter and antimatter. The group have also been exploring possible applications of accelerator technology in healthcare, working jointly with the Imperial College Medical Faculty.
HIGH ENERGY PARTICLES High Energy Particle Collider Studies O. Buchmueller, D. J. Colling, P. D. Dauncey, G. J. Davies, P. J. Dornan, U. Egede, A. Golutvin, G. Hall, J. A. Nash, M. Patel, A. Tapper, T. Virdee
We have been heavily involved in the CMS detector at the LHC and in the discovery of the Higgs since inception. The trigger (a real-time background rejection) and the entire tracking detector and forward calorimeters will be replaced within the next decade. We develop custom readout electronics for the new tracker and trigger and we lead the design of a novel high granularity calorimeter.
neutrino disappearance.
SuperNEMO searches for neutrinoless double-beta decay, a process that allows access the fundamental nature of the neutrino mass. We lead the software development. Intense beams of muons at high energy can give neutrino beams with a well known composition and energy spectrum – the so called Neutrino Factory (NF). We lead the MICE experiment to provide the proof of principle for the technique. Many models for new physics predict lepton flavour violation, such as muon to electron conversion. COMET/PRISM will be sensitive to this process, with COMET Phase-I currently under construction as a flagship experiment at the J-PARC laboratory alongside T2K. Particle Phenomenology O. Buchmueller
The custom readout board for the CMS trigger upgrade
The LHCb detector at the LHC is optimised for measuring b-quark hadrons. Imperial's main contributions to the detector were the Ring Imaging Cherenkov detector, and the High Level Trigger that makes the current physics programme possible. We lead the search for CP violation and new physics. We have also continued to jointly lead Higgs studies at DZero at the Tevatron, culminating in further evidence for a 125GeV Higgs boson in fermion decays, along with a measurement of its spin state.
Neutrino and Charged Lepton Physics P. D. Dauncey, P. J. Dornan, K. Long, J. A. Nash, J. Pasternak, J. K.Sedgbeer, Y. Uchida, M. Wascko
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The Tokai-to-Kamioka (T2K) experiment in Japan is the flagship of the global neutrino oscillation programme. In 2013 we published the world’s first high-significance measurement of electron neutrino appearance and muon www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
The Standard Model leaves open significant questions in particle physics and cosmology that may be answered by new physics at TeV masses. Our work through the London Centre for TeraUniverse Studies is directly connected to our experimental activities and focuses on dark matter and new physics at the LHC.
Limits on masses of SuperSymmetric particles from LHC data
DARK MATTER AND GRAVITATIONAL WAVES
Direct Dark Matter Searches H. Araujo, T. J. Sumner We are heavily involved in direct searches for the dark matter particles, which are thought to account for most of the mass in the Universe. Currently, the LUX experiment at the Sanford Lab in the US places the most stringent limits on the interaction of these particles with ordinary matter. In
The LUX-ZEPLIN detector
parallel with this, we lead the UK programme towards the next-generation experiment, LUX-ZEPLIN, which is entering its construction phase.
Gravitational Wave Detection H. Araujo, T. J. Sumner We have recently seen two major milestones in the LISA low-frequency gravitational wave ‘telescope’ in space. We have delivered flight hardware for the ESA LISA Pathfinder technology mission for launch in mid-2015 and also ESA has earmarked LISA for the 2034 L3 launch slot.
MEDICAL APPLICATIONS Accelerator Developments and Hadron Therapy K. Long, J. Pasternak, P. A. Posocco, J. Pozimski We have established a comprehensive programme on proton accelerators for science and medical applications. The group is leading the high-intensity proton beam Front End Test Stand project to test technologies required for a Neutrino Factory, a neutron spallation source, and LHC upgrades. The activities include the development of a compact proton accelerator based on laser-plasma technology and the design of innovative beam gantries using FFAG technology. e-SCIENCE D. J. Colling We have been one of the most active groups within the GridPP distributed computing project since its formation and provide regional coordination through our leadership of LondonGrid. We also have significant experimentspecific development activities. Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research Dr Henrique Araújo
A first HMRM prototype was launched recently onboard the TechDemoSat-1 satellite.
1. First Results from the LUX Dark Matter Experiment at the Sanford Underground Research Facility, Akerib, D.S.; et al; Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 091303
2. Radiogenic and Muon-Induced Backgrounds in the LUX Dark Matter Detector, Akerib, D.S.; et al.; Astropart. Phys. 62: 33 (2014)
3. The Highly Miniaturised Radiation Monitor, Mitchell, E.; Araujo, H.; et al.; Journal of Instrumentation 9: P07010 (2014)
This year saw the publication of the world’s best exclusion limits on the interaction of dark matter particles from the LUX experiment, which is operating a mile underground at the Sanford Lab in South Dakota. Our result rules out previous ‘hints’ for light particles reported by other teams. A reanalysis to enhance our sensitivity to even lower particle masses is near publication, led by Alastair Currie from Imperial. A yearlong run is now underway which should see LUX extend its reach into unexplored parameter space. In parallel, the LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) nextgeneration experiment, presently completing the conceptual design phase, was selected by the US funding agencies to become a construction project from 2015. LZ counts some 30 institutes mostly in the US and in the UK (the UK contribution is led by Imperial). We are continuing our LZ-related R&D programme here: our team is investigating the phenomenology of high-field breakdown processes in liquid xenon, studying in particular the emission of photons and electrons from thin wires at several hundred kV/cm. Another strand of our work involves radiation detection high above the Earth, rather than underground. We are developing the Highly Miniaturised Radiation Monitor (HMRM) with RAL and ESA. www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
4. Liquid noble gas detectors for low energy particle physics, Chepel, V. and Araujo, H., Journal of Instrumentation 8: R04001 (2013)
Dr Oliver Buchmueller
My work in CMS focused on the final physics exploitation of the RUN1 data taking campaign (20102012) analysing the so-called “parked data”, which since the middle of 2013 have been made available for analysis. Furthermore, in 2014 I have continued my coordination role for the planning of the CMS trigger upgrade strategy for the High-Luminosity LHC. This work has come to a first conclusion by assembling a Technical Design Report, to which I have made very significant contributions. This report will be made public in early 2015. In addition I have further expanded my work on particle physics phenomenology, establishing closer
High Energy Physics
links to theorists via the award of a Senior Experimental Followship with the IPPP (Institute for Particle Physics Phenomenology in Durham). This has resulted in two publications on how to characterise Dark Matter searches at colliders and direct detection experiments. In addition I have also contributed to new work of the MasterCode collaboration. CMS Technical Design Report for Phase2 CMS collaboration, to be published in early 2015
Characterising dark matter searches at colliders and direct detection experiments: Vector mediators Oliver Buchmueller (Imperial Coll., London), Matthew J. Dolan (SLAC), Sarah A. Malik (Imperial Coll., London), Christopher McCabe (Durham U., IPPP), submitted to JHEP Interplay and Characterization of Dark Matter Searches at Colliders and in Direct Detection Experiments Sarah Malik (Imperial Coll., London), Christopher McCabe (Durham U.), Henrique Araujo (Imperial Coll., London), A. Belyaev, Celine Boehm, J. Brooke, Oliver Buchmueller (Imperial Coll., London), et al., submitted to Journal for Physics of the Dark Universe.
The NUHM2 after LHC Run 1 O. Buchmueller (Imperial Coll., London), R. Cavanaugh (Fermilab & Illinois U., Chicago), M. Citron (Imperial Coll., London), A. De Roeck (Antwerp U. & CERN), M.J. Dolan (SLAC), J.R. Ellis (King's Coll, London & CERN), H. Flaecher (Bristol U.), S. Heinemeyer (Cantabria U., Santander), S. Malik (Rockefeller U.), J. Marrouche (Imperial Coll., London) et al., submitted to JHEP
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Research Professor Paul Dauncey
Dauncey et al., arXiv:1408.6865, submitted to J. INST. 2. Observation of the diphoton decay of the Higgs boson and measurement of its properties, V. Khachatryan et al., EUROPEAN PHYSICAL JOURNAL C, Volume: 74 3076 (2014)
Professor Gavin Davies
High Energy Physics boson with exotic spin and parity in VH→Vbb¯ final states, D0 Collaboration, Phys. Rev. Lett. 113 (2014) 161802. 3. Search for invisible decays of Higgs bosons in the vector boson fusion and associated ZH production modes, CMS Collaboration, Eur.Phys.J. C74 (2014) 2980. 4. Interplay and Characterization of Dark Matter Searches at Colliders and in Direct Detection Experiments, S. Malik et al., ArXiv: 1409.4075.
Professor Peter Dornan
My major research project is the CMS experiment at the LHC. Following the discovery of the Higgs Boson by the CMS and ATLAS collaborations in 2012, the main aim of our work has been to characterise the newly discovered particle as precisely as possible. In particular, we need to check if the production rates (in several production modes) and the decay rates (in several decay channels) are consistent with the theoretical predictions. I have concentrated on one particular decay mode, which is Higgs to two photons. This was one of the two main channels contributing to the discovery, mainly because it can be reconstructed efficiently and so gives high statistical power. As part of this, we produced a paper describing a new statistical method to allow for background uncertainties. A final paper on H→γγ decays using all the CMS data from the 2012/13 LHC runs was recently produced and so far, all measurements are consistent with the theory. However, the LHC will turn on again in 2015 and run for three years at a higher centre-of-mass energy, increasing the Higgs data sample by an order of magnitude and allowing improved precision. 1. Handling uncertainties in background shapes: the discrete profiling method, P. D.
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My research has continued to focus on characterisation of the recently observed Higgs boson, both with the CMS experiment at the LHC and the D0 experiment at the Tevatron, as well as searching for non-standard model Higgs boson at CMS. We published the legacy paper in the Higgs to diphoton decay mode, one of the principal discovery channels, achieving single channel evidence. The combination of results from the various decay modes continues to yield results for the couplings and spin in agreement with expectations for the SM Higgs boson. Our searches for invisible decay modes constrain new physics theories, including dark matter models. Returning to this topic has been the other thread in my recent research, and I was very pleased to welcome a JRF, Bjoern Penning, in this area. 1. Observation of the diphoton decay of the Higgs boson and measurement of its properties, CMS Collaboration, Eur.Phys.J. C74 (2014) 3076. 2. Constraints on models for the Higgs
As Professor Emeritus I now use my time to take an overall view of the state of particle physics and explore new directions which I feel can be positive for the group. The recent observation of the Higgs boson at the LHC completes the standard model and although this explains almost all particle interactions there remain areas such as neutrino oscillation, gravity, the matter-antimatter asymmetry and dark matter still to be understood. Thus our experiments must now search for signals from the physics beyond the standard model. New avenues must be explored in addition to the ongoing LHC programme which has yet to uncover any evidence.. Neutrino oscillation is one observation not predicted by the standard model and hence the lepton sector is a prime area to search for new physics and the great prize would be to see charged lepton violation Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research such as a muon changing to an electron. I therefore now support the COMET experiment at the JPARC laboratory in Japan to search for mu to e conversion. Additionally more accurate experiments are necessary in the neutrino area and for this a neutrino factory, long supported in this group, remains the optimal procedure. Professor Ulrik egede
quark. A precision measurement is important for measuring the least well constrained free parameter of the Standard Model. The present measurements suffer from systematic uncertainties that can be reduced by an analysis of the decay Λb→pµν, something that can only be done with the data from the LHCb experiment. Further developments have been made in particle physics phenomenology to improve the interpretation of future experimental measurements. 1. Observation of a resonance in B+→K+μ+μ− decays at low recoil, R. Aaij et al. [LHCb Collaboration], Phys. Rev. Lett. 111 (2013) 112003.
2. Differential branching fractions and isospin asymmetries of B→K(∗)μ+μ- decays, R. Aaij et al. [LHCb Collaboration], J. High Energy Phys. 06 (2014) 133.
The exploitation of the very large datasets produced by the LHCb experiment located at the Large Hadron Collider has been my main involvement. Effort has concentrated on looking for signatures that can constrain the nature of dark matter or explain the prevalence of matter over antimatter in the Universe. This means a continuation of the analysis of B meson decays where new types of particles are created within virtual loops. The discovery of a resonant structure in the dimuon mass spectra of the B+→K+μ+μ− decay led to subsequent big developments for the theory required to determine the influence of possible particles not described within the Standard Model. A new direction of research is related to semileptonic decays of B mesons, with an emphasis on measuring the strength of the coupling between the b and the u www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
3. Measurement of the semileptonic CP asymmetry in B0−B0 mixing, R. Aaij et al. [LHCb Collaboration], arXiv:1409.8586, submitted to Phys. Rev. Lett. 4. The effect of S-wave interference on the B0→K∗0ℓ+ℓ− angular observables, T Blake, U. Egede and A. Shires, J. High Energy Phys. 03 (2013) 027.
Professor Andrey Golutvin
High Energy Physics candidate for dark matter and the baryon dominated Universe, require further dedicated experiments. Together with my colleagues I have recently proposed a new experiment, SHIP, which will be based at CERN’s Super Proton Synchrotron. The experiment will search for heavy Majorana neutrinos and any other new particles that could be messengers between the Standard Model particles and some “Hidden Sector” of new physics. In particular, the existence of Majorana neutrinos is strongly motivated by both theory and experimental evidence, as such particles can simultaneously explain the matter-antimatter asymmetry of the Universe and account for the non-zero neutrino masses. I have been elected spokesperson of SHIP and represent the 35 collaborating institutes. CERN has asked our collaboration to produce an engineering design by the spring. The LHCb experiment has recently started a dedicated programme on the exploration of hidden portals of the Standard Model. Analyses of large, and nearly background free data samples of B decays to the final states with muons have lead to strong constraints on the couplings of the Majorana neutrino and low energy s-goldstinos. 1. Proposal to search for heavy neutral leptons at the SPS , CERN-SPSC-2013-024 / SPSC-EOI-010 2. Search for rare B(s) → μμμμ decays, LHCb collaboration, Phys. Rev. Lett. 110 (2013) 1528276
Recent results from the LHC experiments, ATLAS, CMS and LHCb, have provided further strong confirmation of the Standard Model. However, a number of experimental shortcomings, such as the finite mass of neutrinos, the absence of a
3. Search for Majorana neutrinos in B→πμμ decays, LHCb collaboration, Phys. Rev. Lett. 112 (2014) 131802 4. First observation of the rare decays B→Kππμμ and B→φKμμ, LHCb collaboration, JHEP10 (2014) 064
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Research Professor Geoffrey Hall
G. Hall , M. Pesaresi, M. Raymond, D. Braga et al CBC2: A CMS microstrip readout ASIC with logic for track-trigger modules at HLLHC Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research A 765 (2014) 214–218 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.nima.2014.04.056 G. Hall, D. Newbold, M. Pesaresi, A. Rose A time-multiplexed track-trigger architecture for CMS 2014 JINST 9 C10034 http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/17480221/9/10/C10034
I am the UK PI for the CMS experiment at the CERN LHC. This includes many activities on the experiment, including supervision of the UK detector operational responsibilities, especially on the Tracker which involved much Imperial effort and hardware, and other managerial activities. CMS is preparing an upgrade and much of my time is spent on that, where our group is currently replacing the Level-1 calorimeter trigger and engaged in R&D for new tracker detector modules based on silicon microstrips and a specialised front-end electronic integrated circuit. This module will provide new functions by selecting data to permit reconstruction of many of the charged particle tracks emerging from p-p collisions, and allowing this information to be used in the L1 trigger for the first time. This will increase the power of the trigger, allowing CMS to be more selective in data which are preserved for full analysis, by selecting high transverse momentum tracks and associating them with calorimeter and muon system information. A prototype module of this type was demonstrated in a DESY test beam last December for the first time. We have also carried out experiments on silicon crystal channeling in CERN proton beams. 64
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W. Scandale, W. Ferguson, J. Fulcher, G. Hall, M. Pesares, M. Raymond et al Mirroring of 400 GeV/c protons by an ultra-thin straight crystal. Physics Letters B734, (2014) 1–6 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.physletb.2014.04. 062 The CMS collaboration. Alignment of the CMS tracker with LHC and cosmic ray data 2014 JINST 9 P06009 http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/17480221/9/06/P06009
Dr John Hassard
High Energy Physics Senior Advisor to Sir Magdi Yacoub’s Qatar Cardiovascular Research Centre. We have also been adopted by several oil companies in the MENA region for real-time oil analytics and production allocation. Our team – mostly physicists – has set up a new company in Bahrain, to address the Saudi market, and to complement our Qatari company. We also have a contract within Dubai and will establish a company there in 2014. In addition, our gas sensing technologies (as demonstrated in the 2012 London Olympics, and built on HEP heavy quark separation algorithms) is being adopted by a GCC nation for air quality sensing, and is being studied by a National Oil Company, as a means of rapidly detecting the leakage of Toxic Industrial Chemicals.
Publications The Internet of Things: Smart Cities: Meeting the Threat. Invited talk at University of Shanghai, December 2011 FICCI Conference, Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear, Explosives (CBRNE) Conference, Home Office Invitee and Plenary Speaker. New Delhi, February 2012
I remain on Leave of Absence, promoting technologies derived from Particle Physics into a wider technical and commercial sphere. Our HEP-derived company deltaDOT has gone from strength to strength with tools built on early CMS pattern recognition algorithms (with Dr David Colling) and vertex finding in b quark decays. It has been adopted by the largest vaccine programme in the US, a highly topical development, and has been used in a wide range of biomedical applications, most notable in novel point-of-care cardiovascular biomarker analytics. In Sept 2012, I was appointed
GB Patent GB 1404756.7 2014: Rapid Petroleomic Profiler, Chenevière, Dessort, Al-Mohannadi, Al-Dahik, Chapron, Hassard Filing made 2014.
Professor Ken Long
Muon accelerators have been proposed as intense neutrino sources and as a means to deliver Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research multi-TeV lepton-antilepton collisions. What makes the muon ideal for these applications is its mass, 200 times that of the electron, and the fact that its decays are precisely calculable. We have played seminal and leading roles in the international and European design studies that have established the feasibility of such facilities. Within these studies we have contributed designs for the proton source, the muon acceleration systems and the muon storage ring. The muon beam is produced from the decay in flight of pions, which means that it occupies a large volume of phase space. Before the muons can be accelerated it is necessary to reduce the phase-space volume that the beam occupies, a process referred to as cooling. The muon lifetime is so short that a novel technique, ionization cooling, is required to compress the phase space. We have taken the lead in the execution of the international Muon Ionization Cooling Experiment by which we hope to prove the principle of the ionization cooling thereby establishing high-intensity, cold muon beams as a new technique for particle physics. 1. Physics at a future Neutrino Factory and super-beam facility, Bandyopadhyay, A. et al., The ISS Physics Working Group Collaboration, Rept. Prog. Phys. 72 (2009) 106201, 0710.4947
2. Bogomilov, M. et al., The MICE Colaboration Collaboration, The MICE Muon Beam on ISIS and the beam-line instrumentation of the Muon Ionization Cooling Experiment, JINST 7 (2012) P05009, 1203.4089 3. Characterisation of the muon beams for the Muon Ionisation Cooling Experiment, Adams, D. et al., The MICE Collaboration Collaboration, Eur.Phys.J. C73 (2013) 2582, 1306.1509
4. Adey, D. et al., the nuSTORM Collaboration, Light sterile neutrino sensitivity at the nuSTORM facility, Phys.Rev. D89 (2014) 071301, 1402.5250
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Dr Jaroslaw Pasternak
Jaroslaw Pasternak was focusing on MICE experiment and nuSTORM project for the last year. In particular as the Imperial responsibilities in MICE have increased significantly with Prof. K. Long taking the position of the Spokesman in November last year, Jaroslaw took over the leadership of the Imperial MICE group. He also accepted a role of the Accelerator Integration Scientist and he leads the preparation for commissioning of the MICE experiment at Step IV including the beam commissioning currently envisaged in summer 2015. Recently he led the redesign effort of the final stage of MICE experiment dedicated to demonstration of ionization cooling with RF reacceleration to be operational in 2017. He is also working with his RA Dr J-B. Lagrange on the design of the nuSTORM FFAG ring option, which is one of the main options. He published 2 papers: one on nuSTORM and another on older work within IDS-NF project and two more are in preparation. 1. Adey D et al., Light sterile neutrino sensitivity at the nuSTORM facility, PHYSICAL REVIEW D 89(7):7 pages Article number ARTN 071301 09 Apr 2014.
2. Diktys Stratakis, H. Kamal Sayed, Chris T. Rogers, Androula Alekou, and Jaroslaw Pasternak, Conceptual design and modeling of particle-matter interaction cooling systems for muon based applications ,Phys. Rev. ST Accel. Beams 17, 071001, 14 July 2014.
High Energy Physics Dr Mitesh Patel
My research is primarily focused on the LHCb experiment at CERN's Large Hadron Collider. I am particularly interested in the use of rare decay modes as probes for physics beyond the current "Standard Model" of particle physics. My recent papers include the first measurements of the rare decay B0s→μ+μ− that has been sought for more than 30 years. The measurements constrain the properties of any new scalar particles and have implications for many new physics models. My measurements of B0→K∗0μ+μ− show some tension with the Standard Model that may indicate the existence of a new vector particle. Further measurements of this and related decays should help clarify the situation. Similarly, my measurements of B+→K+ℓ+ℓ− decays, where ℓ=e, μ, show electrons and muons, which behave identically in the Standard Model, have different decay rates. This has stimulated interest in a whole raft of similar measurements. Finally, I have also made new asymmetry measurements to probe anomalous results obtained at other experiments. I am also a member of the SHiP collaboration. We are proposing a new and uniquely sensitive experiment at CERN to search for new light particles that could help Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Research solve a number of problems of the Standard Model. http://lhcb.web.cern.ch/lhcb/ ; http://ship.web.cern.ch/ship
1. Test of lepton universality using B+→K+ℓ+ℓ− decays, R. Aaij et al, [LHCb Collaboration], Phys.Rev.Lett. 113 (2014) 151601 (10.1103/PhysRevLett.113.151601) 2.First measurement of the charge asymmetry in beauty-quark pair production at a hadron collider R. Aaij et al, [LHCb Collaboration], Phys.Rev.Lett. 113 (2014) 082003 (10.1103/PhysRevLett.113.082003)
3.Measurement of Form-Factor-Independent Observables in the Decay B0→K∗0μ+μ−, R. Aaij et al, [LHCb Collaboration], Phys.Rev.Lett. 111 (2013) 19, 191801 (10.1103/PhysRevLett.111.191801)
4.Measurement of the B0s→μ+μ− branching fraction and search for B0→μ+μ− decays at the LHCb experiment, R. Aaij et al, [LHCb Collaboration], Phys.Rev.Lett. 111 (2013) 101805 (10.1103/PhysRevLett.111.101805) /
devising a technique to tailor the wide laser-generated proton spectrum to maximise the yields in the Mo-100 (p, n) Tc-99m channel for direct production. Our approach is based on a revised design of the Gabor lens, which soon will be tested with beam at the Cerberus laser facility at Imperial.
High Energy Physics
[2] Pasternak J, Aslaninejad M, Holland P, Walton G, Posocco PA, 2013, A novel solution for FFAG proton gantries, Proceedings of PAC2013, Pages: 14061408, ISBN: 978-3-95450-138-0.
to search for NDBD as evidence for Majorana neutrino masses down to a level below 0.05eV (equivalent to a half-life of about 1026 years), the region suggested by neutrino oscillation experiments. The first SuperNEMO module will be installed in the Modane underground laboratory, France, over the next two years and will then begin datataking. I lead the SuperNEMO group at Imperial and the software development group within the collaboration. The Imperial group’s main activities are development of physics analysis and software with contributions also to the tracking detector and its commissioning.
Within the area of neutrino physics, neutrinoless double beta decay (NDBD) - a rare, lepton-number violating, nuclear decay process – is of particular current interest. The observation of neutrino oscillations demonstrated that neutrinos have mass; a consequence of this new, beyond the Standard Model physics is renewed activity in NDBD experiments which provide the only way to determine the fundamental nature of the neutrino (Dirac or Majorana). In addition, NDBD experiments offer the possibility of determining the absolute neutrino mass scale. An international collaboration is currently constructing a nextgeneration experiment, SuperNEMO,
This year has seen delivery of our flight hardware for the European Space Agency LISAPathfinder mission. This mission will be launched next year (2015) and it is a technology precursor for the ESA L3 mission in gravitational waves. ESA recently selected the gravitational wave theme for L3 and this represents the successful culmination of two decades of work in developing the technology and promoting the pioneering new science opportunities in the fields of astrophysics, cosmology and particle physics. Following the completion of our ZEPLIN direct dark matter search programme we now moved on with collaboration on
[1] Pozimski J, Aslaninejad M, 2013, Gabor lenses for capture and energy selection of laser driven ion beams in cancer treatment, LASER AND PARTICLE BEAMS, Vol: 31, Pages: 723-733, ISSN: 0263-0346.
Dr Julia Sedgbeer
Professor Tim Sumner
Dr Piero Antonio Posocco
We have been working in a multidisciplinary team with members of the Faculty of Medicine on the development of new approaches to proton therapy. We have identified three different applications of our expertise, namely proton acceleration using laser-plasma technology [1], proton delivery using the FFAG technology [2], and evaluating the effects of proton therapy combined with new metabolic drugs like ADI-PEG20. We extended our work towards modern challenges in medical diagnostics, like the worldwide shortage of Tc-99m for SPECT by 66
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Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research the US-led project LUX which has published the world’s best result to date and continues with a second more sensitive run at the moment. In addition the LUX-ZEPLIN project, which we co-founded in 2008, has gone through an extensive design/ R&D phase and has been selected as one of two next generation direct dark matter search projects in the US. The UK is intending to provide a significant share of the experiment with Imperial playing key roles, and an application for funding is ongoing. 1. First results from the LUX dark matter experiment at the Sanford Underground Research facility: Akerib, D.S.; et al., PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS Volume: 112 Issue: 9 091303 (2014), preprint (arXiv:1310.8214) 2. eLISA: astrophysics and cosmology in the millihertz regime: Amaro-Seoane, P.; et al., Gravitational Wave Notes Volume: 6 4110 (2013), preprint (arXiv:1201.3621)
3. Radiogenic and muon-induced backgrounds in the LUX dark matter detector: Akerib, D.S.; et al., ASTROPARTICLE PHYSICS Volume: 62 3346 (2015), preprint (arXiv:1403.1299)
4. Science with LISPathfinder: Sumner, T.J., ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY of the PACIFIC Conference Series Volume: 467 129-140 (2013)
Dr Alexander Tapper
College, Bristol, STFC and the US my group have been searching the data taken by the CMS experiment at the LHC for evidence of new particles predicted by the theory of Supersymmetry. So far no evidence has been found and we have two papers in preparation, which will complete the searches with the available data, and set stringent limits on the allowed theoretical parameter space. The other focus of my work is preparations for the restart of the LHC at higher energy and luminosity in 2015. To fully benefit from the improved performance of the LHC the CMS experiment must be upgraded and working with colleagues from Bristol, STFC and the US my group is delivering an improved triggering system for the experiment. This will benefit our searches for new physics, with exciting prospects for the new run next year!
• M. Baber et al., Development and testing of an upgrade to the CMS level-1 calorimeter trigger, JINST 9 (2014) C01006.
• A. Tapper (ed.) et al., CMS Technical Design Report for the Level-1 Trigger Upgrade CMS-TDR-012, CERN-LHCC-2013011 (2013). • P. Klabbers et al., CMS level-1 upgrade calorimeter trigger prototype development, JINST 8 (2013) C02013.
Dr Yoshi Uchida
My research has focused recently on completing the analysis of the data taken in the first physics run of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN from 2010 to 2012, and preparing for the restart of the LHC, at higher energy in 2015. Together with colleagues from Imperial
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
High Energy Physics muons—whose existence we have known about for many decades— the detailed behaviour of which can yield more hints about the nature of the fabric of our Universe. I have worked on the T2K neutrino oscillation experiment since 2004, and in the past few years we have discovered that muon neutrinos can turn into electron neutrinos, which in turn unlocks a new set of possible measurements to search for matterantimatter differences in neutrinos. This shapes our ongoing T2K work, and work towards the nextgeneration Hyper-K experiment. For the latter, I have contributed a new idea for how to calibrate the neutrino detectors. I am also working on the COMET experiment, where we will make 18 about 10 muons over a few years, to see if some convert to an electron. This cannot happen under physics as we understand it now— but is quite difficult to exclude when we try to extend this understanding—hence is an extremely sensitive indicator towards the next step in modelling the Universe. COMET Phase-I is due to turn on in the next couple of years, and our group is working hard on building the experiment. 1. Measurement of the inclusive electron neutrino charged current cross section on carbon with the T2K near detector: K. Abe et al (T2K Collaboration); PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS (accepted November 2014) 2. Precise Measurement of the Neutrino Mixing Parameter θ23 from Muon Neutrino Disappearance in an Off-Axis Beam: K. Abe et al (T2K Collaboration); Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 181801
3. Experimental Proposal for Phase-I of the COMET Experiment at J-PARC: R. Akhmetshin et al (COMET Collaboration); KEK/JPARC-PAC 2012-10
My research centres on studying particles such as neutrinos and
4. Indication of Electron Neutrino Appearance from an Accelerator-Produced Off-Axis Muon Neutrino Beam: K. Abe et al (T2K Collaboration); Phys. Rev. Lett. 107, 041801
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Research Dr Morgan Wascko
My research probes the most fundamental aspects of the nature of matter and energy. In particular, I am engaged in the study of neutrino flavour oscillation, which is the first—and so far only—discovery that lies outside the current predictions of the standard model of particle physics. I work on accelerator neutrino experiments, currently focussing on the T2K experiment in Japan.
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T2K sends a beam of muon neutrinos from the J-PARC facility in Tokai-mura across the main island of Japan to the Super-Kamiokande detector deep within the Kamioka mine. We have recently published a stunningly large excess of electron neutrino events allowing us to measure the heretofore unobserved subdominant oscillation and its mixing angle, theta_1-3. These are the next steps toward the goal of searching for violation of charge-parity symmetry with neutrinos. I am also a member of the HyperKamiokande collaboration, which is working toward a megatonne scale water Cherenkov detector. This experiment would provide exquisite sensitivity to the search for violation of charge-parity symmetry in neutrinos, which could explain why the universe is made of matter and not antimatter. http://t2k-experiment.org
High Energy Physics 1. Measurement of the Inclusive Electron Neutrino Charged Current Cross Section on Carbon with the T2K Near Detector, K Abe, et al. [T2K Collaboration], accepted by Phys. Rev. Lett. ( arXiv:1407.7389 [hep-ex] ) 2. Measurement of the inclusive νμ charged current cross section on iron and hydrocarbon in the T2K on-axis neutrino beam, K Abe, et al. [T2K Collaboration], Phys. Rev. D90 (2014) 052010 3. Precise Measurement of the Neutrino Mixing Parameter \theta_{23} from Muon Neutrino Disappearance in an Off-axis Beam, K Abe, et al. [T2K Collaboration], Phys. Rev. Lett. 112 (2014) 181801
4. Observation of Electron Neutrino Appearance in a Muon Neutrino Beam, K Abe, et al. [T2K Collaboration], Phys. Rev. Lett. 112 (2014)
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Photonics
The Photonics Group conducts fundamental research into optical science and develops and applies new technologies for the physical and life sciences, medicine and ICT. Our projects are mostly interdisciplinary and we work closely with industry and external agencies.
LASER TECHNOLOGY Prof R. Taylor, Prof M. Damzen, Dr S. Popov, Dr E. Kelleher, Dr G. Thomas
We conduct a world-leading research activity on fibre and all-solid-state lasers developed for many real-world applications from precision laser manufacturing, remote sensing through to medical imaging and therapeutics.
Fibre Lasers This activity is currently focused on development of compact and high power fibre laser sources, engineered to create new wavelengths and ultrashort pulse formats including: supercontinuum generation in photonic crystal fibres; visible fibre sources by Raman or parametric conversion of IR fibre-lasers; near and mid-infrared sources based on novel Bismuth and Thulium-doped fibre lasers; ultrashort pulse generation using carbon nanotubes or graphene as ‘universal’ saturable absorbers that can operate across all wavelength regions.
Diode-Pumped Solid-State Lasers This activity develops all-solid-state lasers and nonlinear optical technologies to provide efficient sources of high energy pulses including: diodepumped micro-slab lasers (commercialised by Mike Damzen’s spin-out company, Midaz Lasers Ltd); worldleading diodepumped Alexandrite lasers, supported by the European Space Agency (ESA) for next-generation satellite-based remote sensing and future femtosecond laser applications; and resilient “selforganising” lasers based on dynamic nonlinear optical holography that selfcorrect for thermally-induced aberrations in high power lasers.
a) fibre laser supercontinuum source; b) satellite-based remote sensing laser application
imaging for high content analysis and sensing and manipulating pathogenic bacteria. We have particular strengths in fluorescence lifetime imaging (FLIM) for quantitative molecular contrast, including of protein-protein interactions, superresolved microscopy (including STED, PALM and STORM) for imaging below the diffraction limit, and confocal Brillouin scattering microscopy to measure the micromechanical properties of biological tissues. Our fluorescence imaging and measurement technology is being applied in hospitals to clinical diagnostic challenges for cancer, osteoarthritis, heart disease and ophthalmology and to preclinical tomographic imaging of disease models. Programmable light Building on our heritage of computerbased optical design, we utilise adaptive optics and structured illumination to manipulate optical wavefronts for applications ranging from ophthalmology to metrology of astronomical optics, exploiting segmented mirror and spatial light modulator technologies. For imaging we use structured illumination to
realise wide-field optical sectioning (with Mark Neil’s spin-out company, Aurox Ltd) and adaptive optics techniques to measure and correct aberrated wavefronts, including for in vivo studies of the retina for ophthalmology. Non-imaging applications of programmable light include precision opto-genetics and optical tweezers.
ELECTROMAGNETIC THEORY & PHOTONIC STRUCTURES Prof M. McCall, Prof P. Török, Dr K. Weir Rigorous electromagnetic theory and experimental analysis is applied to photonic and nanophotonic structures such as chiral media and metamaterials. The theoretical development of “space-time cloaking” was founded in our group; ultrahigh-resolution micropolarimetry is being applied to plasmonics, metamaterials, micromagnetics and to optical data storage using polarisation to encode multiple bits into each pit of an optical disc.
BIOPHOTONICS
Prof P. French, Prof M. Neil, Prof P. Török, Dr C. Paterson, Dr C. Dunsby, Dr J. McGinty
Our optical imaging and metrology encompasses technology development for biomedical applications in research, drug discovery and healthcare, including microscopy, endoscopy and tomography as well as automated www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
a) fibre laser supercontinuum source; b) satellite-based remote sensing laser application Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Research Professor Michael Damzen
length can be rapidly adjusted with a control current. The liquid lenses have been used to construct a laser beam quality measurement instrument; laser colour marking of metals; and recently adaptive spatial control of a laser cavity.
1. “High efficiency >26 W diode end-pumped Alexandrite laser”, A.Teppitaksak, A. Minassian, G. M. Thomas, and M. J. Damzen, Optics Express, 22, 16386 (2014)
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We have performed the world-first high power development of diodepumped Alexandrite as a new laser technology with broad wavelength tunability [ref. 1]. This work is being supported by the European Space Agency as a new technology for satellite-based remote sensing of the atmosphere and ground vegetation. It also has potential as a low-cost replacement for the femtosecond Ti-sapphire laser. We have generated > 26W, more than an order of magnitude higher than previous diode end-pumping systems, highest ever slope efficiency 49%, and the first Q-switched laser operation of diode-pumped Alexandrite producing ~mJ-pulse energy at 1kHz pulse rate in fundamental TEM00 mode. It was recently presented as an invited Keynote talk at the Optical Engineering and Design conference and reported in trade journal [ref. 2]. We have also patented and implemented a novel technique for obtaining enhanced control of pulsing parameters in a laser [ref. 3]. The method uses a secondary laser cavity to control the gain in a Q-switched primary laser cavity and has enabled clean single-pulse Q-switched operation to be obtained across a very wide repetition rate range of 1– 800 kHz and control of pulse energy. In another project supported by Paul Instrument Fund (Royal Society), we are using liquid lenses, whose focal www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
2. “High-power Alexandrite laser developed for space lidar”, M. J. Damzen, Electrooptics, Technology news (2014) http://www.electrooptics.com/news/news_story.php?news_id =2265. 3. “Pulse control in a Q-switched Nd:YVO4 bounce geometry laser using a secondary cavity”, Optics Letters, 39, 3437 (2014)
Dr Christopher Dunsby
The main focus of our work is the application of photonics technology to quantitative fluorescence imaging and sensing. This includes collaborations with clinicians that aim to exploit endogenous tissue autofluorescence for the detection and diagnosis of disease. Currently, we (PF&CD) have an EPSRC funded project with the National Heart and Lung Institute and the Kennedy Institute for Rheumatology to apply point-probe and endoscopic measurements of fluorescence lifetime to study of heart disease and arthritis. We also have a second EPSRC funded project (CD,PF,MN&CP) in collaboration with the University of Bath to develop
Photonics novel multiphoton microscopes and endoscopes for clinical applications. Our technology (PF&CD) is also applied to measurements of exogenous fluorophores, for e.g. quantification of photosensitiser penetration with Moorfields Eye Hospital, or in cells through fluorescence lifetime imaging of protein-protein interactions, including in multi-well plate formats. We also have projects developing optical superresolution techniques (PF,MN&CD) including stimulated emission depletion microscopy. A recent collaboration with colleagues at King’s College London and the Department of Bioengineering at Imperial has translated optical methods for superresolution imaging to ultrasound superresolution imaging, including in vivo, for the first time. Finally, we continue to develop a high speed 3-D fluorescence microscopy technique called oblique plane microscopy. 1. Fluorescence lifetime spectroscopy of tissue autofluorescence in normal and diseased colon measured ex vivo using a fiber-optic probe S. Coda*, A. J. Thompson*, G. T. Kennedy, K. L. Roche, L. Ayaru, D. S. Bansi, G. W. Stamp, A. V. Thillainayagam**, P. M. W. French** and C. Dunsby** Biomedical Optics Express 5(2), pp. 515-538, 2014 http://dx.doi.org/10.1364/BOE.5.000515 2. Two-Photon Fluorescence Microscopy of Corneal Riboflavin Absorption D. M. Gore, A. Margineanu, P. French, D. O'Brart, C. Dunsby, and B. D. Allan Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science 55(4), pp. 2476-2481, 2014 http://dx.doi.org/10.1167/iovs.14-13975
3. In Vivo Acoustic Super-Resolution and SuperResolved Velocity Mapping Using Microbubbles K. Christensen-Jeffries, R. J. Browning, M.-X. Tang*, C. Dunsby* and R. J. Eckersley* IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging, early online publication, 2014 http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/TMI.2014.2359650
4. Application of time-resolved autofluorescence to label-free in vivo optical mapping of changes in tissue matrix and metabolism associated with myocardial infarction and heart failure J. Lagarto*, B. T. Dyer*, C. Talbot, M. B. Sikkel, N. S. Peters, P. M. W. French, A. R. Lyon** and C. Dunsby** Accepted for publication in Biomedical Optics Express (* and ** indicates equal contributions) Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research Professor Paul French
In the last year I have continued to develop and apply multi-dimensional fluorescence imaging technology, particularly for super-resolved microscopy (SRM), high content analysis (HCA) and preclinical and clinical imaging, in close collaboration with Chris Dunsby, James McGinty, Mark Neil and Carl Paterson. All of our projects are inherently multidisciplinary with collaborations across College and beyond. With respect to SRM, we (with CD, MN) are funded to work with the MRC Clinical Sciences Centre to develop 5 advanced SRM instruments for the study of cellular structure and function beyond the diffraction limit. For HCA, we (with CD) are developing automated multiwell plate readers incorporating fluorescence lifetime imaging (FLIM) technology to assay protein interactions and cellular metabolic processes. We are also developing open source software tools for automated acquisition, rapid analysis and management of image data – particularly developing OMERObased tools in collaboration with the University of Dundee. For preclinical imaging we (with JM) are working with Department of Life Sciences and UCL to develop a platform longitudinal imaging of whole zebrafish from larvae to adults, which is being applied to studies of cancer, inflammation and bacterial infection. www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
For clinical imaging we (with CD) are working on the application of novel instrumentation to measure autofluorescence lifetime for readouts of heart disease and osteoarthritis and (with CD, MN, CP) are working on a compact handled multiphoton microscope and an ultranarrow multiphoton endoscope exploiting adaptive optics to eliminate need for distal scanning or focussing systems.
3-D stimulated emission depletion microscopy with programmable aberration correction, M. O. Lenz, H. G. Sinclair, A. Savell, J. H. Clegg, A. C. N. Brown, D. M. Davis, C. Dunsby, M. A. A. Neil and P. M. W. French, J. Biophotonics 7 (2013) 29-36 doi: 10.1002/jbio.201300041 S.C. Warren, A. Margineanu, D. Alibhai, D.J. Kelly, C. Talbot, Y. Alexandrov, I. Munro, M. Katan, C. Dunsby and P.M.W. French, Rapid global fitting of large fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy datasets, PLoS ONE 8(2013) e70687
An automated multiwell plate reading FLIM microscope for live cell autofluorescence lifetime assays, D. J. Kelly, S. C. Warren, S. Kumar, J. L. Lagarto, B T. Dyer, A. Margineanu1, E. W.-F. Lam, C. Dunsby and P. M. W. French, J. Innov. Opt. Health Sci.. 7 (2014) 1450025-15 pages, DOI: 10.1142/S1793545814500254
A flexible wide-field FLIM endoscope utilising blue excitation light for label-free contrast of tissue, Hugh Sparks, Sean Warren, Joana Guedes, Nagisa Yoshida , Nadia Guerra, Taran Tatla, Chris Dunsby, Paul French, J Biophotonics 2014, DOI 10.1002/jbio.201300203
Dr Edmund Kelleher
My work on ultrafast nonlinear fibre optics is conducted in close
Photonics
collaboration with Prof. Roy Taylor and Dr. Sergei Popov and is a key theme within the Photonics activity at Imperial. Our shared interest in the development of high-brightness, short-pulse fibre laser sources for target wavelengths in the visible and mid-infrared is supported by industrial collaborations with IPG Photonics Inc. and Gooch and Housego PLC, and is focussed on bio-photonic specific applications – lead by Prof. French. My interest in power-scaling modelocked fibre lasers has led to research studying the formation and stabilisation of dissipative solitons and involvement in a project run my the University of British Columbia: using such lasers as seed-sources for frequency upconverted systems based on high-harmonic generation in passive femtosecond enhancement cavities, providing a source of synchrotron-level energy XUV for table-top ARPES experiments. I also continue to work closely with the Graphene Centre at the University of Cambridge on the fundamental study, and application of low-dimensional materials in ultrafast optics, recently broadening the scope of this study – through a collaboration with Nanjing University, China – to include graphene-enabled plasmonic devices. Additionally, diversification of theories and models applied widely in my research in optics has led to collaboration with the Swinburne University of Technology, where nonlinear Schrödinger-type equations are applied to understand the dynamics of deep ocean waterwaves. In particular, modulation instability and the formation of rogue solitons have particularly strong analogues in both the optical and hydrodynamic context. 1. “Tunable Q-switched fiber laser based on saturable edge-state absorption in few-layer molybdenum disulfide (MoS₂),” R. I. Woodward, E. J. R. Kelleher, F. Torrisi, T.
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Research Hasan, R. C. T. Howe, G. Hu, S. V. Popov, J. R. Taylor, Optics Express, Accepted for publication, (2014). 2. “Double wall carbon nanotubes for wideband, ultrafast pulse generation,” T. Hasan, Z. Sun, P. Tan, D. Popa, E. Flahaut, E. J. R. Kelleher, F. Bonaccorso, F. Wang, Z. Jiang, F. Torrisi, G. Privertera, V. Nicolosi and A. C. Ferrari, ACS Nano 8, 4836 (2014).
3. “Chirped pulse formation in ultra-long mode-locked fiber lasers,” E. J. R. Kelleher, M. Erkintalo, J. C. Travers, Optics Letters 39, 1398 (2014). 4. “Simultaneous scalar and cross-phase modulation instabilities in highly birefringent photonic crystal fiber,” A. Kudlinski, A. Bendahmane, D. Labat, S. Virally, R. T. Murray, E. J. R. Kelleher and A. Mussot, Optics Express 21, 8437 (2013).
Professor Martin McCall
‘interrupt-without-interrupt’ functionality potentially allows priority processing whilst a clock signal remains undistorted, despite being temporally suspended.
In another project, we have recently been able to calculate the modes of a laser for which the active medium is structurally chiral. Such lasers issue circularly polarized light, of potential interest and application to 3-D display technology.
1. Transformation Optics and Cloaking: McCall, M.W., CONTEMPORARY PHYSICS, Volume: 54 Issue: 6 273 (2013). 2. Cloaks, editors, and bubbles: applications of spacetime transformation theory: Kinsler, P. and McCall, M.W., ANN. PHYS (BERLIN), Volume: 526 Issue: 1-2 51 (2014). 3. Transformation devices: Carpets in space and space-time: Kinsler, P. and McCall, M. W., PHYS. REV. A. (Accepted) (2014). 4. Modes of structurally chiral lasers: Topf, D. M. and McCall, M. W., PHYS. REV. A. (Accepted) (2014).
Dr James McGinty
Our recent research has sought to understand some of the implications of our introduction of the so-called Spacetime cloak in 2011. This new type of cloak was based on a radically novel interpretation of transformation optics which allowed the concealment of events rather than objects. It was subsequently demonstrated experimentally. We have studied how event cloaks can be designed for simple wave systems, and have examined their directional nature – events concealed in one direction are visible, but distorted, in another. We have considered applications in optical processing, where an 72
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Photonics
to cm sized volumes is optical projection tomography (OPT). OPT is the optical analogue of X-ray CT, where wide-field images of a transparent sample are acquired while the sample rotates. I have been working on improvements to enhance both the spatial resolution and light efficiency while minimising the acquisition time. The condition for transparency can be realised for ex vivo samples by chemical clearing processes – essentially exchanging the water in the sample for a liquid of higher refractive index that matches that of the tissue and therefore suppresses the scattering of light. For in vivo imaging, samples that are inherently transparent can be used, for example the nematode worm and the zebrafish embryo (∼mm scale). In addition to producing 3-D structural reconstructions, I am also translating the quantitative techniques applicable in microscopy to OPT. In particular I am working on techniques to realise time-lapse 3-D imaging of dynamic processes and fluorescence lifetime imaging for measuring protein interactions using Förster resonance energy transfer.
R.K. Mitchell, A. Mondragon, et al. ‘Selective disruption of Tcf7l2 in the pancreatic β cell impairs secretory function and lowers β cell mass.’ Hum. Mol. Genet. [Epub ahead of print] (2014). M. Kone, T.J. Pullen, et al. ‘LKB1 and AMPK differentially regulate pancreatic β-cell identity.’ FASEB. J. 28: 4972-4985 (2014).
My main area of research is centred on developing techniques for quantitative 3-D optical imaging of mesoscopic sized samples (∼mmcm), with particular emphasis on biological and biomedical applications. One such imaging technique for 3-D imaging of transparent samples that is scalable
L. Chen, S. Kumar, et al. ‘Remote focal scanning optical projection tomography with an electrically tunable lens. Biomed.’ Opt. Express. 5: 3367-3375 (2014).
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research Professor Roy Taylor
The work of the Femtosecond Optics Group is directed towards the development of spectral and temporal versatility in fibre based sources with the objective of applications and potential commercialization. Compact, short pulse, moderate average power (~10s W), fully fibre integrated, chirped pulse, masteroscillator power fibre amplifier configurations are being developed, with the emphasis on Yb-doped systems for operation in the 1 μm window. Following first stage pulse compression in conventional grating pairs, generation of pulses ~100s femtoseconds allows further compression in gas filled photonic crystal fibre grating assemblies to pulses ~10s femtoseconds that can be applied to non-linear conversion studies in gases, allowing tuneable uv generation. Extension of the technique to Tm based fibre assemblies has supplied moderate average power, femtosecond pump pulses for broad band supercontinuum generation in the 2-3.5 μm range in silica based fibres containing a high Germania content. With planned power scaling, through initial pulse compression spectral coverage up to 5 μm should be possible. Broadly tuneable visible generation in compact all fibre configurations has been achieved through using frequency-doubled, laser-diode www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
seeded, single-pass cascaded Raman generation in integrated silica fibre assemblies. With near infra-red pumping, highly efficient optical parametric generation in photonic crystal fibres has also allowed spectral generation towards visible wavelengths. In collaboration with Polytechnique Montreal pulse compression of pulses from giant chirped pulsed fibre lasers has been demonstrated in long ( up to 0.5m) chirped fibre Bragg gratings, confirming theoretical models on the performance of this unique class of laser.
1.Mid-infrared Raman-soliton continuum pumped by a nanotube–mode-locked subpicosecond Tm-doped MOPFA” M.Zhang, E.J.R. Kelleher, T.H. Runcorn, V.M. Mashinsky, O.I. Medvedkov, E.M. Dianov, D. Popa, S. Milana, T. Hasan, Z. Sun, F. Bonaccorso, Z. Jiang, E. Flahunt, B.H. Chapman, A.C. Ferrari, S.V. Popov and J.R. Taylor Optics Express 21, 23261 (2013) “Widely tunable polarization maintaining photonic crystal fiber based parametric wavelength conversion” R.T. Murray, E.J.R. Kelleher, J.M. Stone, S.V. Popov, A. Mussot, A. Kudlinski and J.R. Taylor Optics Express 21, 15826 (2013)
Professor Peter Török
Photonics
Bioengineering, includes subcellular resolution confocal Brillouin microscopy to observe elastic properties of endothelial cells of the Schlemm canal, both low and high resolution Brillouin imaging to study the stiffness of coronary artery walls and Brillouin endoscopy to provide in-vivo analysis of membrane stiffness of plaques in coronary arteries. Our Brillouin microscope is also used to study mechanical properties of biofilms and those matrices they populate. This work is carried out in collaboration with Thorsten Wohland and Yehuda Cohen of NUS. Simultaneously, in collaboration with Stefan Maier, capitalising on our earlier work on Müller matrix polarimeter microscopy, we are in the process of building a spectroscopic version of this microscope that will permit 3D functional imaging of plasmonic structures and photonic crystals. We also have developed, together with Stefan Maier, a novel form of super-resolving optical microscope to map the electromagnetic field around subwavelength plasmonic structures, such as nanoantennae that cannot be observed by any other means. 1. Macias-Romero C, Foreman MR, Munro PRT, Török P, 2014, Confocal polarization imaging in high-numerical-aperture space, OPTICS LETTERS, Vol: 39, Pages: 23222325, ISSN: 0146-9592 2. Antonacci G, Foreman MR, Paterson C, Török P, 2013, Spectral broadening in Brillouin imaging, APPLIED PHYSICS LETTERS, Vol: 103, ISSN: 0003-6951
Our group is developing advanced techniques in optical imaging, sensing and microscopy. Our work on Brillouin scattering sensing and imaging, done in collaboration with Carl Paterson from Physics and Rob Krams and Darryl Overby from
3. Foreman MR, Sivan Y, Maier SA, Török P, 2012, Independence of plasmonic near-field enhancements to illumination beam profile, PHYSICAL REVIEW B, Vol: 86, ISSN: 10980121 4. Foreman MR, Török P, 2011, Spin-orbit coupling and conservation of angular momentum flux in non-paraxial imaging of forbidden radiation, NEW JOURNAL OF PHYSICS, Vol: 13, ISSN: 1367-2630
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Plasma Physics
We are one of the largest plasma physics groups in the world, and deal with plasmas ranging from the low densities and temperatures found in industrial processes to the extreme conditions at the centre of a laser driven capsule of fusion fuel or the core of a star. The group's research links experiments, many performed on in-house facilities to complex theory and numerical simulations using super computers. We also host the Centre for Inertial FusionStudies which connects high energy density science to the search for fusion energy production, and the Institute of Shock Physics which creates and studies materials and systems under extremes of pressure.
STRONGLY MAGNETISED PLASMAS S Lebedev, RA Smith, J Chittenden, S Bland, F Suzuki-Vidal.
We build and operate multi-terawatt (1012W) electrical machines and short-pulse lasers to create and study exotic plasma conditions. The group’s 1.4 million amp Z-pinch MAGPIE is the largest open-access machine of its kind in the world and linked to the UK's largest University based laser system Cerberus. MAGPIE allows us to creates plasmas from arrays of wires or foils and then accelerate or ‘pinche’ them with strong magnetic fields. We use this to launch high speed ~100 kms-1 plasma jets or shock waves which simulate astrophysical processes such as star formation in the laboratory. The group’s experimental work is supported by complex computer simulations using tools we develop such as the 3D Magneto-hydrodynamics computer code GORGON. This is now used to simulate plasma dynamics in experiments in laboratories across the world including the 26 mega-amp Z facility in the US. Gorgon is also used to simulate complex laser based experiments such as the stability of NIF inertial fusion implosions. HIGH ENERGY DENSITY PLASMAS Z Najmudin, S Mangles, RA Smith, R Kingham
The group creates and studies high energy density plasmas using powerful lasers, both at Imperial and major laboratories worldwide. Lasers can accelerate particles to very high energies over remarkably short distances and we have produced GeV electron beams in just 1 cm of plasma. These beams can be used to create ultrabright x-ray sources and could one day replace low energy synchrotrons. We have used them to trial new applications including medical imaging and we are also exploring similar laser driven techniques for cancer therapy, where the short stopping distance of a proton beam may be used to target tumours with low collateral damage and high precision. 74
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Cylindrically converging supersonic plasma streams imaged inside a wire array z-pinch (left) and a 3D simulation of a NIF laser fusion implosion (right).
INERTIAL FUSION S Rose, J. Chittenden, R Kingham, Z Najmudin
Compressing and heating a mix of hydrogen isotopes can lead to thermonuclear fusion and potentially a huge energy release that might one day underpin a new generation of power stations. In fusion ignition experiments the plasma density and temperatures created far exceed those at the centre of the sun. Through experiment and computer simulations we study both fundamental plasma processes at these conditions, and advanced fusion concepts such as "fast ignition" and "shock ignition" that may allow us to reach "breakeven", the point where more energy is released from the plasma than required to heat and confine it.
The tools and concepts we develop for inertial fusion research also allow
us to study in the laboratory scale models of some of nature's most extreme phenomena. In "laboratory astrophysics" experiments we probe the formation of accretion disks around black holes and the dynamics of supernova explosions.
MAGNETIC CONFINEMENT FUSION M Coppins, S Cowley, M. Lilley We investigate magnetic confinement fusion using a doughnut shaped Tokamak, in which a low density plasma is held inside strong magnetic fields and heated over multiple seconds with a combination of electric current, microwaves and particle beams. The world’s largest and most successful Tokamak JET is based at Culham, along with a more compact machine, MAST.
Tokamaks are affected by dust, small grains of solid material that are carried along with the plasma. Dusty plasmas occur naturally in space and are also found in industry and affect the production of materials and components. We study them because of their potential to trap radioactive tritium and disrupt future magnetic fusion test machines.
A 3D tomogram of a ~2mm cube of human bone imaged using laser driven betatron radiation. Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research Dr Simon Bland
states produced. This technique demonstrates the ability to miniaturise high pressure experiments, and, with the X-pinch, could provide a new probing method for large facilities. 1. “Radiative precursors driven by converging blast waves in noble gases”, Burdiak et al, Phys Plasmas 21 033302 (2014).
2. “Metal liner-driven quasi-isentropic compression of deuterium” Weinwurm et al, Phys Plasma 20 092701 (2013)
On the MAGPIE facility a series of experiments examined the production of radiative shock waves within gas filled cylindrical liners, and how the application of a magnetic field affected their dynamics (1). Such experiments could influence the design of magnetised inertial fusion targets, and in collaboration with Loughborough University a 10Tesla magnetic field system is being developed to aid experiments. A new method of isentropically compressing a cylinder of material to extreme pressures (>>Mbar) has been explored (2). Critically this technique produces large volumes of compressed material, held at pressure for many ns, hopefully enabling phase changes – e.g. metallisation of hydrogen – to occur. The technique is presently being examined at Sandia National labs. Working with colleagues at CEA Gramat, an ‘X-pinch’ system has been developed to provide X-ray diffraction measurements of materials being dynamically compressed (3). In a separate series of collaborations with the CEA and ESRF, a low energy (50J) laser was used to drive very small samples of iron to MBar pressures, whilst the high precision, micron sized X-ray beam from the synchrotron was used to explore the www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
3. Characteristics of a molybdenum X-pinch X-ray source as a probe source for X-ray diffraction studies, Zucchini et al, submitted to RSI
Professor Jerry Chittenden
Plasma
cylindrical fusion targets driven by the 20MA generator at Sandia National Laboratory. We have adapted this work to develop new techniques for isentropic compression of materials which can be used to recreate the extreme conditions at the centre of gas giant planets. We are also utilising kinetic models of the fast particle species within these plasmas to study the generation of K-alpha photons by runaway electrons, the generation of secondary nuclear fusion reaction products, beam-target reaction processes due to runaway ions and the ignition of a fusion plasma by energetic alpha particles.
1. Effects of perturbations and radial profiles on ignition of inertial confinement fusion hotspots, Taylor S, Chittenden JP, Physics of Plasmas, 21, p062701 (2014). 2. Relativistically correct DD and DT neutron spectra, Appelbe B, Chittenden JP, High Energy Density Physics, High Energy Density Physics, 11, p30 (2014)
3. Stability of shocks relating to the shock ignition inertial fusion energy scheme, Davie CJ, Bush IA, Evans RG, Physics of Plasmas, 21, p082701 (2014)
Our work concentrates on numerical modelling of high energy density physics experiments relating to Inertial Confinement Fusion and magnetised Z-pinch plasmas. We have recently developed a new 3D radiation hydrodynamics model ‘Chimera’, designed to simulate ICF experiments on the National Ignition Facility. We have been collaborating with LLNL on understanding the influence of radiation asymmetry and capsule defects on the energy yield from fusion. Much of this can be inferred from detailed analysis of the distribution of neutron energies emerging from the reacting region. Similarly, using our magneto-hydrodynamics codes, we have studied the role of material strength in determining the dominant instability wavelengths in imploding
4. Metal liner-driven quasi-isentropic compression of deuterium, Weinwurm M, Bland SN, Chittenden JP, Physics of Plasmas, 20, p092701 (2013).
Dr Michael Coppins
Our work on dusty plasmas concentrates on the basic physics of the dust-plasma interaction, and dust in tokamaks. We collaborate with John Allen (Oxford), Umberto Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Research deAngelis (Naples), and Alex Robinson (RAL). On the basic physics side, three topics can be mentioned from the last 12 months. Firstly, we have found the equilibrium charge distribution for large (i.e., larger than a Debye length) dust grains [1], due to fluctuations in the charge. Secondly, the planar source-sheath configuration has been studied computationally and theoretically [2]. Although dust is not directly involved, results from this work have subsequently been used to construct a new model for the charging of large dust grains. Thirdly, the charging of small dust grains in a flowing plasma, and the formation of associated structures in the surrounding plasma, has been studied using kinetic theory [3]. In contrast to the large grain case, we find upstream structures. In the other area, dust in tokamaks, we are currently preparing a paper on hypervelocity dust [4], i.e., particles with speeds > 1.0 km/s which have been reported in some tokamaks. It has been suggested that such particles may significantly damage the vessel walls. Our studies indicate that this is not the case.
1. D.M. Thomas, M. Coppins, Equilibrium probability distribution of a conductive sphere's floating charge in a collisionless, drifting Maxwellian plasma, Phys. Rev. E, 88, 023110 (2013). 2. N. Rizopoulou, A.P.L. Robinson, M. Coppins, M. Bacharis, A kinetic study of the source-collector sheath system in a drifting plasma, Plasma Sources Science Technol., 22, 035003 (2013). 3. C. Stavrou, U deAngelis, J.E. Allen, M. Coppins, A small body in a plasma: effects of ion flow and capture on potential, poster presented at 56th APS Annual Conference on Plasma Physics (New Orleans, 2014). 4. N. Somboonkittichai, M. Coppins, M. Bacharis, U. deAngelis, High velocity dust grain production in tokamaks (in preparation).
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Dr Robert Kingham
Plasma ignition: Robinson, A. P. L.; Strozzi D.J.; Davies J.R.; et al., NUCLEAR FUSION 54, 054003 (2014)
2. Hybrid simulations of fast electron propagation including magnetized plasma transport and non-local effects in the background plasma: Williams B. E. R.; Kingham R. J., PLASMA PHYS. CONTROLLED FUSION 55, 124009 (2013) 3. Super-Gaussian Transport Theory and the Field-Generating Thermal Instability in LaserPlasmas: Bissell J. J.; Ridgers C. P.; Kingham R. J., NEW J. PHYS. 15, 025017 (2013)
Professor Sergey Lebedev
Our recent work focuses on theory and simulation of high-power laser-plasma interaction, in the context of Inertial Fusion Energy and High Energy Density Plasmas. We have been developing and using a new computational approach for calculating transport of laser-generated relativistic electron beams for igniting precompressed fuel. Our semi-kinetic treatment of the background plasma, including magnetic field, has revealed new mechanisms capable of altering beam propagation. In collaboration with colleagues at the University of York and LLNL, we are using our Vlasov-Fokker-Planck codes to validate and improve the heat flow model used in radiation-hydrodynamic codes, for improved modelling of the NIF. We continue research into the dynamics of under-dense plasma heated by nanosecond laser beams. We have extended our magnetothermal instability to include both hydrodynamics and non-equilibrium thermodynamics due to nonMaxwellian electron distributions. To get a complete self-consistent description of the entire system, refraction and filamentation of the laser beam has been added. We are collaborating on several, multiinstitutional laser experiments at UK laser facilities (Vulcan and Orion) to explore this complex physics 1. Theory of fast electron transport for fast
Our experimental work at the Imperial College’s MAGPIE pulsed power facility concentrated on studies of high energy density plasmas and on development and implementation of advanced plasma diagnostics such as collective Thomson scattering, Faraday rotation and interferometry. We continued work on the physics of wire array z-pinches, focusing on detailed measurements of the distribution of the ablated plasma, advection of magnetic field by the plasma flows, and on collisionless interpenetration of counterstreaming ions. We also continued and extended our work in the area of Laboratory Astrophysics: we investigated properties of strong shocks created by colliding supersonic magnetised plasma flows and found that two-fluid plasma effects (Hall term) strongly Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research
affect the shock structure; we detected existence of protons trapped and accelerated to MeV energies by the MHD processes in the laboratory magnetic-tower jets under conditions scalable to the dynamics of magnetised astrophysical jets. We continue collaborations on this work with colleagues at Rochester, Cornell, Rice and Sorbonne Universities. 1. Interpenetration, deflection, and stagnation of cylindrically convergent magnetized supersonic tungsten plasma flows: Swadling, G. F.; Lebedev, S.V.; Harvey-Thompson, A.J.; et al., PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS, Volume: 113, 035003 (2014).
2. The formation of reverse shocks in magnetized high energy density supersonic plasma flows: Lebedev, S.V.; Suttle, L.; Swadling, G.F.; et al., PHYSICS OF PLASMAS, Volume: 21, 056305 (2014).
3. Diagnosing collisions of magnetized, high energy density plasma flows using a combination of collective Thomson scattering, Faraday rotation and interferometry: Swadling, G.F.; Lebedev, S.V.; Hall, G.N. et al., REVIEW SCIENTIFIC INSTRUMENTS, Volume: 85, 11E502 (2014). 4. Observation of energetic protons trapped in laboratory magnetic-tower jets: SuzukiVidal, F.; Patankar, S.; Lebedev, S.V. et al., NEW JOURNAL OF PHYSICS, Volume: 15, 125008 (2013).
Dr Stuart Mangles
imaging, with both soft tissue phasecontrast imaging and tomographic reconstruction of bone demonstrated. A collaborative experiment with QUB also demonstrated the potential for using interaction of the laser wakefield electron beam with a colliding high power laser to produce a bright source of γ–rays [2]. For the generation of ion beams work continued both at the Rutherford Lab [3] and on experiments performed at the ATF (Brookhaven National Laboratory), where a successful experiment to demonstrate the importance of plasma profiling on shock wave acceleration of ions was reported. An initiative to develop an ion source in the basement of Blackett Lab in collaboration with Roland Smith and Piero Posocco has also begun. Our development of a plasma source for the planned proton driven wakefield experiments at CERN continued with the extension of the grant for a further year [4], and improved reliability of the plasma discharge.
1. Laser wakefield accelerator based light sources: potential applications and requirements: F Albert, F.; Thomas, A.G.R.; Mangles S.P.D. et al., PLASMA PHYSICS AND CONTROLLED FUSION, Volume 56, Issue 8, 084015 (2014) 2. Multi-pulse laser wakefield acceleration: a new route to efficient, high-repetition-rate plasma accelerators and high flux radiation sources: Hooker, S.M.; Bartolini, R.; Mangles S.P.D. et al., JOURNAL OF PHYSICS B: ATOMIC, MOLECULAR AND OPTICAL PHYSICS, to be published 2014
3. Direct imaging of the dynamics of a laserplasma accelerator operating in the bubble-regime: Sävert, A; Mangles S.P.D; Schnell, M et al, arXiv 1402.3052 (2014)
Following our work on characterisation of laser wakefield driven betatron x-ray sources [1], a successful experiment performed on the Astra Gemini Facility was able to demonstrate the application of this source for medical www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Plasma Professor Zulfikar Najmudin
Following our work on characterisation of laser wakefield driven betatron xray sources [1], a successful experiment performed on the Astra Gemini Facility was able to demonstrate the application of this source for medical imaging, with both soft tissue phase-contrast imaging and tomographic reconstruction of bone demonstrated. A collaborative experiment with QUB also demonstrated the potential for using interaction of the laser wakefield electron beam with a colliding high power laser to produce a bright source of γ–rays [2]. For the generation of ion beams work continued both at the Rutherford Lab [3] and on experiments performed at the ATF (Brookhaven National Laboratory), where a successful experiment to demonstrate the importance of plasma profiling on shock wave acceleration of ions was reported. An initiative to develop an ion source in the basement of Blackett Lab in collaboration with Roland Smith and Piero Posocco has also begun. Our development of a plasma source for the planned proton driven wakefield experiments at CERN continued with the extension of the grant for a further year [4], and improved reliability of the plasma discharge. 1. Najmudin, Z., et al., Compact laser accelerators for X-ray phase-contrast
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Research imaging. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society a-Mathematical Physical and Engineering Sciences, 2014. 372(2010): p. 20130032. 2. G. Sarri, et al., Ultrahigh Nonlinear Brilliance Multi-MeV γ-Ray Beams from Nonlinear Relativistic Thomson Scattering. Physical Review Letters, 2014: p. To be published. 3. Green, J.S., et al., Enhanced proton beam collimation in the ultra-intense short pulse regime. Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion, 2014. 56(8): p. 084001.
4. Assmann, R., et al., Proton-driven plasma wakefield acceleration: a path to the future of high-energy particle physics. Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion, 2014. 56(8): p. 084013.
Professor Steven Rose
working with scientists at the US Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, home to the National Ignition Facility laser system, to try to get closer to that goal. We are also interested in developing fundamental physics experiments using HED plasmas produced by highpower lasers. Recently we published the design of an experiment that will, for the first time, demonstrate the twophoton Breit-Wheeler QED process in the laboratory (turning pure light into matter). We are now working closely with several groups around the world to undertake that ground-breaking experiment.
1. "A photon-photon collider in a vacuum hohlraum", O J Pike, F Mackenroth, E G Hill and S J Rose, Nature Photonics, 8, 434 (2014).http://www.nature.com/doifinder/10.1038/ nphoton.2014.95 2. "Intensity enhancement of O VI ultraviolet emission lines in solar spectra due to opacity", F Keenan, J G Doyle, M S Madjarska, S J Rose, L A Bowler, and J Britton, L McCrink and M Mathioudakis, Ap J Letts, 78, L39 (2014). http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/2041-8205/784/2/L39
3. "Electron-positron pair creation in burning thermonuclear plasmas", S J Rose, High Energy Density Physics, 9, 480 (2013). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hedp.2013.04.002
My research group works in the area of High Energy Density Physics (HEDP) which is the study of matter in the plasma state at temperatures typically in excess of a million degrees at solid density and above. Our work is theoretical and we develop new models of HED plasmas. We are also involved in the design and analysis of experiments which use high-power lasers or pulsed-power machines to test the validity of those models and generally to better understand the HED regime. Our work is relevant to Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF) which attempts to produce energy gain by thermonuclear reactions in HED plasmas. Energy gain has not yet been demonstrated and our group is 78
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4. "A Monte Carlo algorithm for degenerate plasmas", A E Turrell, M Sherlock, and S J Rose, J Comp Phys 249, 13 (2013). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jcp.2013.03.052
Plasma Professor Roland Smith
My research focuses on the development and exploitation of advanced laser sources to produce ultra-short and ultra-high-intensity light pulses. We use these to create and probe exotic states of matter, ranging from laboratory scale simulations of supernova remnants and plasma jets launched during star formation through to the subfemtosecond dynamics of nanometer scale "clusters" of atoms. To underpin our experiments we operate the UK's largest University based laser Cerberus, which delivers high energy ns and sub-ps pulses to multiple experimental areas. Cerberus is also linked to MAGPIE, one of the world's largest Zpinches. This combination of pulsed power and laser systems allows us to explore the complex behaviour of high-energy-density plasmas in which huge magnetic fields play a dominant role. We also develop new types of target for laser-matter interaction studies, most recently a unique optical levitation trap able to fix isolated few-micron objects with micron precision in vacuum. We have recently used high-energy laser probes to measure the distribution of magnetic fields dragged about by a high velocity plasma flow impacting Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research
a surface. We have also shown that levitated droplet targets provide a unique way of creating small, high-brightness x-ray sources with minimal debris, and extremely low electromagnetic pulses. 1. Interpenetration, Deflection, and Stagnation of Cylindrically Convergent Magnetized Supersonic Tungsten Plasma Flows. Swadling, G, Lebedev, SV, HarveyThompson, AJ, Rozmus, W, Burdiak, GC, Suttle, L, Patankar, S, Smith, RA, Bennett, M, Hall, GN, Suzuki-Vidal, F and Yuan, J. . Phys. Rev. Lett. Vol. 113, Iss. 3, Art. No. 035003 (2014).
2. The formation of reverse shocks in magnetized high energy density supersonic plasma flows. Lebedev, SV, Suttle, L, Swadling, GF, Bennett, M, Bland, SN, Burdiak, GC, Burgess, D, Chittenden, JP, Ciardi, A, Clemens, A, de Grouchy, P, Hall, GN, Hare, JD, Kalmoni, N, Niasse, N, Patankar, S, Sheng, L, Smith, RA, SuzukiVidal, F, Yuan, J, Frank, A, Blackman, EG and Drake, RP. Phys. Plas, Vol. 21, Iss. 5, (2014). 3. Flat-top picosecond pulses generated by chirped spectral modulation from a Nd:YLF regenerative amplifier for pumping few-cycle optical parametric amplifiers. Mecseki, K, Bigourd, D, Patankar, S, Stuart, NH and Smith, RA. Appl. Optics. Vol. 53, Iss. 10, PP 2229-2235 (2014).
4. Spectral enhancement in optical parametric amplifiers in the saturated regime. Bigourd, D, Patankar, S, Robbie, SI, Doyle, HW, Mecseki, K, Stuart, N, Hadjicosti, K, Leblanc, N, New, GHC and Smith, RA. Appl. Phys. B Vol. 113 Iss. 4, PP 627-633 (2013).
Dr Francisco Vidal Suzuki
experiments, a new field also known as Laboratory Plasma Astrophysics. The experiments are typically conducted on the MAGPIE pulsedpower facility at Imperial College, with astrophysical applications ranging from the formation of jets in young stars, the physics of accretion discs, and supersonic, magnetised plasma flows and shocks. The experiments are part of collaborative work with researchers worldwide including Observatoire de Paris (France), Universidad de las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Spain) and University of Rochester (US). In early 2015 I will be leading a series of experiments looking at the formation of radiative shocks of astrophysical interest at the world-class Orion laser at AWE Aldermaston, as part of a successful bid on their academic access program.
Plasma
1. Observation of energetic protons trapped in laboratory magnetic-tower jets: Suzuki-Vidal, F.; Patankar, S.; Lebedev, S. V.; et al., New Journal of Physics 15, 125008 (2013) 2. Interaction of radiatively cooled plasma jets with neutral gases for laboratory astrophysics studies: Suzuki-Vidal, F.; Lebedev, S. V.; Krishnan, M.; Skidmore, J.; et al., High Energy Density Physics 9, 141-147 (2013)
3. New probing techniques of radiative shocks: Stehlé, C.; Kozlová, M.; Larour, J.; Nejdl, J.; Champion, N.; Barroso, P.; Suzuki-Vidal, F.; et al., Optics Communications 285, Issue 1, p. 6469 (2012)
My research is aimed at reproducing astrophysical phenomena by the means of carefully scaled laboratory www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
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The Institute of Shock Physics
Over the past few years the Institute of Shock Physics has established a diverse research profile probing the response of condensed matter under ultra-fast and extreme compression. These necessarily multi-scale, multidisciplinary studies require both experimental and computational activities extending to MBar pressures, intermediate to very high strain rate regimes, and from kilometers to sub-micrometer length scales. Supported by a unique suite of state-of-the-art experimental facilities the institutes’ research activities understanding fundamental processes occurring in materials under extreme conditions, find relevance to a wide range of applications in both natural and man-made environments; from fusion technologies to astrophysical events such as interplanetary impact.
Time sequence of synchrotron X-ray images captured during the impact loading of a high-Z rapid prototyped lattice.
Synchrotron X-ray Studies of Extreme Processes Dr Daniel Eakins, Dr David Chapman
We are developing a new capability for the X-ray imaging of extreme physical processes which leverages the brilliance of third generation light sources. Classically our understanding of materials under extreme conditions is determined indirectly using non-penetrating diagnostics (visible light); the use of X-rays provides a unique opportunity to probe within a material while it is dynamically loaded, to directly study its equation of state, strength and failure properties. By integrating a purpose-built impact system with the I12 high-energy beamline at the Diamond Light Source, we have performed the first experiments involving time-resolved synchrotron X-ray imaging of dynamic compression in high-Z materials. This pioneering experimental work will enable more faithful macroscopic representation of statistical microstates in heterogeneous systems, the study of shock energy localization during instability growth, and direct density probing of material states under extreme conditions. The team also collaborates internationally participating in dynamic X-ray experiments in both Europe and the US. A recent highlight is the involvement in the first EXAFS experiment on Fe driven to Mbar pressures using a high-power laser at the ESRF.
Royal British Legion Centre for Blast Injury Studies Dr William G Proud
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CBIS conducts research into understanding the process of blast injury on www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
people. It has strong links to the Institute of Shock Physics. The institute has designed and instrumented a range of loading devices for the centre including shock tubes and Split Hopkinson Pressure Bars (SHPB). Our overall aim is to ensure that the loading conditions on these complex materials are understood and are in the correct pressure-time space for blast processes. Two specific research projects highlight the synergistic nature of the interaction. (a) examining the effect of representative pressure pulse from the blast waves on STEM cells. The SHPB was used to provide the loading and a sample cell was developed which had to be fully calibrated mechanically, able to withstand the pressures imposed on it and also be biologically inert. The results indicate that pressures as low as 100 atmospheres for 100 microseconds can result in the destruction of 10% of STEM cells. The debris from these cells is biologically active and may cause longer term pathologies (b) Modifying the output of the Shock Tube to produce the blast loading seen from a range of explosive masses, over distance through a variety of mitigation. This required precise control of the shock tube operation. As a result of this we can produce blast loadings equivalent to 25 kg of TNT at 2 m distance or, at the other extreme, the loading produced inside a vehicle from a small external charge.
Pulsed Power driven High Pressure Physics Experiments Dr Simon Bland, Dr Jeremy Chittenden
We are developing a series of new capabilities to drive matter into high
pressure states without the use of shock waves. Such capabilities allow new areas of the equation of state to be explored, enabling low temperature phase changes to be examined and provide the basis for studying the cores of giant planets planetary cores. The new 2 Mega-Ampere current generator, MACH, has recently begun operations, demonstrating methods of tailoring the pressure drive onto an target. Simultaneously the use of convergent targets, to significantly increase the available pressures, has been explored using the world leading Gorgon MHD code. To directly probe the states produced in these experiments, a new, ns timescale, multi-KeV X-ray source is being developed with colleagues at CEA Gramat. Already this source has been used to demonstrate X-ray diffraction and future experiments will explore its use in Xray absorption spectrometry.
Diffraction pattern produced using an Xpinch at CEA Gramat. Acknowledgements ; The Institute acknowledges the support of Imperial College London and AWE, Aldermaston Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research Dr Daniel Eakins
Institute of Shock Physics
understanding of the role of defects/interfaces can lead to a new design capability for materials with predefined shock properties. 1. R.E. Winter, M. Cotton, E.J. Harris, D.J. Chapman, D.E. Eakins, G. McShane, "Plateimpact loading of cellular structures formed by selective laser melting", Modelling and Simulation in Materials Science and Engineering (2014) vol. 22 (2) pp. 025021 doi:10.1088/0965-0393/22/2/025021.
My research is directed toward the mechanisms of deformation in condensed matter at extreme strain-rates, from the bulk to submicron scale. I focus on the transition between elastic and plastic behaviour, with specific attention to the processes of ultrafast inelastic deformation (defect generation, plasticity, localisation, fracture, etc.). My work seeks to resolve the relationship between the structure of solid phases and their pathway through various defect states, from the early moments of loading to their bulk conclusions. Within this area, I am presently working on the effect of alloying and other impurities on ultrafast elastoplasticity, new analytical methods for simulating true dislocation dynamics under dynamic loading, and the temperature dependence of dynamic fracture mechanisms. My work also involves the study of heterogeneous materials, and the statistical representation of nonuniform material response at various microstructural levels. This area extends my earlier work on powder systems into new territory through the coupling of novel experimental techniques and spatially-resolved diagnostics with 2D/3D numerical simulation. One of the primary drivers for this work is to establish a “Materials by Design” theme, whereby improved www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
2. D.R. Jones, D.J. Chapman, D.E. Eakins, "A gas gun based technique for studying the role of temperature in dynamic fracture and fragmentation", Journal of Applied Physics (2013) vol. 114 pp. 173508 doi:10.1063/1.4828867.
3. B. Gurrutxaga-Lerma, D.S. Balint, D. Dini, D.E. Eakins, A.P. Sutton, "A dynamic discrete dislocation plasticity method for the simulation of plastic relaxation under shock loading", Proceedings of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences (2013) vol. 469 (2156) pp. 20130141–20130141 doi:10.1098/rspa.2013.0141. 4. V.H. Whitley, S.D. McGrane, D.E. Eakins, C.A. Bolme, D.S. Moore, J.F. Bingert, "The elastic-plastic response of aluminum films to ultrafast laser-generated shocks", Journal of Applied Physics (2011) vol. 109 (1) pp. 013505 doi:10.1063/1.3236654.
Dr William Proud
My personal research is best summarised as:(a) the high-rate loading of granular and piezo-electric materials, determining how their nonlinear behaviour changes with stress level, load duration, strain-rate, and temperature (b) optical effects of shock in birefringant materials to develop a fundamental understanding of nonisotropic materials (c) biological and other soft materials under blast and impact loading. I also retain a string interest in energetic materials. The references below are relatively brief conference papers, more detailed articles can be found visiting the Institute of Shock Physics Website. The area of shock physics is multidisciplinary and this research has progressed quickly thanks to colleagues in bio-engineering, civil engineering, medicine, materials science and earth sciences and engineering. I am closely involved with the management and research direction of The Royal British Legion Centre for Blast Injury Studies and the Institute of Security Science and Technology, both of which are stimulating and vibrant research centres cutting across traditional research boundaries.
(1) Temperature effects on the mechanical behaviour of PZT 95/5, A S Khan, J E Balzer, J M Wilgeroth and W G Proud, Journal of Physics: Conference Series Vol. 500. (2014) 1742-6596 500 112038 doi:10.1088/17426596/500/11/112038 (2) Gas percolation through sand, W G Proud, Journal of Physics: Conference Series Vol. 500. (2014) 1742-6596 500 112052 doi:10.1088/1742-6596/500/11/112052
2014 has been very productive for the Institute of Shock Physics. A lynchpin is the application of time-resolved diagnostic techniques to wellcontrolled loading scenarios. This allows excellent interact with modellers, theoreticians and experimental groups. Linkage to other Imperial departments and cross-faculty is a strength.
(3) Technique to measure change in birefringence under shock compression, G R Tear, D E Eakins, D J Chapman and W G Proud, Journal of Physics: Conference Series Vol. 500. (2014) 1742-6596 500 192020 doi:10.1088/1742-6596/500/19/192020 (4) Integrated experimental platforms to study blast injuries: a bottom-up approach. C Bo, A Williams, S Rankin, W G Proud and K A Brown, Journal of Physics: Conference Series Vol. 500. (2014) 1742-6596 500 102001 doi:10.1088/1742-6596/500/10/102001
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Quantum Optics and Laser Science
The research mission of QOLS is to carry out basic science using lasers and to investigate, utilize and control photonic and material states and processes down to the quantum level.
LASER CONSORTIUM Jon Marangos, Vitali Averbukh, Leszek Frasinski, Peter Knight, John Tisch and Amelle Zair
This major grouping of experimental and theoretical physicists is concerned with the interaction of highintensity and ultra-short laser pulses with matter. Attosecond (As) Science We are pioneering new methods to measure electron motion in matter in real time. Through this we are learning how electrons move inside molecules and solids on a timescale of ~100 As vital for revealing the correlations in many electron quantum systems. Ultrafast science with X-ray free electron lasers Free electron lasers are opening new frontiers in the imaging of matter at the nanoscale with full time resolution. We are studying ways to make few-fs time resolved measurements using these instruments. Development of ultrafast, high power, laser sources. The group has pioneered the development of new sources including high power fiber based systems. High energy density science with intense lasers In collaboration with the Plasma Physics group this research uses various high power laser facilities at CLF as well as our in-house Cerberus laser system.
CENTRE FOR COLD MATTER Ed Hinds, Jony Hudson, Rob Nyman, Ben Sauer, Danny Segal, Mike Tarbutt and Richard Thompson Cold atoms and Molecules: We use the techniques of laser cooling and trapping to control and manipulate matter onto microchips (Atom chips) at temperatures a few billionths of a degree above absolute zero . With these devices, we aim to build ultra precision sensors and components for quantum information processing. Ultracold molecules offer new opportunities because of increased degrees of freedom and because they interact strongly with applied electric fields and with one another, allowing for the study of the physics of strongly-interacting many-body quantum systems. Electron electric 82
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dipole moment We measure the shape of the electron – its electric dipole moment. This is a test of physics beyond the Standard Model of particle physics and a test of timereversal symmetry violation. Quantum nanophotonics Single photons are the essential building blocks for photonic information processing. We use single organic dye molecules at cryogenic condition because they can serve as an efficient source of indistinguishable single photons. Bose-Einstein condensation of photons At low temperature and high density, the properties of a fluid depend on the quantum nature of its constituents, whether they are bosons or fermions. Bosons tend to bunch together, and in extreme cases form a giant wave called a Bose-Einstein Condensate (BEC). We are making a room temperature BEC of photons. Our aim is to understand how photon BECs form, study their properties and their interactions. Ion traps Here we test the predictions of Quantum Electrodynamics (QED) using highly-charged ions and also investigate the fascinating physics of "ion Coulomb crystals", which can be used in applications such as quantum simulation and studies of quantum tunnelling. We carry out our experiments with a Penning trap,
which uses static electric and magnetic fields to confine atomic ions. We use laser cooling to reduce the temperature of calcium ions to less than 1 kelvin and study the ions using precision laser spectroscopy and high resolution imaging of the ions.
CONTROLLED QUANTUM DYNAMICS THEORY David Jennings, Myungshik Kim, Peter Knight, Florian Mintert, Geoff New and Terry Rudolph The theoretical research interest of the group is the control and manipulation of physical systems to exhibit manifestly quantum mechanical effects such as quantum correlations and quantum interference. The emphasis is on using these effects to perform novel protocols in e.g. quantum computing in hybrid architectures, quantum communication and quantum simulations or to uncover the subtle role quantum mechanics may play in natural phenomena. Our general approaches can also be used, for instance, to elucidate the role of fundamental symmetries in nature, as well as metrology (precision measurement). Finally, the study of controlled quantum dynamics may lead us to new insights in the foundations of quantum mechanics itself.
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research Dr Vitali Averbukh
Quantum Optics and Laser Science
dynamics”, Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 083004 (2013). [2] K. Schnorr, A. Senftleben, M. Kurka, A. Rudenko, L. Foucar, G. Schmid, A. Broska, T. Pfeifer, K. Meyer, D. Anielski, R. Boll, D. Rolles, M. Kübel, M. F. Kling, Y. H. Jiang, S. Mondal, T. Tachibana, K. Ueda, T. Marchenko, M. Simon, G. Brenner, R. Treusch, S. Scheit, V. Averbukh, J. Ullrich, C. D. Schröter, and R. Moshammer, “Timeresolved measurement of interatomic Coulombic decay in Ne2 ”, Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 093402 (2013).
[3] J. Leeuwenburgh, B. Cooper, V. Averbukh, J. Marangos and M. Ivanov, “High- order harmonic generation spectroscopy of correlation-driven electron hole dynamics”, Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 123002 (2013).
The main direction of out work has been development and theoretical modelling of time-resolved attosecond spectroscopic techniques for the study of ultrafast electron hole migration in molecules. We have suggested several such techniques that are now being at various stages of experimental realisation: (1) singlephoton laser-enabled Auger decay (spLEAD) spectroscopy of hole migration, (2) high-order harmonic generation spectroscopy of electron correlation-driven hole dynamics, (3) time-dependent Auger spectroscopy of hole migration. In addition, we have provided theoretical support for one of the first two time-resolved measurements of the inter-atomic Coulombic decay in clusters. Finally, we have developed the first of its kind first-principles molecular method for numerical modelling of many-electron dynamics in strong external field based on B-spline single-electron basis and the manybody Green's function approach, B-spline algebraic diagrammatic construction (B-spline ADC). First successful applications of the new methodology to molecular strong field processes have been published and more are in progress. [1] B. Cooper and V. Averbukh, “Singlephoton laser enabled Auger spectroscopy for measuring attosecond electron hole www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
[4] J. P. Marangos, B. Cooper, P. Kolorenč, L. Frasinski, and V. Averbukh, “Analysis of a measurement scheme for ultrafast hole dynamics by few femtosecond resolution
Professor Leszek Frasinski
Leszek Frasinski collaborated in experiments performed at the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) at Stanford [1,2] and the free electron laser (FLASH) in Hamburg [3]. His main contribution to this collaboration was adaptation of the covariance mapping technique to the high event rate induced by free electron lasers. The success of these experiments led to theoretical developments of the technique [4]. The aim of this research is to gain understanding into electron dynamics of atoms and molecules under intense x-ray irradiation. It is expected that this understanding will allow us to study large biological molecules, such as viruses, with atomic resolution on the femtosecond timescale.
1. “Dynamics of Hollow Atom Formation in Intense X-ray Pulses Probed by Partial Covariance Mapping” L J Frasinski, V Zhaunerchyk, M Mucke, R J Squibb, M Siano, J H D Eland, P Linusson, P v.d. Meulen, P Salén, R D Thomas, M Larsson, L Foucar, J Ullrich, K Motomura, S Mondal, K Ueda, T Osipov, L Fang, B F Murphy, N Berrah, C Bostedt, J D Bozek, S Schorb, M Messerschmidt, J M Glownia, J P Cryan, R Coffee, O Takahashi, S Wada, M N Piancastelli, R Richter, K C Prince, and R Feifel, Phys. Rev. Lett. 111 073002, 5 pages (13 August 2013) [DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.111.073002] [URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/12267]
2. “Femtosecond X-ray-induced explosion of C60 at extreme intensity” B F Murphy, T Osipov, Z Jurek, L Fang, S-K Son, M Mucke, J H D Eland, V Zhaunerchyk, R Feifel, L Avaldi, P Bolognesi, C Bostedt, J D Bozek, J Grilj, M Guehr, L J Frasinski, J Glownia, D T Ha, K Hoffmann, E Kukk, B K McFarland, C Miron, E Sistrunk, R J Squibb, K Ueda, R Santra, and N Berrah, Nat. Commun. 5 4281 (27 June 2014) [DOI: 10.1038/ncomms5281] 3. “Coulomb explosion of diatomic molecules in intense XUV fields mapped by partial covariance” O Kornilov, M Eckstein, M Rosenblatt, C P Schulz, K Motomura, A Rouzée, J Klei, L Foucar, M Siano, A Lübcke, F Schapper, P Johnsson, D M P Holland, T Schlatholter, T Marchenko, S Düsterer, K Ueda, M J J Vrakking and L J Frasinski, J. Phys. B: At. Mol. Opt. Phys. 46 164028, 11 pages (13 August 2013) [DOI:10.1088/0953-4075/46/16/164028] [URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/11746] 4. “Theory and simulations of covariance mapping in multiple dimensions for data analysis in high-event-rate experiments” V Zhaunerchyk, L J Frasinski, J H D Eland and R Feifel, Phys. Rev. A 89 053418 (22 May 2014) [DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.89.053418] [URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/13752]
Dr Jony Hudson
I have continued my work on measuring the shape of the electron. We have developed new Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Research measurement techniques [1] and are currently engaged in a comprehensive set of technical upgrades to the apparatus. These will build on our world-leading 2011 measurement, aiming to improve our sensitivity by over three orders of magnitude [2]. One of the techniques we are developing, laser cooling for simple molecules [3], looks particularly promising, and has broad applicability beyond our field. I have also started a new research direction, applying the techniques of machine learning and artificial intelligence to data mine laws of physics directly from experimental data.
[1] Stochastic multi-channel lock-in detection By: Hudson, J. J.; Tarbutt, M. R.; Sauer, B. E.; et al. NEW JOURNAL OF PHYSICS Volume: 16 Article Number: 013005 Published: JAN 2 2014 [2] Design for a fountain of YbF molecules to measure the electron's electric dipole moment By: Tarbutt, M. R.; Sauer, B. E.; Hudson, J. J.; et al. NEW JOURNAL OF PHYSICS Volume: 15 Article Number: 053034 Published: MAY 22 2013 [3] Laser cooling and slowing of CaF molecules By: Zhelyazkova, V.; Cournol, A.; Wall, T. E.; et al. PHYSICAL REVIEW A Volume: 89 Issue: 5 Article Number: 053416 Published: MAY 16 2014
Dr David Jennings
Quantum Optics and Laser Science
entanglement, the development of entropic uncertainty relations [2,3] and several papers on quantum thermodynamics [4], which is a very active and important field in recent times. The geometric work on entanglement is currently being extended by a PhD student, under my supervision, and Ref [1] has already had good impact in the community. The uncertainty relations work was extremely timely -- much dispute had emerged on the correct way of quantifying measurement-disturbance in quantum theory, and we were able to place very general constraints on what form this could ever take. The thermodynamic work has aimed to identify the genuinely quantummechanical aspects of thermodynamics. Ref [4] is currently under review in Nature Communications, and we are in the process of revising the manuscript. This too has attracted attention in the community, and I expect this to initiate a meaningful and significant new line of research.
[1] Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 020402 (2014) [2] Phys. Rev. A 89, 052108 (2014) [3] Phys. Rev. A 89, 042122 (2014) [4] http://arxiv.org/abs/1405.2188 (2014)
Professor Myungshik Kim
macroscopic systems which is why quantum mechanics was thought to be applied only to a sub-atomic system. Kim’s research interests in the foundations of quantum physics are concentrated on the issues of the manifestations of wave-particle duality and the quantum-to-classical transition. Why is it not possible to observe quantum superpositions and nonlocality in everyday life? For this question, he came up with a possible solution based on fuzziness in operations [1]. His suggestion is in contrast to the usual assumption based on decoherence and coarsening of measurements. He then considered another fundamental problem in relation to the wave-particle duality and the impact of measurements on this [2]. The quantum-mechanical superpositions are more easily generated in an isolated system such as a cavity. However, in order to characterise and control the superpositions, we need to bring them out. He and his colleagues show how those quantum states can be taken out from the cavity in [3]. 1. H. Jeong, Y. Lim and M. S. Kim, ‘Coarsening measurement references and the quantum-to-classical transition’, Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 010402 (2014).
2. J-C Lee, H-T. Lim, K-H Hong, Y-C Jeong, M.S. Kim and Y-H Kim, ‘Experimental demonstration of delayed-choice decoherence suppression’ Nature Comm.5, 4522 (2014).
3. T. Tufarelli, A. Ferraro, A. Serafini, S. Bose and M.S. Kim, ‘Coherently opening a high-Q cavity’, Phys. Rev. Lett. 112,133605 (2014).
In the period 2013-2014 I (together with collaborators) have put 9 papers on the arxiv, with most of these now published. The topics included work on geometric properties [1] of quantum 84
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The paradoxical ideas that quantum mechanics promotes are welldeveloped for simple quantum systems. However, it is hard to observe its unique properties in Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research Professor John Marangos
Quantum Optics and Laser Science
J.P.Marangos and L.E. Chipperfield "Optimization of Quantum Trajectories Driven by Strong-Field Waveforms," Physical Review X 4, 021028 (2014). 2. B.Cooper, P.Kolorenc, L.J.Frasnski, V.Averbukh and J.P.Marangos, “Analysis of a measurement scheme for ultrafast hole dynamics by few-femtosecond resolution Xray pump-probe Auger spectroscopy”, DOI:10.1039/C4FD00051J Faraday Discussion 3. S.J.Weber, M.Oppermann and J.P.Marangos, “Role of rotational wavepackets in strong field experiments”, Physical Review Letters 111, 263601 (2013)
My main activity as Director of the Blackett Laboratory Laser Consortium has been in leading the research in the Attosecond Science Programme, which is funded by two grants (EPSRC Programme Grant “Attosecond electron dynamics in molecular and condensed phase systems”, and ERC Advanced Grant “Attosecond science by emission and transmission of X-rays”). The research has been progressing in the following main areas: (a) development of high harmonic generation (HHG) sources driven by few-cycle mid-IR pulses for attosecond transient absorption measurements, (b) HHG spectroscopy for direct measurement of attosecond resolved electronic and nuclear motion in molecules following ionization, (c) development of sources for attosecond pump-probe measurements, (d) measurement of the photoelectric effect from solid surfaces with attosecond resolution and (e) development of X-ray pump/X-ray probe methods for ultrafast structural dynamics studies using X-ray free electron lasers. This has resulted in the publication of more than 18 journal papers in the 2013-14 period including: 1. S. Haessler, T. Balčiunas, G. Fan, G. Andriukaitis, A. Pugžlys, A. Baltuška, T. Witting, R. Squibb, A. Zaïr, J.W.G Tisch,
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4. J. Leeuwenburgh, B. Cooper, V. Averbukh, J. P. Marangos, and M.Y. Ivanov, "High-Order Harmonic Generation Spectroscopy of Correlation-Driven Electron Hole Dynamics," Physical Review Letters 111, 123002 (2013).
Dr Florian Mintert
the fundamental property of complete positivity [3] (which is imposed by the probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics). As specific goal of control we target the creation of long-distance entanglement in disordered spin chains. A description in terms of matrixproduct states allows us to describe systems of one hundred interacting spins. We implemented a method based on Lyapunov control in terms of this description and designed control fields that establish strong entanglement in chains with ten percent relative fluctuation in the nearest neighbor interaction [4]. [1] Accurate effective Hamiltionans via flow in Floquet space Albert Verdeny Vilalta, Andreas Mielke & F.M.Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 175301 (2013) [2] Optimal Control of Effective Hamiltonians Albert Verdeny, Łukasz Rudnicki, Cord A. Müller & F.M. Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 010501 (2014)
[3] Completely positive approximate solutions of driven open quantum systems Farhang Haddadfarshi, Jian Cui & F.M. arXiv:1409.6184 [4] Long distance entanglement in disordered spin chains Jian Cui & F. M. arXiv:1407.1327
Professor Terry Rudolph
During the last year, the main focus of our work was on the optimal control of quantum systems through polychromatic driving. We developed a framework to identify effective Hamiltonians with renormalization techniques in Floquet theory [1] and developed a formalism for the construction of polychromatic control fields that realise desired effective dynamics with high accuracy [2]. Currently, we are extending these endeavors to open quantum systems, and we identified means to devise approximate solutions for driven open quantum systems that respect
Published 18 papers since January 2013. Topics covered include foundations of quantum thermodynamics, new mathematical representations of quantum states, some important simplifications of Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Research photonic quantum computation (for which IP protection is currently being sought) and a variety of abstract results in quantum foundations and quantum information.
[arXiv:1405.2188 [pdf, other] Thermodynamic laws beyond free energy relations Matteo Lostaglio, David Jennings, Terry Rudolph (Acceptance to Nature Communications appears likely)
arXiv:1303.4724 [pdf, other] Quantum Steering Ellipsoids Sania Jevtic, Matthew F. Pusey, David Jennings, Terry RudolphJournal-ref: Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 020402 (2014) arXiv:1311.2913 [pdf, other] On the experimental verification of quantum complexity in linear optics Jacques Carolan, Jasmin D. A. Meinecke, Pete Shadbolt, Nicholas J. Russell, Nur Ismail, Kerstin Wörhoff, Terry Rudolph, Mark G. Thompson, Jeremy L. O'Brien, Jonathan C. F. Matthews, Anthony Laing Journal-ref: Nature Photonics 8, 621 (2014)
arXiv:1306.2724 [pdf, ps, other] Efficient universal blind computation Vittorio Giovannetti, Lorenzo Maccone, Tomoyuki Morimae, Terry G. Rudolph Journal-ref: Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 230501 (2013)
Quantum Optics and Laser Science
recently surpassed in sensitivity by the ThO experiment run by a Harvard-Yale collaboration. We are making a number of improvements to the apparatus to regain the lead. On CaF, there is strong interest to make an ultra cold gas of polar molecules, not least to study dipoledipole interactions in this strongly quantum limit. We have made measurements of cooling and slowing in CaF and are currently working on a slow CaF source so that we can bring the molecules to rest.
Laser cooling and slowing of CaF molecules, Zhelyazkova V, Cournol A, Wall TE, Matsushima A, Hudson JJ, Hinds EA, Tarbutt MR, Sauer BE PHYSICAL REVIEW A 89(5) 053416, 2014.
Stochastic multi-channel lock in detection, Hudson JJ, Tarbutt MR, Sauer BE, Hinds EA, NEW JOURNAL OF PHYSICS 16: 013005, 2014
Dr Mike Tarbutt
Dr Ben Sauer
I have been working on improvements to out experiment to measure the permanent electric dipole moment (EDM) of the electron, and on experiments to directly laser cool CaF molecules. While the EDM experiment did provide the most stringent limit on the size of this time-reversal violating effect, it was 86
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on the local density of matter, as hypothesized in some extensions of the Standard Model. We found no dependence and set new bounds on such variations of the constants [1]. We then extended this work to precise measurements of millimetrewave transitions in CH [2]. These transitions have been observed in extra-galactic sources at high redshift, and so can be used to test whether the fundamental constants vary with time. Precise measurements using molecules benefit from cooling the molecules to very low temperatures. We have demonstrated that laser cooling, a method commonly used to cool atoms, can also be used to slow and cool a beam of CaF molecules [3]. We then analysed how laser cooling can be used to make a magnetooptical trap of these molecules [4]. [1] “A search for varying fundamental constants using hertz-level frequency measurements of cold CH molecules”, S. Truppe, R.J. Hendricks, S.K. Tokunaga, H.J. Lewandowski, M.G. Kozlov, Christian Henkel, E.A. Hinds and M.R. Tarbutt, Nat. Commun. 4, 2600 (2013). [2] “Measurement of the lowest millimetrewave transition frequency of the CH radical”, S. Truppe, R. J. Hendricks, E. A. Hinds and M. R. Tarbutt, Astrophys. J. 780, 71 (2014).
Our work focusses on the production of cold molecules and their applications in fundamental physics. We have made extremely precise frequency measurements of microwave transitions in the CH molecule and have compared these laboratory measurements to astrophysical measurements of the same transitions in CH observed in cold molecular clouds in the Milky Way. Through this comparison, we have tested whether the values of the fundamental constants depend
[3] “Laser cooling and slowing of CaF molecules”, V. Zhelyazkova, A. Cournol, T. E. Wall, A. Matsushima, J. J. Hudson, E. A. Hinds, M. R. Tarbutt, B. E. Sauer, Phys. Rev. A 89, 053416 (2014).
[4] “Magneto-optical trapping forces for atoms and molecules with complex level structures”, M. R. Tarbutt, accepted for publication in New J. Phys., arXiv:1409.0244 (2014).
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research Professor John Tisch
My research within the Blackett Laboratory Laser Consortium is concerned with Attosecond Science and Technology and can be divided into three interconnected themes: i) the development of state-of-the-art ultrafast laser technology, ii) the use of these lasers to develop novel short-wavelength (UV to X-ray) coherent light sources, with focus on
www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Quantum Optics and Laser Science
those providing attosecond (10-18 sec) pulse durations, iii) the application of i) and ii) to implement novel techniques for tracking attosecond time-scale electron dynamics in matter. Recent work on theme (i), in collaboration with LOA Paris, has been a detailed study [1] of the hollow-fibre pulse compression technique used by labs around the world to produce highpower laser pulses of durations approaching 1 optical cycle. Towards theme (ii), we have demonstrated for the first time the generation of synchronised VUV and XUV attosecond pulses for pump probe experiments, with support from collaborators in Hannover [2]. Also, we have made the first spatial coherence measurements of high order harmonic radiation generated in laser-ablated plumes [3]. A recent highlight from theme (iii) is the first measurement of temporal
broadening of attosecond photoelectron wavepackets from solid surfaces [4], in collaboration with Imperial colleagues from the EXSS group and from CFEL in Hamburg.
1. W.A. Okell et al. "Carrier-envelope phase stability of hollow fibers used for high-energy few-cycle pulse generation." Optics letters 38, 3918 (2013). 2. J. Henkel et al. "Prediction of attosecond light pulses in the VUV range in a high-orderharmonic-generation regime." Physical Review A 87, 043818 (2013).
3. R.A. Ganeev et al. "Spatial coherence measurements of non-resonant and resonant high harmonics generated in laser ablation plumes." Applied Physics Letters 104, 021122 (2014). 4. Okell, W. A., et al. "Attosecond streaking of photoelectron emission from disordered solids." arXiv preprint arXiv:1410.5613 (2014).
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Space and Atmospheric Physics
The group studies interplanetary space and planetary environments, as well as the Earth's atmosphere and oceans. A major part of the group’s activity is the development and operation of numerical models and sensitive instrumentation for space science and Earth observation.
SPACE PLASMA PHYSICS Dr Jonathan Eastwood, Dr Bob Forsyth, Prof Tim Horbury, Prof Steve Schwartz
Fundamental Plasma Processes: Magnetic reconnection, turbulence, and shock waves govern much of the dynamics of plasmas, giving rise to the transport of momentum and energy while accelerating charged particles to high energies in the process. Our internationally recognised leadership in understanding these fundamental plasma processes employs spacecraft data, theory and modeling. We lead the magnetic field instruments on important current spacecraft (ESA’s Cluster and Cassini missions) and future missions (ESA’s Solar Orbiter and JUICE). Applications of Space Plasma Physics: Interplanetary space is pervaded by a supersonic solar wind emanating from the Sun’s corona. Variability in that solar wind, due to solar activity and eruptions from the solar surface, often termed “Solar Storms” leads to “Space Weather” which can energise the Earth’s radiation belts and lead to spectacular aurorae. Space Weather also has a huge impact on satellites and groundbased systems (e.g., electricity grids) representing risks to vital services and expensive infrastructure, and now forms a major element in the national risk register. PLANETARY PHYSICS Dr Marina Galand, Prof Michele Dougherty FRS, Dr Ingo MuellerWodarg
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Planetary research is focused on the Cassini mission to Saturn and its largest moon Titan, which has a dense “Earthlike” atmosphere. The group leads the magnetometer team and investigates Saturn’s magnetosphere, its plasma boundaries, as well as the internal magnetic field of the planet. We study planetary ionospheres, some, such as Titan, hosting heavy organics, others, such as at Saturn, playing a key role in closing the global magnetospheric currents which arise. We study the upper atmosphere of Saturn using our Saturn Thermosphere Ionosphere model. We lead the Venus Express Atmospheric drag experiment and use it to determine the polar thermosphere structure at Venus. We lead the operation of the Plasma Consortium suite of instruments on board ESA’s Rosetta mission to the www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
comet 67P Churyumov-Gerasimenko. We lead the magnetometer team on the JUICE (Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer) mission to Jupiter and its icy moons and are designing the instrument in order that it can resolve induced currents flowing in the liquid water oceans at Ganymede, Callisto and Europa. CLIMATE PHYSICS Dr Helen Brindley, Dr Arnaud Czaja, Dr Heather Graven, Prof Joanna Haigh FRS, Dr Juliet Pickering, Prof Ralf Toumi, Dr Apostolos Voulgarakis
Modelling: We study the physical processes and composition in the atmosphere and ocean using idealised, regional and global models (e.g. HadGEM, NASA GISS). Key expertise lies in the impact of key physical processes on our climate system, such as solar variability, the coupling of tropical and extra-tropical storms with the ocean, the impact of changes in atmospheric composition on radiation and precipitation, and the role of fires in the Earth System. Earth Observation: Scientific lead for the Geostationary Earth Radiation Budget (GERB) project, the only instrument to observe the broadband energy emitted and reflected by the Earth at high temporal resolution. GERB data are used to quantify, the diurnal variability in Saharan dust net radiative
forcing at the top of the atmosphere, the surface, and within the atmosphere. Our Tropospheric Airborne Fourier Transform Spectrometer (TAFTS) participates in national campaigns to assess the radiative effect of cirrus clouds across the electromagnetic spectrum, again with the ultimate aim of using observations to improve modelling capability. Satellite observations from instruments such as the Tropospheric Emission Spectrometer (TES) and Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer (IASI) play a vital role to better understand feedbacks operating in the Earth system. A new activity relates to the carbon cycle via measurements and modelling of atmospheric CO2 and CO2 isotopes. INSTRUMENTATION Chris Carr, Dr Helen Brindley, Dr Heather Graven, Dr Juliet Pickering
Our research is underpinned by instrumentation projects for spaceflight, research aircraft, and in the laboratory. Our magnetometers fly on the Cluster, Cassini, Solar Orbiter and JUICE missions. the Plasma Consortium instrumentation on the Rosetta mission, and the GERB instruments for the Meteosat 2nd Generation spacecraft. In the laboratory, our unique visible-vacuum ultraviolet Fourier Transform Spectrometer studies atomic and molecular spectra of importance for interpretation of spectral measurements of planetary atmospheres and astrophysical objects. Measurements of atmospheric CO2 and its isotopic composition are being developed to study anthropogenic emissions and their impacts on the global carbon cycle. Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research Dr Helen Brindley
Space and Atmospheric Physics
reshaped National Centre for Earth Observation (NCEO).
1. Achieving climate change absolute accuracy in orbit: Wielicki, B., Young, D., Mlynczak, M., Thome, K., et al., Bull. Amer. Meteorol. Soc., doi: 10.1175/BAMS-D-1200149.1, (2013)
2. Intercomparison of satellite dust retrieval products over the west African Sahara during the Fennec campaign in 2011: Banks, J., Brindley, H., Flamant, C., Garay, M., et al., Rem. Sens. Env., 136, 99-116, (2013)
Work over the last year has had three main foci: 1. The role of mineral dust in shaping the Earth's Radiation Balance over Africa and the Middle East; 2. The use of spectrally resolved radiances, measured from satellite, to diagnose climate change; 3. The assessment of different dust/aerosol retrieval schemes and application of these in multi-disciplinary areas (e.g. solar energy resources). All of these topics are areas of ongoing activity and have resulted in the establishment of a number of collaborations and associated publications. Specific examples include the first ever quantification of the net top-of-atmosphere dust radiative effect over the Sahara at a sub-diurnal timescale; the use of multi-platform observations to provide recommendations regarding the strengths and weaknesses of various commonly used dust retrieval products; the assessment of the relative importance of environmental factors influencing energy production from a multijunction concentrating solar photovoltaic system; and, as part of the NASA led CLARREO Science Definition Team, the development of a robust strategy for climate monitoring space mission design. These activities have led to a major role for Imperial in the recently www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
3. Validation of energy prediction method for a concentrator photovoltaic module in Toyohashi Japan: Chan, N., Young, T., Brindley, H., Ekins-Daukes, N., et al., Progress in Photovoltaics, 21, 1598-1610, (2013)
4. Mineral dust aerosol net direct radiative effect during GERBILS field campaign period derived from SEVIRI and GERB: Ansell, C., Brindley, H., Pradhan, Y. and Saunders, R., J. Geophys. Res., 119, 4070-4086, (2014)
Dr Arnaud Czaja
Efforts in my group have recently focused on understanding how warm and fast ocean currents such as the Kuroshio and the Gulf Stream impact on storms and atmospheric motions of larger scales in the extratropics. Using a combination of high resolution numerical experiments (UK Met Office Model) and atmospheric reanalysis data (ERA interim, 1979-present), we have shown that the Gulf Stream affects both the cold and warm sectors of cyclones, although with very different mechanisms (shallow convection and moist inertial
instability, respectively). We have also shown that atmospheric heat transport in the storm track is sporadic in nature, with a large contribution to the mean arising from shirt-lived and extreme bursts of heat transport.
1. O'Reilly, C. and A. Czaja: The response of the Pacific storm track to Kuroshio variability, Quart. J. Roy. Met. Soc., DOI:10.1002/qj.2334 (2014). 2. Parfitt, R. And A. Czaja: On the diabatic forcing the North Atlantic storm-track, submitted to Quart. J. Met. Soc. (2014).
3. Messori, G. and A. Czaja: Some considerations on the spectral properties of meridional heat transport by transient eddies, Quart. J. Roy. Met. Soc, DOI:10.1002/qj.2224 (2013). 4. Sheldon, L. and A. Czaja, Seasonal and interannual variability of an index of deep convection over western boundary currents, Quart. J. Roy. Met. Soc., DOI: 10.1002/qj.2103. (2013)
Dr Jonathan Eastwood
My research currently centres on understanding how magnetic reconnection across current sheets in collisionless space plasmas works. This process lies at the heart of many solar, space and astrophysical plasma phenomena such as solar flares and geomagnetic storms. Working with postdoc Dr. Heli Hietala and PhD student Rishi Mistry, and in collaboration with UC Berkeley, the University of Maryland, and the University of Delaware, we have recently published new research Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Research showing for the first time how the energy explosively released by reconnection is partitioned, and demonstrating how reconnection can operate in a bursty fashion over a prolonged period of time. This work is intimately related to the applied science of space weather, which represents a threat to infrastructure resilience and is now included on the UK national risk register. In collaboration with the plasma physics group (Prof. Jerry Chittenden), and PhD student Lars Mejnertsen we have adapted the Gorgon computer code (used for laboratory plasmas) to simulate the solar wind-magnetosphere interaction, most recently using the DiRAC high performance computing facility. These simulations, informed by our group’s research into the underpinning physics, will be both useful for interpreting satellite observations and are directly relevant for improving future space weather forecasts. 1. Eastwood, J. P., H. Hietala, G. Toth, T. D. Phan and M. Fujimoto, What controls the structure and dynamics of Earth’s magnetosphere?, in Structures in Cosmic Plasmas edited by A. Balogh, Springer (NL), 2014 (reprinted in Space Sci. Rev., 2014).
2. Hietala, H., J. P. Eastwood and A. Isavnin, Sequentially released tilted flux ropes in the Earth's magnetotail, Plasma Phys. Control. Fusion, 56, 064001, 2014. 3. Eastwood, J. P., T. D. Phan, J. F. Drake, M. A. Shay, A. L. Borg, B. Lavraud and M. G. G. T. Taylor, Energy partition in magnetic reconnection in Earth’s magnetotail, Phys. Rev. Lett., 110, 225001, 2013. 4. Eastwood, J. P., T. D. Phan, M. Øieroset, M. A. Shay, K. Malakit, M. Swisdak, J. F. Drake and A. Masters, Influence of asymmetries and guide fields on the magnetic reconnection diffusion region in collisionless space plasmas, Plasma Phys. Control. Fusion, 55, 124001, 2013.
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Dr Marina Galand
Space and Atmospheric Physics 1. Predictions of ion production rates and ion number densities within the diamagnetic cavity of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko at perihelion: Vigren, E. and Galand M., ApJ, 772:33, doi:10.1088/0004-637X/772/1/33 (2013). 2. On the thermal electron balance in Titan’s sunlit upper atmosphere: Vigren, E.; Galand, M.; Yelle, R.V.; et al., Icarus, 223, 234-251, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.icarus.2012.12.010 (2013).
3. Increasing Positive Ion Number Densities Below the Peak of Ion-Electron Pair Production in Titan's Ionosphere, Vigren E.; Galand M.; Shebanits O.; et al., ApJ, 786, 69, doi:10.1088/0004-637X/786/1/1 (2014).
We have developed a new expertise and led original work in the active field of cometary plasma in relation with the on-going ESA/Rosetta mission which reached its target, comet 67P, in August 2014. We have been closely involved in this mission through the Rosetta Plasma Consortium (RPC) and the Rosetta Orbiter Spectrometer for Ion and Neutral Analyzer (Rosina). We have pursued our research on Titan’s complex ionosphere using multiinstrumental dataset from the Cassini spacecraft. We have in particular identified a key role played by negative ions unexpectedly discovered in Titan’s deep ionosphere. This work was performed with colleagues from Europe (France, Sweden, UK) and from University of Arizona. We have also continued our participation to Saturn’s ionospheric studies with application to the ring rain and have led work on the characterization of the acceleration processes above Saturn’s auroral regions. Our giant planet interest has expended to the Jovian system – with our involvement in the plasma package and UV spectrometer onboard the ESA/Jupiter Icy Moon Explorer (JUICE) – and to exoplanets under stellar radiation. In collaboration with colleagues from Boston University we have broaden our expertise of CO2dominated atmospheres from Venus to Mars, with original work applied to the plasma heat budget.
4. Numerical simulations of ion and electron temperatures in the ionosphere of Mars: Diurnal variations at solar minimum conditions: Matta, M.; Galand M.; Moore L; et al., Icarus, 227, 78-88, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/ j.icarus.2013.09.006 (2014).
Dr Heather Graven
My research focuses on atmospheric CO2 and the global carbon cycle. I study the influences of fossil fuel combustion and natural exchanges with the ocean and terrestrial biosphere on CO2 by combining observations and models in regional and global-scale studies. In a recent paper in Science we showed long-term changes in the observed seasonal cycle of CO2 concentration. The observations show a 50% increase in the amplitude of the seasonal cycle, reflecting changes in northern ecosystems that are much larger than predicted by current IPCC Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research
models. Before joining Imperial in late 2013, I began a collaborative project to study CO2 fluxes from fossil fuel emissions and biospheric exchange in California with a grant from NASA’s Carbon Monitoring System. I was also awarded funding from the European Commission and the Royal Society in 2013-14. I am developing new collaborations in the UK with researchers at Imperial and at the University of Oxford, University of Bristol, Queens University Belfast, and the University of East Anglia. Themes that will be explored involve the oceanic sink of CO2 and its sensitivity to ocean circulation change, and development of innovative atmospheric observations to distinguish anthropogenic from natural influences on the carbon cycle. Goldberg, S.J., G.I. Ball, B. Allen, G.S. Schladow, A.J. Simpson, H. Masoom, R. Soong, H. Graven, and L.I. Aluwihare, 2014. Refractory Dissolved Organic Nitrogen Accumulation in High Elevation Lakes, Nature Communications, in revision.
Graven, H.D., R.F. Keeling, S.C. Piper, P.K. Patra, B.B. Stephens, S.C. Wofsy, L.R. Welp, C. Sweeney, P.P. Tans, J.J. Kelley, B.C. Daube, E.A. Kort, G.W. Santoni and J.D. Bent, 2013. Enhanced seasonal exchange of CO2 by northern ecosystems since 1960, Science, 341, 1085-1089, doi:10.1126/science.1239207.
Graven, H.D., X. Xu, T.P. Guilderson, R.F. Keeling, S.E. Trumbore, and S. Tyler, 2013. Comparison of independent Δ14CO2 records at Point Barrow, Alaska. Radiocarbon, 55 (23), 1541-1545, doi:10.2458/azu_js_rc.55.16220.
Khatiwala, S., T. Tanhua, S. Mikaloff Fletcher, M. Gerber, S.C. Doney, H.D. Graven, N. Gruber, G.A. McKinley, A. Murata, A.F. Ríos, C.L. Sabine, and J.L. Sarmiento, 2013. Global ocean storage of anthropogenic carbon. Biogeosciences, 10, 2169-2191, doi:10.5194/bg-10-2169-2013.
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Professor Jo Haigh FRS
Space and Atmospheric Physics be refined.
1. Orr, A., T.J. Bracegirdle, J.S. Hosking, W. Feng, H. K. Roscoe and J. D. Haigh 2013 Strong dynamical modulation of the cooling of the polar stratosphere associated with the Antarctic ozone hole. J. Clim. 26, 662-668. http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00480.1 2. Wen, G., R.F. Cahalan, J.D. Haigh, P. Pilewskie, L. Oreopoulos and J.W. Harder 2013 Reconciliation of modeled climate responses to spectral solar forcing. J. Geophys. Res., 118, 6281-6289, DOI:10.1002/jgrd.50506
My work concerns how variations in solar UV radiation influence the structure of the stratosphere3 and how changes in the stratosphere influence the climate below1. Measurements from the SORCE satellite suggest larger solar cycle trends in UV than previously thought and we have shown that they imply very different impacts on ozone and surface climate2. The calibration of these data is being continuously revised, and the remaining lifetime of the satellite is uncertain, while the successor mission is not expected to launch until mid2017. With no other measurements having the calibration required for the investigation of multi-year trends there will not only be a gap in the record but also insufficient new data to confirm the SORCE measurements. To address this data gap, in such an important climate variable, we have proposed a new approach for measuring the solar spectrum4. The basis of the method is to take measurements of atmospheric ozone, and other parameters sensitive to solar irradiance, and to analyse variations in these to deduce what changes in the spectrum must have produced them. To date we have demonstrated the statistical methods but not produced a robust change in solar spectrum Nevertheless the technique is promising and we are developing new ways in which it might
3. Solanki, S.M., N.A. Krivova and J.D. Haigh 2013 Solar irradiance variability and climate. Ann. Rev. Astron. Astrophys., 51, 311-351.
4. Ball, W.T., D.J. Mortlock, J.S. Egerton, and J.D. Haigh 2014 Assessing the relationship between spectral solar irradiance and stratospheric ozone using Bayesian inference. J. Spac. Wea. Spac. Clim., 4, A25, DOI: 10.1051/swsc/2014023.
Professor Tim Horbury
Development of the Solar Orbiter magnetometer continues well, led by the Instrument Manager Helen O’Brien, with launch planned for 2017. Major challenges remain from the thermal, vibration and electromagnetic environment of the spacecraft but the magnetometer team are on track for our first hardware delivery, of our Electrical Model, by the end of 2014: the final, Flight Model is due for delivery by the end of 2015.
Research work has concentrated on collaborations regarding solar wind Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Research waves and turbulence (with Lorenzo Matteini and Junior Research Fellow Chris Chen) and, with PhD student Martin Archer, dynamics of the interaction of the solar wind with the Earth’s magnetosphere. 1. Archer MO, Horbury TS, 2013, Magnetosheath dynamic pressure enhancements: occurrence and typical properties, ANNALES GEOPHYSICAE, Vol: 31, Pages: 319-331, ISSN: 0992-7689
2. Archer MO, Horbury TS, Eastwood JP, Weygand JM, Yeoman TKet al., 2013, Magnetospheric response to magnetosheath pressure pulses: A low-pass filter effect, JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCHSPACE PHYSICS, Vol: 118, Pages: 5454-5466, ISSN: 2169-9380
3. Matteini L, Horbury TS, Neugebauer M, Goldstein BE et al., 2014, Dependence of solar wind speed on the local magnetic field orientation: Role of Alfvenic fluctuations, GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, Vol: 41, Pages: 259-265, ISSN: 0094-8276
4. Owens MJ, Horbury TS, Wicks RT, McGregor SL, Savani NP, Xiong Met al., 2014, Ensemble downscaling in coupled solar wind-magnetosphere modeling for space weather forecasting, SPACE WEATHER-THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF RESEARCH AND APPLICATIONS, Vol: 12, Pages: 395405, ISSN: 1542-7390
Dr Adam Masters
Space and Atmospheric Physics
MESSENGER, and also involves analytical modelling. The programme covers a range of space plasma phenomena and processes, including Kelvin-Helmholtz instability, collisionless shock waves, and magnetic reconnection. Advances have implications for energy transport through the space environments surrounding different planets, can be extrapolated to exoplanets, and have the potential to change our fundamental understanding of how space plasma systems work in our Solar System and beyond. Results published in recent years include: 1. Data taken by the Cassini spacecraft at Saturn shows that we need to revise our understanding of how the solar wind interacts with the planet’s magnetic field; 2. Modelling of magnetic reconnection between Uranus’ magnetic field and the solar magnetic field reveals the uniqueness of the Uranian system; 3. The detection of relativistic electrons in the near-Saturn solar wind shows that high-Mach number shock waves are more efficient cosmic particle accelerators than previously thought. This work is supported by a wide international network of collaborators, most notably at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.
1. Magnetic reconnection at Uranus’ magnetopause, A. Masters, Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics, , Volume 119, pp. 5520-5538, Published online in Jul 2014, DOI: 10.1002/2014JA020077.
2. Neptune and Triton: Essential pieces of the Solar System puzzle, A. Masters, et al., Planetary and Space Science, in press, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pss.2014.05.008i.
My research focuses on space plasma physics in diverse planetary environments. Work in this area is driven by in situ data returned by missions to explore the Solar System, such as Cassini-Huygens and 92
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3. Can magnetopause reconnection drive Saturn's magnetosphere?, A. Masters, et al., Geophysical Research Letters, Volume 41, Issue 6, pp. 1862-1868, Published in Mar 2014, DOI: 10.1002/2014GL059288.
4. Electron acceleration to relativistic energies at a strong quasi-parallel shock wave, A. Masters, et al., Nature Physics, Volume 9, Issue 3, pp. 164167, Published in Mar 2013, DOI: 10.1038/nphys2541.
Professor Steve Schwartz
Work initiated with a previous STFC post-doc on the heating of electrons at the bow shock located sunward of the Earth’s magnetosphere has reached a definitive, though provocative conclusion. We showed that the high mobility of the collision free electron population together with the curved nature of the bow shock couples distant regions of the shocked plasma (the magnetosheath). The result, predicted based on simulations and tested with data from the Cluster and THEMIS spacecraft, is that, despite the strong variation in Mach number and therefore total heating rate around the bow shock, the magnetosheath electron temperature is roughly constant, implying a varying proportion of heat taken up by other species. The electron heating is controlled by as yet unknown processes that occur at the point where the interplanetary magnetic field first touches the bow shock, i.e., where it is tangent to the surface. Other work, with post-doc Matteini, has explored the dynamics of different solar wind ions in the presence of interplanetary turbulence, and a first look at data from the European Space Agency’s comet chaser, Rosetta at comet P67 Churyumov-Gerasimenko. 1 J. J. Mitchell and S. J. Schwartz. Isothermal magnetosheath electrons due to nonlocal electron cross talk. J. Geophys.
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Research Res., 119:1080-1093, 2014.
2 V. See, R. F. Cameron, and S. J. Schwartz. Non-adiabatic electron behaviour due to short-scale electric field structures at collisionless shock waves. Annales Geophysicae, 31:639-646, 2013.
3 S. J. Schwartz, E. G. Zweibel, and M. Goldman. Microphysics in Astrophysical Plasmas. Space Sci. Rev., 178:81-99, 2013.
4 A. Masters, L. Stawarz, M. Fujimoto, S. J. Schwartz, N. Sergis, M. F. Thomsen, A. Retino, H. Hasegawa, B. Zieger, G. R. Lewis, A. J. Coates, P. Canu, and M. K. Dougherty. Electron acceleration to relativistic energies at a strong quasi-parallel shock wave. Nature Physics, 9:164- 167, 2013.
Professor Ralf Toumi
Space and Atmospheric Physics
[Radu, Raluca; Toumi, Ralf; Phau, Jared Influence of atmospheric and sea surface temperature on the size of hurricane Catarina QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL METEOROLOGICAL SOCIETY Volume: 140 Issue: 682 Pages: 1778-1784 Part: A
2. Nicholls, James Farley; Toumi, Ralf On the lake effects of the Caspian Sea QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL METEOROLOGICAL SOCIETY Vol: 140 Iss: 681 Pages: 1399-1408 Part: B 2014 2. White, R. H.; Toumi, R. River flow and ocean temperatures: The Congo River JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCHOCEANS Volume: 119 Issue: 4 Pages: 2501-2517 2014
4. Nissan, Hannah; Toumi, Ralf On the impact of aerosols on soil erosion GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS Volume: 40 Issue: 22 Pages: 5994-5998 2013
Dr Apostolos Voulgarakis
atmospheric models and remote sensing observations (Marlier et al., 2014). A further focus of the team has been understanding the changes of short-lived gaseous constituents in the atmosphere from pre-industrial times to present-day, and into the future (Voulgarakis et al., 2013a). This has also included the study of aerosol interactions (Voulgarakis et al., 2013), which is also a topic currently investigated in the team from a hydrological perspective. Voulgarakis, the leader of the team, is currently analysis lead for the international Chemistry-Climate Model Initiative (CCMI) and a member of the Scientific Steering Committee of the Precipitation Driver and Response Model Intercomparison Project (PDRMIP).
Marlier, M. E., R. S. DeFries, A. Voulgarakis, P. L. Kinney, J. T. Randerson, D.T. Shindell, Y. Chen and G. Faluvegi (2013), El Niño and health risks from landscape fire emissions in Southeast Asia, Nature Clim. Change, 3, 131136 doi:10.1038/NCLIMATE1658.
Our principal work is on regional climate modelling (1-4 ) and stochastic weather generators to gain a physical understanding of processes particularly as they relate to extreme events such as cyclones and floods. We are strongly engaged with industry. In the Climate KIC we lead the OASIS project (www.oasislmf.org) which is an exciting project to develop open source catastrophe modelling for insurance and other sectors. One of the highlights of our recent work is that we have demonstrated how tropical cyclones become larger in a warmer environment (1). This discovery of the size effect is important for impacts which are directly proportional to the footprint. of cyclones. www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Marlier, M. E., A. Voulgarakis, D.T. Shindell, G. Faluvegi, Henry, C. L., and Randerson, J. T. (2014), The role of temporal evolution in modeling atmospheric emissions from tropical fires, Atmos. Environ., 89, 158-168, doi:10.1016/j.atmosenv.2014.02.039.
The composition-climate team investigates the interactions between atmospheric constituents and climate change, from regional to global scales. For this, global climate models that involve interactive composition are used in conjunction with observations, especially from satellites. A major focus over the past few years is the study of fireatmosphere interactions. Recent work in the team investigates the interannual variability of pollution from wildfires, its climatic drivers, and its effects on human health (Marlier et al., 2013). Furthermore, the impact of the temporal resolution of fire emissions on atmospheric composition and climate forcing has been explored, using global
Voulgarakis, A., V. Naik, J.-F. Lamarque, D.T. Shindell, P.J. Young, M.J. Prather, O. Wild, R.D. Field, D. Bergmann, P. Cameron-Smith, I. Cionni, W.J. Collins, S.B. Dalsøren, R.M. Doherty, V. Eyring, G. Faluvegi, G.A. Folberth, L.W. Horowitz, B. Josse, I.A. McKenzie, T. Nagashima, D.A. Plummer, M. Righi, S.T. Rumbold, D.S. Stevenson, S.A. Strode, K. Sudo, S. Szopa, and G. Zeng (2013a), Analysis of present day and future OH and methane lifetime in the ACCMIP simulations, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 13, 25632587, doi:10.5194/acp-13-2563-2013.
Voulgarakis, A., D.T. Shindell, and G. Faluvegi (2013a) Linkages between ozone depleting substances, tropospheric oxidation and aerosols, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 13, 49074916, doi:10.5194/acp-13-4907-2013.
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Theoretical Physics
The research of the Theoretical Physics Group covers a wide range of areas bound together by the theme of fundamental questions in cosmology, gravity, particle physics, and quantum theory.
STRING/M-THEORY AND QUANTUM FIELD THEORY Duff, Gauntlett, Hanany, Hull, Stelle, Tseytlin, Waldram, Wiseman
Within this subtheme we work on the physical and mathematical structure of string/M-theory as a proposed frameworkfor unifying the Standard Model of Particle Physics with General Relativity. In addition, string/M-theory provides deep insights into the non-perturbative structure of quantum field theory.
The AdS/CFT correspondence, which relates strongly coupled quantum field theory to weakly coupled gravitational descriptions in higher spacetime dimensions, is one of the most profound discoveries in string/M-theory and is a major focus of the group. Our activities of the Group in this area are supported by two ERC Advanced Grants. One is focussed on exploring integrability structures present in particular systems. The second Is focussed on trying to apply the AdS/CFT correspondence to poorly understood strongly coupled systems that arise in condensed matter physics, such as the high temperature superconductors. The properties of black holes play a central role in this work, as they do in other areas of research in this subtheme. The Group also actively investigates the very rich mathematical structure of string/M-theory. This line of research could lead to a precise mathematical definition of what string/M-theory is. It is also important in connecting string theory with particle phenomenology and in obtaining exact non-perturbative results in quantum field theory. This area is supported by an EPSRC Programme Grant. COSMOLOGY AND QUANTUM FIELD THEORY Contaldi, Dowker, Magueijo, Rajantie, Wiseman. Emeritus: Jones, Kibble and Rivers
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The principal objective in this subtheme is to discover ways of testing
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innovative particle physics and quantum gravity theories against hard astrophysical data. A particular strength of the Group is the leading expertise in both theoretical cosmological models and the extraction of phenomenology from the data. We have made significant contributions to the inflationary theory of cosmological perurbations, using both analytical and lattice techniques. One focus is on the physics arising at the end of inflation, particularly in relation to defect production. Alternatives to inflation are also investigated including cyclic universe models and varying speed of light theories. Modified theories of gravity obviating the need for dark matter are another focus. The cosmology group has been pioneering the extraction of phenomenology from quantum gravity in several guises and testing it against data. On the more observational side, we continue to work on the development and application of methods of CMB data analysis, including involvement in a number of experimental efforts such as Planck and Spider.
Image © R. Dijkgraaf
QUANTUM GRAVITY AND FOUNDATIONS OF QUANTUM MECHANICS Dowker, Halliwell. Emeritus: Isham
The Group also works on other approaches to quantum gravity including causal set theory, which posits that spacetime is fundamentally discrete. The foundations of quantum mechanics, including the emergence of classicality, are investigated both in connection to low energy phenomenology and to provide insights into the structure of quantum gravity. COMPLEXITY AND NETWORKS Evans Emeritus: Rivers
The group also has a keen interest in statistical physics arising in classical systems. This ranges from applications of graph theory, to discrete space times, to citation networks and to studies of how spatial constraints alter the structure of networks, both in theoretical models and in data from actual
Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Research Professor Carlo Contaldi
Contaldi, Carlo R., Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics, Issue 09, article id. 001, pp. (2014).
Professor Fay Dowker
Theoretical Physics
2.Introduction to Causal Sets and Their Phenomenology, by Fay Dowker, General Relativity and Gravitation 45 (2013) pp 16511667 3.A histories perspective on characterizing quantum non-locality, by Fay Dowker, Joe Henson and Petros Wallden, New Journal of Physics, 2014 New J. Phys. 16 033033 4.Quantum Information Processing and Relativistic Quantum Fields, by Dionigi M.T. Benincasa, Leron Borsten, Michel Buck and Fay Dowker, Class. Quantum Grav. 31 075007
Professor Michael Duff FRS
In a highly cited paper, showed how suppression of primordial perturbations on the largest cosmological scales could reconcile the observations announced by BICEP2 collaboration in April 2014. We also introduced a new formalism to reconstruct the acceleration trajectory during inflation from existing data. With student Jonathan Horner we also showed how to obtain the latest constraints in general Hubble flow inflationary trajectories from the Planck satellite observations. A second paper with Horner calculated non-Gaussianity from the same generalised trajectories. We continued work in preparation for the SPIDER balloon-borne CMB polarisation telescope that is scheduled to fly in Antarctica during the first week of December 2014 after suffering a delay last year due to Antrctic operations being curtailed by the U.S. government shutdown.
1. Suppressing the impact of a high tensor-toscalar ratio on the temperature anisotropies, Contaldi, Carlo R.; Peloso, Marco; Sorbo, Lorenzo, Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics, Issue 07, article id. 014, pp. (2014). 2. BICEP's acceleration, Contaldi, Carlo R., Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics, Issue 10, article id. 072, pp. (2014).
3. PLANCK and WMAP constraints on generalised Hubble flow inflationary trajectories, Contaldi, Carlo R.; Horner, Jonathan S., Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics, Issue 08, article id. 050, pp. (2014). 4. Non-gaussian signatures of general inflationary trajectories, Horner, Jonathan S.; www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
My research on the causal set approach to quantum gravity continued with the discovery of a family of discrete non-local Lorentz invariant D’Alembertian operators for scalar fields extending results in 2 and 4 dimensions to all dimensions. I continued my work on Foundations of Quantum Mechanics with work on characterising non-locality from the perspective of a sum-over-histories approach to quantum theory. We discovered a strong connection between a condition on sets of experimental probabilities – a quantum analogue of a non-contextuality condition – that arises naturally in a histories approach and a condition that is known in the quantum information literature as “Almost Quantum.” We did work highlighting the fact that a relativistic quantum field theory lacks a set of rules specifying what interventions by external observers, including measurements, are possible. Restricting measurements and interventions to those that do not violate relativistic causality puts constraints on the processing of quantum information using quantum fields. 1.Causal Set D’Alembertians for various dimensions, by Fay Dowker and Lisa Glaser, Class. Quantum Grav. 30 195016
My recent work in collaboration with Leron Borston and my students Alex Anastasiou, Leo Hughes and Silvia Nagy is devoted to finding a consistent quantum theory of gravity. We address the question of whether gravity, a force traditionally described by Einstein’s general relativity, can be regarded as the product of two Yang-Mills theories (quantum field theories used in the standard model of particle physics to describe the strong, weak and electromagnetic forces). There has already been some progress in this direction at the level of scattering amplitudes in momentum space but our goal is more ambitious. We aim to find an exact correspondence at the level of off-mass-shell fields in coordinate space. A key ingredient will be our recent unified description of all supersymmetric Yang-Mills theories [3] in terms of the four division algebras; real (R), complex (C), quaternion (H) and octonion (O). The global symmetries that result Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Research from tensoring one (R, C, H, O) theory with another are then just those of the so-called Freudenthal magic square, well-known to mathematicians [2.4]. But even more interesting is the Yang-Mills origin of local gravitational symmetries such as general coordinate invariance and local supersymmetry [1].
1) Yang-Mills origin of gravitational symmetries By A. Anastasiou, L. Borsten, M.J. Duff, L.J. Hughes, S. Nagy. arXiv:1408.4434 [hep-th]. Phys.Rev.Lett (to appear) http://journals.aps.org/prl/edannounce/PhysR evLett.111.180001 2) A magic pyramid of supergravities By A. Anastasiou, L. Borsten, M.J. Duff, L.J. Hughes, S. Nagy. arXiv:1312.6523 [hep-th] 10.1007/JHEP04(2014)178. JHEP 1404 (2014) 178.
3) Super Yang-Mills, division algebras and triality By A. Anastasiou, L. Borsten, M.J. Duff, L.J. Hughes, S. Nagy. arXiv:1309.0546 [hep-th]. 10.1007/JHEP08(2014)080. JHEP 1408 (2014) 080. 4) A magic square from Yang-Mills squared By L. Borsten, M.J. Duff, L.J. Hughes, S. Nagy. arXiv:1301.4176 [hep-th]. 10.1103/PhysRevLett.112.131601. Phys.Rev.Lett. 112 (2014) 131601.
Dr Tim Evans
2013 on different aspects of this work while my collaboration with archaeologist in Toronto produced several more publications (e.g. Evans, 2014). I organised two international meetings at Imperial in September, attended by around fifty academic each. This was part of my involvement in a UK EPSRC NetworkPlus collaboration on Emeregence and Non-Equilibrium Physics. I continue to work as scientific advisor for two companies: Symplectic Ltd (part of the Digital Science division of Macmillan) and the start-up Newflo. This has included some consultancy work. My paper on 3D printing and complexity published in December 2013 (Reiss et al, 2013) was selected by the editors of the journal, and received widespread coverage resulting in the sixth highest ever rating for an article in that journal (EPL) on altmetrics.com. 1. DS Reiss, and JJ Price, and TS Evans, Sculplexity: Sculptures of Complexity using 3D printing, European Physics Letters, 104 (2013) 48001 [altmetric id 1871611].
2. JR Clough, J Gollings, TV Loach and TS Evans, Transitive reduction of citation networks, Journal of Complex Networks, 2014 (in press) DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/comnet/cnu039
3. TS Evans, Which Network Model Should I Use? Towards a Quantitative Comparison of Spatial Network Models in Archaeology, in The Connected Past: challenging networks in archaeology and history, T. Brughmans A. Collar & Coward, F. (Eds.), Oxford University Press, 2014.
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I pursued my interest in complexity and networks in two main directions. My new programme of research on temporal networks has produced its first paper (Clough et al. 2014) with others submitted. On the other hand my long standing interest in networks constrained by space continues. I gave three invited talks at international venues in November www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Theoretical Physics Professor Jerome Gauntlett
The AdS/CFT correspondence, which arose out of string theory, is a powerful theoretical tool to study strongly coupled quantum field theories using weakly coupled gravitational descriptions in higher spacetime dimensions. In recent years there has been a concerted effort to apply these “holographic” techniques to vexing condensed matter systems such as high temperature superconductors and strange metal phases using, amongst other things, novel black hole solutions. In ref 4 we used these techniques to model the rapid quench of a superconductor and discovered an emergent temperature scale in the superconducting phase below which the approach to equilibrium is oscillatory and above which it is not. We have pioneered the study of spatially modulated phases and in ref 3 we investigated the competition between striped phases and superconducting phases and in the process discovered black holes describing meta-magnetic phases. In refs 1 and 2 we pioneered the construction of a class of black hole solutions that incorporate momentum dissipation and hence provide more realistic models of metals. We found models of coherent metals, with Drude peaks, incoherent metals (with some similarity to the strange metals) and insulators as well as transition between these states.
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Research
1. Novel metals and insulators from holography, A. Donos and J.P. Gauntlett, JOURNAL OF HIGH ENERGY PHYSICS Issue: 6, Article Number: 007, Published: JUN 3 2014 2. Holographic Q-lattices, A. Donos and J.P. Gauntlett, JOURNAL OF HIGH ENERGY PHYSICS Issue: 4, Article Number: 040 Published: APR 7 2014 3. Competing orders in M-theory: superfluids, stripes and metamagnetism, A. Donos, J.P. Gauntlett, J. Sonner and B. Withers, JOURNAL OF HIGH ENERGY PHYSICS Issue: 3, Article Number: 108 Published: MAR 2013 4. Holographic Superfluids and the Dynamics of Symmetry Breaking, M.J. Bhaseen, J.P. Gauntlett, B.D. Simons, J.Sonner and T. Wiseman, PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS Volume: 110 Issue: 1 Article Number: 015301 Published: JAN 2 2013
Professor Jonathan Halliwell
proofs of Fine's theorem, which is essentially the logical converse of Bell's theorem -- it states that the CHSH inequalities are not only a necessary condition for the existence of an underlying hidden variables theory, they are also a sufficient condition.
1. Suppression of quantum-mechanical reflection by environmental decoherence: D. J. Bedingham and J. J. Halliwell, Phys. Rev. A 88, 022128 (2013) 2. Classical limit of the quantum Zeno effect by environmental decoherence: D.J.Bedingham, J.J.Halliwell: Phys. Rev. A 89, 042116 (2014)
3. Quantum backflow states from eigenstates of the regularized current operator: J.J.Halliwell, E.Gillman, O.Lennon, M.Patel, I.Ramirez,, J. Phys. A: Math. Theor. 46, 475303 (2013)
4. Two proofs of Fine's theorem: J.J.Halliwell, Phys Lett A 378, 2945 (2014).
Professor Amihay Hanany
In the last year or so I completed two substantial papers with my postdoc Dan Bedingham, which demonstrate two closely related results for a point particle system: both quantum-mechanical reflection off a simple step potential and the Zeno effect arising from very frequent position measurements are suppressedas a result of environmental decoherence. The classical limit of these two non-classical effects is thereby obtained. With four undergraduate project students, I wrote a paper on how to generate an exhaustive class of backflow states, states of positive momenta but negative current so that the probability flows backwards, an intriguing nonclassical effect awaiting experimental confirmation. I also wrote a short letter offering a new and transparent
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Theoretical Physics
we used these results to predict moduli spaces of Argyres Douglas theories. In 2 we solved a long standing problem of finding the moduli space of instantons for exceptional groups. Other topics of study included the moduli space of vortices in 6, the deformation of brane tilings by mass terms in 4, and development of Hilbert series techniques in 3. 1.T r (G) Theories and Their Hilbert Series Stefano Cremonesi (King's Coll. London, Dept. Math & Imperial Coll., London), Amihay Hanany (Imperial Coll., London), Noppadol Mekareeya (CERN), Alberto Zaffaroni (Milan Bicocca U. & INFN, Milan Bicocca). Oct 6, 2014. 56 pp. s
2.Coulomb Branch and The Moduli Space of Instantons Stefano Cremonesi, Giulia Ferlito, Amihay Hanany (Imperial Coll., London), Noppadol Mekareeya (CERN). Aug 28, 2014. 41 pp. IMPERIAL-TP-14-AH-08, CERN-PH-TH2014-136
3.Highest Weight Generating Functions for Hilbert Series Amihay Hanany, Rudolph Kalveks (Imperial Coll., London). Aug 20, 2014. 68 pp. Published in JHEP 1410 (2014) 152 IMPERIALTP-14-AH-07
4. Mass-deformed Brane Tilings Massimo Bianchi (Rome U.,Tor Vergata & INFN, Rome2), Stefano Cremonesi, Amihay Hanany (Imperial Coll., London), Jose Francisco Morales (Rome U.,Tor Vergata & INFN, Rome2), Daniel Ricci Pacifici (Padua U., Astron. Dept. & INFN, Padua), Rak-Kyeong Seong (Korea Inst. Advanced Study, Seoul). Aug 8, 2014. 34 pp. Published in JHEP 1410 (2014) 27 IMPERIAL-TP-13-AH-04, KIAS-P14038, IMPERIAL-TP-13-AH-06 DOI: 10.1007/JHEP10(2014)027
During this year the attention was devoted to the study of the Coulomb branch of N=4 supersymmetric gauge theories in 3 dimensions. We developed a new formula for the Coulomb brach Hilbert series, and this is based on the contributions from monopole operators to the chiral ring. This led to a collection of new results. In 9 we showed how to get new mirror pairs by gauging a global symmetry, which amounts to ungauging a gauge symmetry in the mirror. In 8,7,1 we developed technical tools related to this formula that involve Hall Littlewood polynomials in various forms. In 5
5.Complete Graphs, Hilbert Series, and the Higgs branch of the 4d N=2 (An,Am) SCFT's Michele Del Zotto (Harvard U., Phys. Dept.), Amihay Hanany (Imperial Coll., London). Mar 25, 2014. 20 pp. 6.Hilbert Series and Moduli Spaces of k U(N) Vortices Amihay Hanany (Imperial Coll., London), Rak-Kyeong Seong (Korea Inst. Advanced Study, Seoul). Mar 19, 2014. 102 pp. IMPERIAL-TP-13-AH-04, KIAS-P14016
7.Coulomb branch Hilbert series and Three Dimensional Sicilian Theories Stefano Cremonesi, Amihay Hanany (Imperial Coll., London), Noppadol Mekareeya (CERN), Alberto Zaffaroni (INFN, Milan Bicocca & Milan Bicocca U.). Mar 10, 2014. 45 pp. CERN-PH-TH-2014-036, IMPERIAL-TP-14-SC02 DOI: 10.1007/JHEP09(2014)185 8.Coulomb branch Hilbert series and HallLittlewood polynomials Stefano Cremonesi, Amihay Hanany (Imperial Coll., London), Noppadol Mekareeya (CERN), Alberto Zaffaroni
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Research (INFN, Milan Bicocca & Milan Bicocca U.). Mar 3, 2014. 67 pp. CERN-PH-TH-2013-278, IMPERIAL-TP-14-SC-01 DOI: 10.1007/JHEP09(2014)178 9.Mirror Symmetry in Three Dimensions via Gauged Linear Quivers Anindya Dey (Texas U. & Texas U., TCC), Amihay Hanany (Imperial Coll., London), Peter Koroteev (Perimeter Inst. Theor. Phys.), Noppadol Mekareeya (CERN). Jan 31, 2014. 73 pp. Published in JHEP06 (2014) 059 UTTG-36-13, TCC-030-13, CERNPH-TH-2013-279 DOI: 10.1007/JHEP06(2014)059
Professor Chris Hull FRS
Hull and Zwiebach in a highly cited paper from 2009. The geometry and physics of doubled spacetime were developed and discussed in [2]. Explicit forms were found for finite gauge transformations, elucidating the nature of tensors and showing the relation with generalised geometry. The development of these results and their application to the global structure of doubled geometry is the subject of on-going research.
Theoretical Physics
the first has been published [2]. There is however an ongoing dispute about the validity of this work.
[1. T.W.B. Kibble, The standard model of particle physics, European Rev. 23, 36–44 (2014)
2. Richard Lieu, T.W.B. Kibble and Lingze Duan, Measurement of the dispersion of radiation from a steady cosmological source, Ap. J. 778, 73 (2013)
Professor João Magueijo
1) Emergent Time and the M5-Brane By C.M. Hull and N. Lambert, arXiv:1403.4532 [hepth] , JOURNAL OF HIGH ENERGY PHYSICS 1406 (2014) 016. 2) Finite Gauge Transformations and Geometry in Double Field Theory By C M Hull. arXiv:1406.7794 [hep-th], to appear in , JOURNAL OF HIGH ENERGY PHYSICS.
Professor Sir Tom Kibble FRS
In joint work with Neil Lambert, the possibility of time emerging from a theory without time was discussed. We argued that the strong coupling limit of the maximal super-YangMills theory in 5 Euclidean dimensions has an emergent time dimension and gives a description of the 5+1 dimensional M5-brane theory, compactified on a timelike circle. The discussion involved questions of how to quantise Euclidean theories without time, and indeed the meaning of quantum theory in such systems. Issues of space-time signature, emergent dimensions and periodic time were also addressed.
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String theory has duality symmetries, which allow the construction of nongeometric backgrounds. String theory on a torus requires dual coordinates conjugate to winding number. This leads to physics and novel geometry in a doubled spacetime. This is formulated in double field theory, introduced by www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Not a lot to report! Much of my activity in the last two years has been directed towards giving historical talks about the origins of the Higgs mechanism and the unified electroweak theory, or the wider standard model. None has been published yet, but one, given at DICE2014 in Castiglioncello will be published next year. A semi-popular invited talk I gave at the annual meeting of the Academia Europaea in Wrocław has been published [1]. I also provided some theoretical input to a project undertaken by Richard Lieu and his student Lingze Duan of the University of Alabama at Huntsville on possible methods of improving astrophysical measurements, of which
Over the past year I continued to investigate the cosmology of models with deformed dispersion relations, and their relation to dynamical dimensional reduction, as seen in many quantum gravity schemes. A remarkable dual picture was discovered in [1] dispensing with the dubious concept of spectral dimension, replacing it by the straightforward Hausdorff dimension o fmomentum space, and shedding light on they scale-invariance of the associated cosmological fluctuations. A better understanding of how departures from exact scaleinvariance may arise was also obtained in a couple of papers (e.g. [2], where a connection with intermediate inflation was found). More importantly, a method was found for introducing deformed dispersion relations representative of dimensional reduction without picking out a preferred frame. This may prove to be the best set up for studying these scenarios, with a minimal number of free parameters. On different front I continued to
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Research investigate the cosmological consequences of Cartan gravity, e.g. regarding signature change (see [4]). This followed up on earlier work on torsion and spin cosmology. 1. G.Amelino-Camelia, M.Arzano, G.Gubitosi and J.Magueijo, Dimensional reduction in momentum space and scale-invariant cosmological fluctuations, Phys. Rev. D {bf 88}, no. 10, 103524 (2013) 2. J.D.Barrow and J.Magueijo, Intermediate inflation from rainbow gravity, Phys. Rev. D88, no. 10, 103525 (2013)
3. G.Amelino-Camelia, M.Arzano, G.Gubitosi and J.Magueijo, Planck-scale dimensional reduction without a preferred frame,Phys. Lett. B736, 317 (2014) 4. J.Magueijo, M.Rodriguez-Vazquez, H.Westman and T.G.Zlosnik, Cosmological signature change in Cartan Gravity with dynamical symmetry breaking, Phys. Rev. D89, 063542 (2014)
Professor Arttu Rajantie
Collider at CERN, which will be searching for magnetic monopoles. I have worked on identifying theories that would predict light magnetic monopoles and developed methods for calculating their predictions from quantum field theory.1
1. MoEDAL Collaboration (B. Acharya et al.), “The physics programme of the MoEDAL experiment at the LHC”, International Journal of Modern Physics A29 (2014) 1430050
Theoretical Physics
conformal theory in n-1 dimensions and higher spin theory in AdSn space showing the equality of the corresponding partition functions and Casimir energies on a spatial sphere. The higher spin theory in AdSn is also closely related to higher-derivative conformal higher spin theory in n-1 dimensions for which we determined the conditions of cancellation of conformal anomalies.
2. L. Bethke, D. G. Figueroa and A. Rajantie, “On the Anisotropy of the Gravitational Wave Background from Massless Preheating”, Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics 1406 (2014) 047
1. A.A. Tseytlin,On partition function and Weyl anomaly of conformal higher spin fields, Nucl. Phys.B 877, 598 (2013)
3. L. Bethke, D. G. Figueroa and A. Rajantie, “Anisotropies in the gravitational wave background from preheating”, Physical Review Letters 111 (2013) 011301
3. S.Giombi, I.R.Klebanov and A.A.Tseytlin, Partition Functions and Casimir Energies in Higher Spin AdS(d+1)/CFT(d), Phys. Rev. D 90, 024048 (2014)
3. S. Orani and A. Rajantie, “Supersymmetric hybrid inflation with a light scalar”, Physical Review D88 (2013) 043508
Professor Arkady Tseytlin
2. B.Hoare, A.Stepanchuk and A.A.Tseytlin, Giant magnon solution and dispersion relation in string theory in AdS3xS3xT4 with mixed flux, Nucl. Phys.B 879, 318 (2014)
4. B.Hoare, R.Roiban and A.A.Tseytlin, On deformations of AdSn x Sn supercosets, JHEP 1406, 002 (2014)
Professor Daniel Waldram
I have investigated the cosmological implications of the Higgs field and other possible light scalar fields. Together with my PhD student Laura Bethke and Daniel Figueroa from University of Geneva, we showed that in the presence of a light scalar field, the gravitational wave background from the end of inflation in the early universe would be anisotropic, and that if observed, these anisotropies could be used to test and constrain cosmological theories.2,4 With another PhD student Stefano Orani, we showed a light scalar field can arise from a supersymmetric theory, with interesting cosmological consequences.3 I am also a member of the new MoEDAL experiment at the Large Hadron
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Our work on AdS/CFT duality continued along several directions. We developed an integrabilitybased approach to superstrings in AdS3 x S3 space discovering that the corresponding disperstion relation for elementary magnons has a novel form different from the one in the much studied AdS5 x S5 case. We also investigated integrable deformations of AdSn x Sn supercoset models finding new relations between previously known integrable sigma models in AdS2 x S2 and AdS3 x S3 cases. We also studied vectorial AdS/CFT between singlet sector of free scalar or free fermion
My work has focused on understanding the geometric structures underlying string theory generalisations of Einstein gravity, with implications for the AdS/cft correspondence, flux compactifications and more generally the symmetry structure underlying M theory. In collaboration with two (now former) PhD students, André Coimbra and Charles Strickland-Constable, we defined a generalised notion of Riemannian geometry, based on exceptional groups, that gives a reformulation of type II and eleven-
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Research dimensional supergravities as generalised pure Einstein theories [1,2]. With Strickland-Constable (then at DESY) and a postdoc at Imperial College, Kanghoon Lee, we used this formalism to derive a universal description of consistent truncations of supergravities as generalised ScherkSchwarz reductions, giving for the first time a geometrical understanding of the remarkable sphere consistent truncations first discovered in the late 1980s. With Mariana Graña (IPhT, Saclay), Jan Louis (Hamburg Univ and DESY) and Ulrich Theis (Hannover) we analysed the structure of string and quantum corrections to type II reductions on SU(3) structure manifolds, showing that they closely mirror the correction on conventional Calabi-Yau manifolds. Finally with Coimbra, Ruben Minasian (IPhT, Saclay) and Hagen Triendl (CERN) we showed how the string corrections to heterotic sueprgravity could again be described using the formalism of generalised geometry. Results from these last three projects all appeared as preprints during the year. 1. Ed(d)×ℝ+ generalised geometry, connections and M theory: A. Coimbra, C. StricklandConstable and D. Waldram, JHEP 1402, 054 (2014).
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2. Supergravity as Generalised Geometry II: Ed(d)×ℝ+ and M theory: A. Coimbra, C. Strickland-Constable and D. Waldram, JHEP 1403, 019 (2014).
Dr Toby Wiseman
During the period 2013-2014 my research has been focussed on the gravitational aspects of the AdSCFT correspondence. I have continued to use numerical methods to solve the bulk gravitational Einstein equations in situations of relevance for dual field theory physics. In particular I showed how quench dynamics relevant for describing holographic superconductors can be reproduced [1], and also discussed a new class
Theoretical Physics of black holes with non-Killing horizons [2] which is important in understanding plasma flow in strongly coupled gauge theory via holography. I co-authored an invited review [3] on these and related topics applying gravitational methods to study strongly coupled field theory. I have also developed new methods to understand the emergence of black hole physics in thermal supersymmetric gauge theory, starting with the work [4], and this is now an on-going program. 1. Holographic Superfluids and the Dynamics of Symmetry Breaking: J. Bhaseen, J. Gauntlett, B. Simons, J. Sonner, T. Wiseman; Phys.Rev.Lett. 110 (2013) 015301 2. Stationary holographic plasma quenches and numerical methods for nonKilling horizons: P. Figueras, T. Wiseman; Phys.Rev.Lett. 110 (2013) 171602 3. Holographic thermal field theory on curved spacetimes: D. Marolf, M. Rangamani, T. Wiseman ; Class.Quant.Grav. 31 (2014) 063001 4. On black hole thermodynamics from super Yang-Mills: T. Wiseman ; JHEP 1307 (2013) 101
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Technical Development, Intellectual Property and Commercial Interactions, the Blackett Laboratory Industry Club Research in the Physics Department at Imperial College is a mix of fundamental and end-user-inspired interdisciplinary science. This profile promotes the primary role of physics in advancing elemental knowledge and also highlights its crucial role in stimulating economic growth,and in tackling key global issues.
We engage with over 60 external companies through collaborative research, consultancy, knowledge transfer and patenting/licencing of our intellectual property. We also contribute to economic growth through setting up commercially successful spinout companies.
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We collaborate with the commercial sector at all levels and of course PhD students within the Department benefit from direct industrial sponsorship and EPSRC CASE awards.
The Department set up an industry club in 2010 in order to interact on a more regular basis with companies who are interested to recruit our students and postdocs and engage with the department on collaborative research projects.
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Technical Development, Intellectual Property and Commercial Interactions, the Blackett Laboratory Industry Club The technology developments and commercial activities within our research groups include the following:
Astrophysics Both the Herschel and Planck teams continue the development of data reduction and analysis software for these two missions. For Planck our work is aimed at the determination of beam shapes and focal plane geometry from actual survey data using either scans across individual bright sources or through combination of data on large numbers of fainter sources. This work is crucial to the science goals of the Planck mission. For Herschel we are coordinating the development of data reduction and analysis software for the whole of the SPIRE instrument and have special responsibility for mapmaking codes through a contract from the European Space Agency which will be used for both the SPIRE and PACS instruments.
Condensed Matter Theory The group has a wide-ranging computational and theoretical research portfolio with a strategic focus on materials for structural, electronic and photonic applications, providing theoretical and computational expertise. Many projects have direct relevance to the next generation of technologies. Our work on metamaterials has shown how to create perfect lenses that beat the diffraction limit, how to harvest light efficiently, and how to make objects invisible. Our work on functional and structural materials includes studies of radiation damage in fusion and fission reactors, surfaces and grain boundaries in perovskites for functional applications, the high-temperature corrosion of Ni- and Febase structural alloys, thermoelectrics for power generation, capacitors for energy storage, and plasticity under shock loading.
The Group enjoys working relationships with Accelrys, Astron, Antenova, Argonne National Laboratory, Baker Hughes, BP, BAE, Element Six, Materials Design, Placental Analytics, Rolls-Royce, the UK Atomic Energy Authority, the UK Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, and the US Air Force Office of Scientific Research. We hold several patents.
Experimental Solid State Physics The experimental Solid State Physics Group develops technologies across a broad range of areas that have impact on the displays and lighting sector, the information and communication technologies sector, the solar
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energy sector, and the health care and security sectors. Our innovations derive largely from expertise in molecular electronic materials and devices, inorganic semiconductors and devices, nanomagnetism and transition metal oxides and devices. Programmes span materials design, synthesis and processing, device fabrication and optimization and applications assessment. Welldeveloped skills in optical and electrical materials and device characterization and modelling underpin this activity. Much of the work in the group proceeds through collaborative research programmes frequently involving industrial partners. Leading international companies that have supported our work include BP Solar, Merck, DuPont Teijin Films, Sumitomo Chemical Co., Philips Research Labs., Solvay, Unilever, CDT, Toshiba, BASF, LG, Solenne B.V., Toyota, and Oxford Instruments. The group also benefits from collaborations with the NPL at Teddington. The group also has a strong record of protecting intellectual property and exploiting it through spinout companies such as QuantaSol and Molecular Vision.
High Energy Physics The dark matter experimental part of the High Energy Physics group is dedicated to the development of advanced particle detectors for 1- 100 keV energies and associated technology (high precision ultra-high vacuum technology in copper, partper-billion level gas purification, charge/light readout technologies, cryogenics). A joint development programme has being undertaken with UK-based ET Enterprises Ltd (formerly Electron Tubes Ltd) to develop a photomultiplier tube with ultra-low radioactive background. This work is in its final stages and promises to deliver the world’s most radio-pure phototube, which will find world-wide application in large experiments for neutrino detection, dark matter searches, and neutrinoless double-beta decay. The underground laboratory at Boulby represents a symbiotic relationship between industry (CPL mine) and university research. The gravitational-wave project drives charge control systems and associated technology (UV light sources, particle guns, satellite instrumentation). For this work the group collaborates with EADS (Astrium UK, Astrium Germany), Carlo Gavazzi Space (Italy), ETL, the European Space Agency, SciSys and SEA. Plasma Physics The Group is engaged in work involving the development and exploitation of high-voltage pulsed power sys-
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Technical Development, Intellectual Property and Commercial Interactions, the Blackett Laboratory Industry Club tems and high-power lasers. Our research using lasers has led to developments in the field of 'compact' plasma-based particle accelerators with many potential applications ranging from advanced light sources to medical imaging and hadron therapy. We also investigate dusty plasmas, an understanding of which is important in integrated circuit manufacture and for future fusion power plant designs. We collaborate with many companies and organisations that provide support for our activities in a broad range of ways including commercial contracts, knowledge transfer secondments, PhD support and through joint grant awards. These include UKAEA Culham, the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, AWE Aldermaston plc, Sandia National Laboratory, the Laboratory for Laser Energetics (University of Rochester), the Institute of Laser Engineering (University of Osaka), the US Naval Research Laboratory and the Lawrence Livermore National Labo-
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ratory. We also host the Centre for Inertial Fusion Studies (CIFS) and the Institute of Shock Physics (ISP) which has substantial links with commercial and industrial organisations, include QinetiQ, THALES and BAE as well as its major sponsor, AWE. These involve investigations of high-speed impacts e.g. on electronic components, high strain-rate loading of engineering and biological materials and the development of robust predictive capabilities for systems under extremes of strain and pressure. Laser Consortium Our technology is associated with developing high intensity and ultra short laser pulses. Theoretical descriptions of the effect of these intense fields have led to technology that can be used to produce microscopic optical structures by laser induced modification (through multiphoton ionisation) of media. The attosecond basic
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Technical Development, Intellectual Property and Commercial Interactions, the Blackett Laboratory Industry Club technology programme promises to open up new fields of ultra high time resolution measurement in surface science etc. Technology recently developed as part of this project has been spun out and a second custom system for hollow fibre pulse compression to generate 10 fs pulses has been delivered to RAL under contract. A broadband phase shaper for high intensity laser pulses is also in the process of being patented. Plasmas produced by interaction of short pulse lasers with sub wavelength clusters and micronscale objects are a promising source for x-ray generation at lithographically important wave-lengths. They also produce high energy density plasmas of interest for the testing of numerical codes. Blast waves in extended cluster media can be used to model astrophysical and other strongly driven systems and produce high quality data useful in the benchmarking of complex radiation hydrocodes. We have an active collaboration with AWE including funding, personnel exchange and equipment loan.
Quantum Optics and Laser Science The Group applies cutting edge laser technology, quantum-enhanced technology and detailed numerical modeling to a broad range of measurement and control problems in information processing, metrology, sensing and basic physics research. The Centre for Cold Matter has an ongoing collaboration with the K. J. Lesker company investigating transparent conductive films for polymers. There are also links with PG Technology (Precision machining company) on design of molecular decelerators, and with Shimadzu Research Laboratories (Europe) on the development of novel THz detectors which has recently resulted in a joint patent. There are ongoing collaborations with the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) on ion trapping and the development of ultra-stable lasers. This has included supervision of students funded by the NPL who carry out most of their experimental work there, but who are registered as students at Imperial College. The Quantum Information Theory sub group has links with a number of companies including Toshiba and NTT.
Photonics In the Photonics group, most of our projects are interdisciplinary and we work closely with industry. Direct support for research into high throughput and multidimensional fluorescence imaging, particularly fluorescence lifetime imaging (FLIM) has come from Perkin Elmer Life and Analytical Sciences (UK) Ltd and GE Healthcare. ‘In kind’ support has come from AstraZeneca UK Ltd, GlaxoSmithKline R&D, Kentech Instruments Ltd, Leica Microsystems (UK) Ltd, Olympus 104
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Optical Co UK Ltd. We also have a founding interest in Aurox Ltd, a spin-out from Oxford University, manufacturing optical microscopy equipment. Our fibre laser programme addresses wavelength and pulse length versatile, all-fibre configurations primarily deploying MOPFA (Master Oscillator Power Fibre Amplifier) technology including development of versatile compact seed sources, to generate high average power, spectrally bright single mode sources. The fibre laser work has long-standing collaboration and support from the IPG Group of Companies. Direct support in the area of high power diode-pumped solid-state lasers and nonlinear optics has come from the Electro-Magnetic Remote Sensing (EMRS) Defence Technology Centre, established by the UK Ministry of Defence and run by an industrial consortium of SELEX Sensors and Airborne Systems, Thales Defence, Roke Manor Research and Filtronic. This involves novel adaptive sensors and laser sources for enhancing signal and information retrieval in complex remote sensing scenarios. Pilkington Optronics (now Thales) have supported CASE awards and ‘in kind’ support has come from Shell Research Labs, Spectra-Physics and Spectron Laser Systems. The European Space Agency is sponsoring the development of new high efficiency tunable lasers for next generation satellite-based remote sensing for atmospheric and earth science addressing climate change, weather prediction and monitoring the health of the Earth’s biosystem. Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
Technical Development, Intellectual Property and Commercial Interactions, the Blackett Laboratory Industry Club
Space and Atmospheric Physics The group has a long history of leading magnetometer instruments for space research. Our continued collaboration with Ultra Electronics Ltd has resulted in a new fluxgate design which at 100g is half the mass of any sensor we have previously flow in space. We completed a collaboration with EADS Astrium, MSSL (UCL) and SciSys Ltd to validate new data-handling architectures for future small satellites where processing power and resources will need to be shared amongst many users. We have also completed a first stage of testing new, commercially available, solid state magnetoresistive sensors, with promising results.
As part of an EU Marie Curie Research Training Network GLADNET we are also studying the characteristics of Glow Discharges, used as an analytical method in industrial applications for example in quality testing of thin coatings. The group is strongly engaged with the Climate knowledge Innovation Community (KIC) and is developing the next generation catastrophe model software for the insurance sector.
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Theoretical Physics The dominant part of the Group's activities lie in studying theories of the fundamental nature of the universe and associated commercial applications arise in the very long term. However, there are some subsidiary consultancy activities. Tim Evans is a consultant with Digital Science http://www.digital-science.com/ who produce software to collate and analyse information for academics and academic institutions, for instance Digital Science produces Symplectic's Elements software which manages the publications of academics at Imperial College. He is also a Scientific Advisor to NewsfFlo http://www.newsflo.net who produce software to collate and analyse information from News outlets for academic institutions. Jerome Gauntlett is a Scientific Advisor for the Arts Club in Mayfair and he was the Theoretical Physics consultant for the film the Theory of Everything.
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Technical Development, Intellectual Property and Commercial Interactions, the Blackett Laboratory Industry Club BLACKETT LABORATORY INDUSTRY CLUB
In 2010 the department set up the Industry Club, with the aim to enhance the good working relationships that exist between the Imperial College Physics Department and a number of companies and to develop such relationships with new partners. The department set about creating two departmental wide events per year inviting all Industry club members. The PGR Research Symposium event which is held in June each year, is a show casing event where all second year PhD students present posters and all third year PhD students give talks. Industry club members are involved in choosing poster prize winners. The second major event of the year is the industry club recruitment event, which is a more traditional career fair. Both events are well attended.
Laboratory, Oxford Instruments, IPG Photonics, Qioptiq, RBS, Renishaw, TTP, Toshiba, Winton Capital. Bespoke recruitment events were held for Winton Capital, Renishaw and Electronic Arts.
In 2014, the industry club co-sponsored our international undergraduate summer research exchange programme (i-UROP) at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of British Columbia,and Seoul National University creating the opportunity for seven of our third year Physics undergraduates to enjoy a state of the art research experience. The industry club also sponsors a PhD thesis prize and two of our club members AWE and Winton Capital also sponsor their own named post graduate thesis prize.
2014 Industry Club members include: AWE,BP, Bloomberg, Electronic Arts National Physical 106
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Prizes and Awards Prizes & Awards 1.1.13-31.12.14
Astrophysics • Astrophysics Group – The Herschel-SPIRE Team, in which Imperial’s Astrophysics Group played a major role, has been awarded the 2014 Royal Astronomical Society Group Achievement Award. • Dr Dave Clements – The Herschel-Spire Team, of which Imperial is a part has been awarded the 2013 Arthur C Clarke Award for Academic Study/Research – 2014 • Dr Jonathan Pritchard – Awarded the Rees Rawlings Prize for the best PGCert portfolio of 2013 (by the Imperial EDU Group) - 2014 • Mr Hikmatali Shariff – 3 Minute Thesis Competition winner – 2014 • Dr Roberto Trotta - awarded an STFC Impact Acceleration Account award entitled “From Supernovae to Road Safety: Astrostatistical data analysis techniques for accident prevention” - 2014 Condensed Matter Theory • Prof Sir John Pendry – Won the Isaac Newton Medal of the Institute of Physics 2013 • Prof Sir John Pendry – Awarded the Julius Springer Prize for Applied Physics 2013 • Prof Sir John Pendry - awarded a share of the 2014 Kavli Prize in Nanoscience – 2014 • Prof Mike Finnis - received a von Humboldt Research Award from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in Germany. The award comprises 60K Euros in Germany - 2014
Experimental Solid State • Prof Donal Bradley – Received the Founders Prize Lecture of the IOP/RSC Polymer Physics Group at the Physical Aspects of Polymer Science biennial meeting in Sheffield – 2013 • Professor Donal Bradley - awarded an Honorary DSc from the University of Sheffield – 2014 • Professor Jenny Nelson - awarded a Fellowship of the Royal Society – 2014 • Dr John Labram has been awarded the Elings Prize Fellowship from the University of California Santa Barbara - 2014 • Mr Gianluca Bovo – awarded a Spring E-MRS’ 2014 Graduate Student Award - 2014 • Mr James Semple – 3 Minute Thesis Competition winner - 2014 • Mr Ed Yoxall – Awarded the Solid State Physics Prize - 2014 • Ms Katharina Zeissler - Awarded the Winton Capital Prize - 2014 www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
High Energy Physics • Prof Tijinder Virdee – received Honorary Doctorate (Honoris Causa) from Queen Mary University of London – 2013 • Prof Tijinder Virdee – Received Honorary Doctorate from the Universite Claude Bernard Lyon 1, Lyon, France; Awarded the Asian GG2 Award; Named 37th on the list of Britian’s 101 Most Influential Asians. • Prof Sir Tejinder Virdee was knighted in the 2014 Queen’s Birthday Honours List - 2014 • Dr Lyn Evans - is a Visiting Professor in High Energy Physics – is the first winner of the prestigious St David Award for Innovation and Technology - 2014 • Dr Gregory Iles – Received the CMS 2013 Achievement Award from the CMS Experiment at CERN – ‘For his leading contribution to electronics design’ - 2014 • Mr Nick Wardle – Awarded the Winton Capital Prize 2014 • Prof Lyndon Rees Evans – Awarded Dirac Medal by the International Centre for Theoretical Physics at Trieste and won the Glazebrook Medal and Prize – Institute of Physics – 2013 ISP • Miss Chiara Bo – Awarded AWE PhD Prize – 2014 • Mr Michael Rutherford – Won 1st place at the RAL High Power Laser meeting Student Poster Competition - 2014
PE CDT • Mr Joseph Shaw – awarded both a Fall and a Spring E-MRS’ 2014 Poster Prize - 2014
Photonics • Mr Ben Chapman – Awarded the Blackett Laboratory – Industry Club Thesis Prize - 2014 Plasma Physics • Dr Guy Burdiak - awarded 2014 Culham Thesis – 2014 • Professor Steve Cowley - awarded a Fellowship of the Royal Society – 2014 • Professor Steve Cowley - awarded a Fellowship of the Royal Academy of Engineering in recognition of his outstanding and continuing contributions to engineering - 2014 • Mr Arthur Turrell - Awarded AWE PhD Prize - 2014 Quantum Optics & Laser Science • Prof Sir Peter Knight – Received Imperial College Medal – 2013 • Prof Sir Peter Knight awarded Honorary Degree of D
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Prizes and Awards Litt by Macquarie University – 2014 • Prof Sir Peter Knight elected Honorary Fellowship of the Institute of Physics - 2014 • Dr Ben Brown – EPSRC Doctoral Prize Fellowship 2014 • Mr Steffen Driever – Awarded a Newport Research Excellence Travel grant to attend the Photonics west Conference in San Francisco. Also won the best student paper award - 2014 • Mr Sandeep Mavadia - Awarded the Anne Thorne Thesis Prize - 2014 • Mr Malte Oppermann – Awarded the Anne Thorne Thesis Prize - 2014 • Mr Stefan Truppe - Awarded the Blackett Laboratory – Industry Club Thesis Prize - 2014 Space & Atmospheric Physics • Prof Michele Dougherty and the Magnetometer Team – won the Group Achievement Award in Geophysics, awarded by the Royal Astronomical Society – 2014
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• Professor Michele Dougherty - awarded a Royal Society Research Professorship - 2014 • Emeritus Prof John Harries – Awarded Fellowship of Aberystwyth University (equivalent to an Honorary Degree elsewhere) - 2014 • Ms Minyi Liang - awarded a Kristian Gerhard Jebsen Scholarship within the Grantham Institute to undertake research in the Department of Physics - 2014
Theoretical Physics • Prof Tom Kibble – Awarded Dirac Medal by the International Centre for Theoretical Physics at Trieste and Honorary Fellow status of the Institute of Physics – 2013 • Professor Tom Kibble - received the 2014 Einstein Medal of the Albert Einstein Society of Bern, Switzerland - 2014 • Professor Tom Kibble - awarded the Royal Medal of the Royal Society of Edinburgh – 2014 • Professor João Magueijo - awarded a Leverhulme Research Fellowship for “Dimensional reduction at
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Prizes and Awards the Planck scale and models of the early universe” 2014
Teaching • These members of staff were shortlisted as nominees for the Student Academic Choice Awards: Dr Simon Bland, Dr Tim Evans, Dr Joachim Hamm, Prof Martin McCall, Prof Peter Torok - 2013 • Faculty of Natural Sciences Awards for Teaching Excellence were awarded to: • Prof Steven Cowley • Prof Matthew Foulkes • Prof Terry Rudolph • Dr Richard Hendricks • Dr Edward Hill • Dr Subhanjoy Mohanty • Dr Alexander Richards • Dr Francisco Suzuki Vidalm • Miss Giulia Ferlito • Mr Peter T Fox • Mr Jeremey Turcaud • Mr John Wood UG Student • Leo Hughes - awarded the Julian Schwinger Prize for the Best Student Presentation - 2014 • Renjie Yun - awarded a prestigious Lee Family PhD Scolarship -2014 Abdus Salam Postgraduate Prize 2013 For annual award to a student in the Department of
Physics for the best performance in the Quantum Fields and Fundamental Forces MSc Peter Jones (M) £250
Adrian Sutton Prize Prize for a major contribution to the life of the Centre for Doctoral Training in Theory and Simulation of Materials Andrea Greco (M) £600
Gladys Locke Prize in Applied Optics For annual award to the student who achieves the best overall performance in the Applied Optics MSc course, taking into account written examinations, laboratory and project work. Paloma Matia Hernando (F) £100
Winton Capital Prize for the Best PhD Thesis in Physics For annual award to the student with the best PhD thesis in Physics using computational methods. Nick Wardle (M) £250 Winton Capital Prize for the Best PhD Thesis in Physics For annual award to the student with the best PhD thesis in Physics using computational methods. Katharina Zeissler (F) £250
Director's Prize For annual award to the student with the best overall performance in the Plastic Electronics MRES. Scott Wheeler (M) £250
Anne Thorne Thesis Prize A PhD thesis in experimental physics concerned with the development and / or use of new experimental instrumentation or techniques. Malte Oppermann (F) £200
Anne Thorne Thesis Prize A PhD thesis in experimental physics concerned with the development and / or use of new experimental instrumentation or techniques. Sandeep Mavadia (M) £200 Research Prize for best MRes Project in PE CDT The MRes in Plastic Electronics will have a prize sponsored by Sigma-Aldrich for best MRes Project David Harkin (M) £250
Alina Khmelevskaya receiving her Ken Allen prize from Prof Jordan Nash. www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
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Prizes and Awards For 5 years from 2011 In recognition of doctoral thesis work that has made a significant scientific or technology contribution as measured by peer review publications or patents filed in an area of applied physics. Ben Chapman (M) £200 For 5 years from 2011 In recognition of doctoral thesis work that has made a significant scientific or technology contribution as measured by peer review publications or patents filed in an area of applied physics. Stefan Truppe (M) £200
For 5 years from 2011 In recognition of doctoral thesis work that has made a significant scientific or technology contribution as measured by peer review publications or patents filed in an area of solid state physics. Ned Yoxall (M) £200
Materials Design Prize - For 5 years from 2011 For annual award to students who make the most significant progress at the early stage assessments. Gabriel Lau(M) £300 Materials Design Prize For 5 years from 2011 For annual award to students who make the most significant progress at the late stage assessments. Thomas Swinburne(M) £300 Prize for Outstanding Contribution to the Life Centre for Doctoral Training in Theory and Simulation of Materials for 7 years from 2013 For Outstanding Contribution to the Life Centre for Doctoral Training in Theory and Simulation of Materials Anthony Lim (M) £200
Prize for Outstanding Contribution to outreach or public engagement by a student in the Centre for Doctoral Training in Theory and Simulation of Materials for 7 years from 2013 For Outstanding Contribution to outreach or public engagement by a student in the Centre for Doctoral Training in Theory and Simulation of Materials Marc Coury(M) £200
Prize for Outstanding Contribution to the Life of the TSM CDT - For 5 years from 2011 For annual award to the student who makes the most outstanding (non-academic) contribution to the success and development of the Centre. Vincent Chen (M) £100
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Prize for Outstanding Contribution to the Life of the TSM CDT - For 5 years from 2011 For annual award to the student who makes the most outstanding (non-academic) contribution to the success and development of the Centre. Mohammed Khawaja (M) £100 Prize for Outstanding Contribution to the Life of the TSM CDT - For 5 years from 2011 For annual award to the student who makes the most outstanding (non-academic) contribution to the success and development of the Centre. Daniel Rathbone (M) £100 Prize for Outstanding Contribution to the Life of the TSM CDT - For 5 years from 2011 For annual award to the student who makes the most outstanding (non-academic) contribution to the success and development of the Centre. Chiara Liverani (F) £100
Prize for innovation in computation or experimental physics on graduation for 5 years from 2013 Best PhD in the field of High Energy Density, shock regimes and plasma Physics. AWE will provide the department with an annual sum. Chiara Bo(F) £250 Prize for innovation in computation or experimental physics on graduation for 5 years from 2013 Best PhD in the field of High Energy Density, shock regimes and plasma Physics. AWE will provide the department with an annual sum. Arthur Turrell (M) £250 College Prize for award for outstanding achievement College Prize for award for outstanding achievement Jassell Majevadia(F) £250
College Prize for award for outstanding achievement College Prize for award for outstanding achievement Aeneas Wiener(M) £250
Sir Peter Knight Award Best overall performance in the MRes year by a Controlled Quantum Dynamics Centre for Doctoral Training student. Antony Milne (M) £200
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Prizes and Awards PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of talk Session 1 Peter Sinclair (M) £200 PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of runner up talk Session 1 Andrew Gilbert (M) £100
PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of talk Session 2 Giuliana Di Martino (F) £200
PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of runner up talk Session 2 Ben Chapman (M) £100 PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of talk Session 3
Joe Fallon (M) £200
PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of runner up talk Session 3 Gabriele Messori (M) £100 PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of talk Session 4 Lionel Fafchamps(M) £200
PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of talk Session 5 Alex Perevedentsev (M) £200
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PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of talk Session 6 Aisha Kaushik (F) £200
PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of runner up talk Session 6 Matthew Kenzie (M) £100 PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of poster Michel Buck (M) £100 PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of poster Zara Abdelrahman (F) £100
PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of poster Anthony Lim (M) £100 PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of poster Leo Hughes (M) £100
PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of poster Yen-Hung Lin(M) £100 PGR Symposium (25/06/2013) Winner of poster Joshua Chadney (M) £100
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Grants Awarded
ASTRO Imperial College STFC Impact Acceleration Account Dr Roberto Trotta, Pathways to Impact Astrostatistical data analysis £14,836 Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Stephen Warren, STFC studentship enhancement programme for Nathalie Skrzypek £12,958
CMTH Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Dr Yan Francescato, Doctoral Prize Fellowship £47,306 Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Prof Peter Haynes, Capital Equipment for Centres for Doctoral Training £397,033 The Leverhulme Trust Prof Ortwin Hess, Extreme nonlinear chirality in THz metasurfaces £184,819
Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Prof Ortwin Hess, Programme Grant: Mathematical fundamentals of Metamaterials for multiscale Physics and Mechanics (led by Department of Maths) £589,286 European Office Of Aerospace Research & Development Prof Ortwin Hess, Full-Time-Domain Maxwell-Bloch Modelling of Semiconductor Lasers £28,546 Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Prof Ortwin Hess, Programme Grant: Nano-Optics to controlled Nano-Chemistry Programme Grant (NOtCH) (led by University of Cambridge) £1,039,871
The Royal Society Dr Johannes Lischner, University Research Fellowship (held jointly with Department of Materials) £612,046
EXSS Cambridge Display Technology Ltd Prof Thomas Anthopoulos, Solutionprocessed hybrid complementary circuits on plastic £195,000 Imperial College EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account Prof Donal Bradley, Knowledge Transfer Secondment for Jim Bailey to NPL £44,588
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Imperial College EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account Prof Donal Bradley, Pathways to Impact - Copper thiocyanate as an anodeenhancing overlayer for low-temperature solution-processed optoelectronic devices £113,015
The Leverhulme Trust Prof Stefan Maier, Hybrid nanoantennas £197,120
Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Dr Alasdair Campbell, Asymmetric Synthesis and Study of Platinum Metallahelicenes in Circularly Polarised Phosphorescent Organic Light Emitting Diodes (led by Department of Chemistry) £88,824
Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Prof Stefan Maier, Strategic Equipment: Optical Fabrication and Imaging Facility for three-dimensional sub-micron designer materials for bioengineering and photonics £718,553
Imperial College Trust Dr Will Branford, Topological Spin Textures £20,223
Imperial College EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account Dr Alasdair Campbell, Pathways to Impact (led by Department of Chemistry) £69,470 Imperial College Trust Dr Amanda Chatten, trochemical reactor
Photo-elec£5,034
Imperial College EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account Prof Lesley Cohen, Knowledge Transfer Secondment for Milan Bratko to Cryogenic Ltd £23,492 European Space Agency / Estec Dr Ned Ekins-Daukes, Highly Radiation Tolerant Multi-Junction Solar Cells £61,538
Commission of the European Communities Dr Worawat Khunsin, Marie Curie Fellowship: Photonic-plasmonic hybrid for optical switching and biosensing application £171,319
The Leverhulme Trust Prof Stefan Maier, Nano-particle assisted super-resolution microscopy for live cell imaging £68,089
Office Of Naval Research Global Prof Stefan Maier, Beyond Nanoplasmonics Platform £54,286
Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Prof Stefan Maier, Programme Grant: Mathematical fundamentals of Metamaterials for multiscale Physics and Mechanics (led by Department of Maths) £569,856
Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Prof Stefan Maier, TERACELL: Integrated Microwave-to-Terahertz Sensors for label-free circulating tumour cell detection (led by Department of Materials) £293,308
Commission of the European Communities Prof Jenny Nelson, CHEETAH - Cost reduction through material optimisation and HIgher EnErgy outpuT of solAr pHotovoltaic modules - joining Europe's Research and Development efforts in support of its PV industry (led by Department of Chemistry at Imperial) £41,692 Met Office Prof Jenny Nelson, AVOID 2 (led by Grantham Institute) £2,318
Imperial College EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account Prof Jenny Nelson, Knowledge Transfer Secondment for Wing Chung Tsoi to NPL £52,558
Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Prof Jenny Nelson,SUPERSOLAR Solar Energy Hub £185,749 Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Dr Paul Stavrinou, FPP3D: Coupling frontal photopolymerisation and interfacial wrinkling for single shot 3D patterning (led by Department of Chemical Engineering) £13,138 Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Dr Paul Stavrinou, Capital Equipment for Centres for Doctoral Training £384,892
Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Dr Katharina Zeissler, Doctoral Prize Fellowship £49,724
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Grants Awarded HEP Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Ulrik Egede, STFC studentship enhancement programme for Greg Ciezarek £9,719
Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Geoffrey Hall, Added Capital Equipment for CMS £109,000 Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Ken Long, MICE Spokesperson support £263,501
Wellcome Trust internal scheme Dr Piero Posocco, Towards a compact proton irradiator for in-vitro radiobiological studies £62,430
Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Tim Sumner, LISA Pathfinder Mission Support £125,696 Science and Technology Facilities Council Dr Yoshi Uchida, STFC studentship enhancement programme for Ben Smith £9,719 Science and Technology Facilities Council Dr Morgan Wascko, The Hyper-K UK Proposal £98,328
PHOTONICS Imperial College EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account Prof Paul French, Pathways to Impact Translating automated FLIM-HCA to drug discovery, systems biology and basic research £124,591
The Leverhulme Trust Prof Paul French, Nano-particle assisted super-resolution microscopy for live cell imaging (led by Experimental Solid State) £56,055 Royal Academy Of Engineering Dr Edmund Kelleher, RAE Fellowship: Next generation short-pulse lasers for the visible and ultraviolet £434,126 Commission of the European Communities Prof Martin McCall, GoPhoton! £39,773
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council Dr James McGinty, Enhancing spatial and temporal resolution for isotropic vol-
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umetric imaging and 3D cell tracking £163,322 Imperial College EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account Prof Mark Neil, Pathways to Impact Micro_led array optical projection systems ñ applications in optogenetics £66,091
PLASMA US Department of Energy Dr Simon Bland, Pulsed Power High Energy-Yr 3 £132,353 Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Dr Michael Coppins, Dust in Magnetized Plasmas £417,696 Commission of the European Communities Dr Christos Kamperidis, Marie Curie Fellowship: Construction and Optimization of a Novel, Ultra-Compact, UltraFast X-Ray Coherent Source £164,153
Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Zulfikar Najmudin, Plamsa wakefield acceleration £88,948 Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) Dr William Proud, Frangible Simulants £1,876 AWE Plc Prof Steven Rose, ORION opacity Phase 2 £330,000 Imperial College EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account Prof Roland Smith, Knowledge Transfer Secondment for Siddharth Patankar to AWE £23,908 Imperial College EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account Prof Roland Smith, Knowledge Transfer Secondment for Chris Price to RAL £49,460
QOLS Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Dr Ben Brown, Doctoral Prize Fellowship for for Ben Brown £36,370 Imperial College EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account Prof Edward Hinds, Knowledge Transfer Secondment for Ben Yuen to NPL £81,242
Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Prof Edward Hinds, Institutional Sponsorship for Quantum Technologies 2014 £300,000
Qatar Foundation Prof Myungshik Kim, Quantum state engineering - Y3 £63,211 The Leverhulme Trust Prof Myungshik Kim, Proposal for quantum optical tests of the minimum length scale £118,662 Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Prof Myungshik Kim, Capital Equipment for Centres for Doctoral Training £116,557 Commission of the European Communities Dr Florian Mintert, ERC Starting Grant: Optimal dynamical control of quantum entanglement (grant transferred from Freiburg) £356,980
U.S Army (US) Prof Terry Rudolph, Photonic Quantum Characterization, Verification and Validation £23,435 Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council Prof Terry Rudolph,Programme Grant: Engineering Photonic Quantum Technologies (led by University of Bristol) £612,782
The Royal Society Dr Vijay Singh, Newton Fellowship: Design for a fountain of YbF molecules to measure the electron's electric dipole moment £66,000 Engineering & Physical Science Research Council Dr William Okell, Doctoral Prize Fellowship £62,124
SPAT Science and Technology Facilities Council Mr Chris Carr, Cluster FGM (2014) £103,959 Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Michele Dougherty, Cassini (2014) £330,702
The Royal Society Prof Michele Dougherty, Royal Society Professorship £912,156
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Grants Awarded Commission of the European Communities Dr Jonathan Eastwood, Heliospheric Cataloguing, Analysis and Techniques Service (HELCATS) £172,190 Commission of the European Communities Dr Heather Graven, Marie Curie Career Intergration Grant: Observing Carbon Dioxide Emissions at Regional Scales (OCDERS) £74,074
Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Tim Horbury, STFC studentship enhancement programme for Martin Archer £12,958 Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Tim Horbury, Solar Orbitor additional equipment £52,000
Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Steven Schwartz, Cluster CSC (2014) £102,169
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Imperial College EPSRC, NERC and STFC Impact Acceleration Accounts" Prof Steven Schwartz, Support for SpaceLab conference 2014 £18,000
Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology Prof Ralf Toumi, Stochastic Parameterization and Forecasting of Wind Energy in India £191,472
Theoretical Physics Commission of the European Communities Prof Jerome Gauntlett, ERC Advanced Grant: GravQuantMat - Gravity, black holes and strongly coupled quantum matter £1,402,530
Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Jerome Gauntlett, Consolidated Grant: M Theory, Cosmology and Quantum Field Theory £1,909,894 Imperial College Trust Prof Jerome Gauntlett, String Theory, Quantum Field Theory and Cosmology £20,000
Commission of the European Communities Dr Steffen Gielen, Marie Curie Fellowship: Cosmology from QGó What quantum gravity teaches us about the origin of the universe: Extension of early universe cosmology by using non-perturbative quantum gravity. £164,152 John Templeton Foundation Prof Joao Magueijo, What banged? £269,881
The Leverhulme Trust Prof Joao Magueijo, Research Fellowship: Dimensional reduction at the Planck scale and models of the early universe £41,610 Science and Technology Facilities Council Prof Arttu Rajantie, STFC studentship enhancement programme for Laura Bethke £12,958
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Blackett Laboratory Alumni Events 2013-14
Early in 2014, the department was approached by the 1974 undergraduate cohort, a subset of which keeps in regular contact with each other. The group got in touch with Linda Jones, now Departmental Administrator, asking whether a function could be held for them over the Imperial Festival in May. The request resulted in the Department hosting a social event for over 100 alumni within (the very fondly remembered) Blackett level 8 common room. Linda toured many of the alumni to visit the level1 main lecture theatre and other familiar haunts. Inspired by the success of this event, and recognising the need to provide Physics focused alumni visits, the department contacted the College Alumni office to ask them to help organise the first formal Departmental alumni function. In September 2014, over 120 alumni attended an exclusive Physics event to hear Professor Sir Tom Kibble talk about his role in the prediction of the www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
Higgs Boson. the elusive particle whose existence was finally confirmed at CERN in 2012. Alumni were offered tea and cake in the Blackett Laboratory foyer (a trip down memory lane for many) followed by a champagne reception in the common room and the 8th floor roof terrace overlooking the West London skyline and the Royal Albert Hall. The appeal of such a prestigious speaker was apparent as the event attracted a huge range of alumni from recent graduates through to those who were taught by Professor Kibble himself. Friends of Imperial Theoretical Physics In 2013 the Theoretical Phyiscs Group at Imperial College initiated a new association called "Friends of Imperial Theoretical Physics" or FITP for short. The purpose of FITP is to host periodic popular talks at South Kensington campus allowing members to keep abreast of the exciting research that is currently going on in the Group and in theoretical physics more generally. Department of Physics Review 2013 -14
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Blackett Laboratory Alumni Events 2013-14 In 2013 FITP hosted a Symposium celebrating Tom Kibble's 80th Birthday concluding with a keynote talk by Nobel Laureate Steven Weinberg to a packed audience of over 700 people in the Great Hall. In 2014 FITP organised a talk titled "The World in Eleven Dimensions" by Professor Michael Duff FRS, the Abdus Salam Professor of Theoretical Physics.
getting the message that science is fun, worthwhile, interesting and exciting out to the next generation. Janet (nee Eccles) and Gwyndaf John Physics 1971
A Grand Day Out! Imperial Festival 2014, the dates went straight into our calendar when we received our email from the Friends. This was our third Festival, and it didn’t disappoint, the event seems to be going from strength to strength. First of all, a visit to the Alumni base in the Senior Common Room. Always a cheerful welcome with a good cup of coffee and biscuits to get us going. Everyone is keen to chat and within minutes we had been exchanging words with an alumnus of 1958 Elec Eng who was visiting with a fellow student and a recent alumnus of 2013 Computer Science who had climbing the Queen’s Tower firmly on her agenda. Next the big marquee. So much to see, so much to learn about, so much to try. Knowledgeable students keen to share their enthusiasm; explaining, demonstrating and inspiring the Festival visitors. Great to see so many children who had come along with their families having such a good time controlling skiing penguins by nodding their head, whizzing cars down tracks to simulate DNA, looking at tape worms in jars, ugh! My own favourites included the 3D printer attached to the scanning fluid pipette which generated amazing models such as of the eye of a fly. Also the enthusiastic epigenetics student whose patience whilst trying to explain to two physicists what it was all about was impressive. Lectures to go to, workshops to try out, Jezebel and Bo to visit, the day sped by but we were keeping an eye on the time as we had an important date at 4:30pm. The Physics Department had invited alumni for a nostalgic visit to the department- and they did it in style. We met in the Senior Common Room on level 8, scene of our post finals party so many years ago. We were warmly welcomed by organiser Linda Jones, the Physics Department Operations Manager, and Professor Lesley Cohen, Director of External Liaison. Wine and a superb buffet ensured that people relaxed, mixed, reminisced and generally had a really good time. Thank you for a day to remember for alumni like us. It is also great to see that IC is doing such an excellent job in 116
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Juno Transparency and Opportunity Committee http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics/staff/juno
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Juno Transparency and Opportunity Committee http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics/staff/juno
The Juno Transparency and Opportunity Committee meets monthly throughout the year. The business of the meetings is driven by (i) the evaluation of progress on the action plan from the last AthenaSWAN application, and (ii) new and on-going initiatives related to wider issues, such as the gender and the racial imbalance among physics students. Information about the committee’s activities, including the minutes, are disseminated to the department through the committee website, which is accessible through the departmental website.
The activities of the committee are often driven by an individual member, which is then supported by the committee as a whole through advice and concrete action. During the previous year, the main output of the committee is as follows:
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1. Following a meeting between several members of the committee and Elizabeth Truss MP (at the time Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Childcare) at the Department for Education (DoE) an invitation was issued and accepted for her to visit Imperial in 2014. That visit happened on May 14, 2014, when the Under-Secretary www3.imperial.ac.uk/physics
emphasised the need for better math and science teaching to encourage more pupils to take up STEM subjects after the age of 16, particularly girls and those from less affluent backgrounds. This was also a central theme during the visit to the DoE.
focus the interview on the personal and career development of the appraisee. The new form has already been used in PRDP cycle during 2014.
5. One of the main activities of the Juno Committee is the preparation of the Departments application for 2. As an outgrowth of Mark Richards’ an Athena-SWAN Gold Award, which Insights programme, Lesley Cohen will be submitted in April 2015. The spearheaded a Women’s Day on Department currently holds the June 4, 2014. Presentations Silver Award, which was first included an overview, female awarded in 2009, and renewed in researchers/academics talking about 2012. There is only one department their journey, tours and lunch, where within Imperia (Chemistry) and one staff talked informally with the physics department in the UK students about all aspects of (Cambridge) with Gold Awards. academic life at Imperial.
3. Following the successful initiation of the PDRA committee to provide a forum for the concerns of that community, Rob Nyman (Juno Committee member) has established a committee for Early Career Researchers.
4. Training sessions for the new form for the personal review and development plan (PRDP) began in November 2013, with additional sessions to be added as needed. The new form is designed for use across all job categories and to
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