The ultimate in optical detection is the ability to detect individual quanta of light - packets of energy known as photons. Single-photon detectors now underpin a host of technologies at the frontiers of science, from new methods of medical imaging to ‘quantum cryptography’, the ultimate in secure communciations. 
Scientists at Heriot-Watt University have delivered a state-of-the-art single photon detector system to the UK’s National Physical Laboratory (NPL). This detector system exploits revolutionary superconducting single-photon detector technology, which far outperforms conventional detector types in terms of infrared sensitivity, signal-to-noise and timing resolution. This instrument will enable scientists at NPL to carry out groundbreaking experiments in quantum metrology and quantum information processing, ensuring the UK retains its international lead in these important 21st Century technologies.
This work was carried out by Dr Robert Hadfield a Reader in Physics and Royal Society University Research Fellow at Heriot-Watt University, and Ms Catherine Fitzpatrick, a research engineer who is sponsored by the National Physical Laboratory under the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council Photonics Engineering Doctorate scheme. This work demonstrates the tremendous value of close partnerships between Universities and Industry.
The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council this week announced £26,000 of funding to the Ultrafast Nonlinear Optics summer school to be held from 11 - 21 August 2010 at Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh. Branded as SUSSP66, the summer school is the 66th in a series of Physics summer schools co-organised by the Scottish Universities Summer Schools in Physics (SUSSP) charity, which ran its first summer school in 1960.
The summer school will be hosted in Heriot-Watt's state-of-the-art Postgraduate Centre, and will attract around 100 research students and distinguished lecturers from around the world. Contributors include Professor Tom Baer, the current president of the Optical Society of America, and Dr Thomas Udem, who worked closely with 2005 Nobel Laureate Prof. Theodore Hänsch.
The summer school will cover the science and applications of lasers that produce pulses of light lasting less than one trillionth of a second. Prof. Derryck Reid, Director of SUSSP66, said, "I'm delighted that the EPSRC has chosen to support the School, and in doing so it has recognised the timeliness of this event and the prominence that Scotland now has in this field."
Applications for the summer school close on 31 January 2010.
Heriot-Watt Physics is one of eight Scottish physics departments to benefit from the investment of £48 million by the Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council (SFC) and the participating universities for the Scottish Universities Physics Alliance (SUPA), the pooling arrangement of eight Scottish universities committed to sharing resource and expertise in physics research.
This is the second investment in SUPA which was set up in 2004. The cash will help fund major developments in Scotland’s research infrastructure and personnel. At Heriot-Watt, these will include investment in a new state-of-the-art nanofabrication facility, including Electron Beam Lithography and Focused Ion Beam facilities. We will also be investing in new academic staff positions, in areas which align with our current research strengths in condensed matter nano-physics and photonics.
Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning, Fiona Hyslop said: “Scotland’s universities have a worldwide reputation for excellence in research.“
“We need to help them grow that expertise, while also encouraging different institutions to work together to better share their knowledge with each other and with Scotland’s business community to help our economy grow and recover from the current downturn.“
“This investment will help support those efforts and help us strengthen Scotland’s claim as a world leader in research and development, while also delivering practical benefits for the NHS and medical world.”
Since its launch in 2004, the pooling partners have established the SUPA Graduate School, attracted high-quality academic staff from around the world to Scotland, increased the volume of physics research in Scotland, and greatly enhanced the quality of Research Assessment Exercise submissions from physics researchers.
October 2009: New Course in 'Chemical Physics' for 2010 entry! See Undergraduate Course Details pages for more information.
October 2009:
£510,000 Research funding awarded to Dr Brian Gerardot for the study into Quantum optics of tuneable zero-dimensional solid-state emitters.
September 2009: Welcome to all new Physics students (and welcome back to returning students). Registration of NEW students is on Wednesday 9th September in Room DB113 at 0930. There is a Physics Freshers reception DB315 on Thursday, 10th September at 3.30 for all new students.
August 2009: £550,591 research funding from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council to support research into "Optical attocecond pulses" led by Prof D T Reid.
July 2009: Research Assistant vacancy in the Waves and Fields Group. For information on the vacancy and the application process please refer to the Human Resources pages (Ref 69/09/A/W). For further information about the Waves and Fields research group see the WAF group webpages. [NOTE: this vacancy closing date has passed].
June 2009: Congratulations to all our Graduating students! A selection of Photo's from the day are available [here].
March 2009: Heriot-Watt Physics Department listed as 'top UK Physics department for Graduate Prospects' in Times Good University Guide. The Guardian League Table lists us as 'top Scottish Department' and 5th in the UK. For the full listing details see the external links to the various league tables below.
Student Experience Survey: Times Higher Education's annual Student Experience Survey shows Heriot-Watt University as 4th in Scotland (best in Edinburgh!) and 24th in the UK. The survey covers both academic and non-academic aspects of the student experience. Heriot-Watt students gave particularly high ratings to the campus environment, sports facilities, and the University's connections with industry. See [THE League table] for information.
Febuary 2009: EPSRC Research Funding: £338,914 from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council for "Full-field coherent quantum imaging" led by Prof G Buller. A PhD vacancy exists in the area of 'Quantum Imaging' see our PhD projects list for details.
February 2009: Carnegie Trust Research Funding: £ 39 000 from the Carnegie Trust, for the "Scottish Quantum Coherence Programme" led by Dr. Patrik Öhberg. The grant is a three year visitor programme which aims to attract high profile scientists to Scotland to work on problems related to quantum phenomena and quantum information.
MBE Facility moves into new state of the art Nano-science and Materials facility: The move involved dismantling and lowering the MBE chamber from the old second floor lab down to the custom designed ground floor lab. The lift isn't big enough...we needed a crane! [photo1] [photo2] [photo3]
Jan 18th 2009: Cairngorm Weather Station Featured on BBC's Countryfile: [view programme] The AWS feature is 46 minutes into the programme, but the other features from the Cairngorms are worth watching too!
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RAE 2008: Physics Department research is ranked 15th in the UK
Heriot-Watt Physics Department has performed strongly in the 2008 RAE, with a much-improved performance compared to 2001. We are now in equal 15th place in the UK, alongside Oxford and Southampton, reflecting the increasing strength of our research activity. For more details see [Times Higher RAE Results] | | | | |
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Latest News
January 2010: PhD projects - a revised list of PhD projects available for 2010 start is available on our PhD studies page. [find out more].
December 2009: Dr Robert Hadfield has delivered a state of the art superconducting-single photon detector system to the UK National Physical Laboratory. This advanced detector system will be used by NPL researchers in quantum metrology and quantum information processing experiments. This work demonstrates the tremendous value of Heriot-Watt physics research to the UK scientific community...[read more]
Laser Summer School comes to Edinburgh's Heriot-Watt University (news item: November 2009): The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council has announced £26,000 of funding to the Ultrafast Nonlinear Optics summer school to be held from 11 - 21 August 2010 at Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh. Branded as SUSSP66, the summer school is the 66th in a series of Physics summer schools co-organised by the Scottish Universities Summer Schools in Physics (SUSSP) charity, which ran its first summer school in 1960... [read more].
SUPA II: Physics Department shares in £48 million investment in Scottish Physics (November 2009): Heriot-Watt Physics Department is one of eight Scottish physics departments to benefit from the investment of £48 million by the Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council and the participating universities for the Scottish Universities Physics Alliance, the pooling arrangement of eight Scottish universities committed to sharing resource and expertise in physics research [read more].
October 2009: New Course in 'Chemical Physics' for 2010 entry! See Undergraduate Course Details pages for more information.
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Physics Department Open Days
We welcome you to visit the department on our department open days to find out about our facilities, teaching, and to meet the academic staff. For details of the open days, and contact details, please see our 'open days' pages.
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News Archive
December 2008: Research funding of £644,432 from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council announced for 'Advanced waveguide laser source development using ultrafast laser inscription'. Led by Prof. Ajoy Kar.
December 2008: Doctoral training centre funding announced: EPSRC funding for our Engineering Doctorate Centre in Optics and Photonics Technologies allows us to take in around 10 students per year for five years starting in 2009 [more] [>EPSRC Press release] [HWU EngD website]
December 2008: Research funding awarded: £37,612.28 from Renishaw Plc for "Raman spectroscopy: biomedical applications for non-invasive characterisation of cells and tissue" awarded to Dr Lynn Paterson, Prof. Ajoy Kar and Dr Derek Ball
December 2008: Heriot-Watt wins two Doctoral Training Centre funding packages to train scientists and engineers for Britain’s future.
The School of Engineering and Physical Sciences at Heriot-Watt University has won £11m funding for new Centres which will generate the scientists needed for Britain's future (announced 5 December 2008). This is funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, the UK funding body for science and engineering.
Heriot-Watt is the lead institution in The Optics and Photonics Technologies Centre which is to receive £4.8m to train postgraduate Research Engineers to fill the gap in an industry which involves 1,000 photonics companies in the UK alone, supporting 250,000 jobs and generating £20bn of revenue. The global photonics market of £250bn is growing at 11% per annum. Across all fields of engineering, the Royal Academy of Engineering has identified that “the lack of UK-based students of sufficient quality endangers the supply chain of skilled personnel into UK industry and academia”.
Professor Andrew Harvey, leader of the new Centre, to be run in partnership with St Andrews, Strathclyde and Glasgow Universities, said, “Optics and photonics pervade life, from imaging, illumination and manufacturing, through its exploitation by the wider scientific community, for example, in medical assessment and treatment, environmental monitoring and metrology, to fundamental scientific research. “In fact there is barely an aspect of modern life, and the industrial community integrated with it, that is not dependent upon optical and photonic technologies. The proposed centre will support research across the full range of Optics and Photonics Technologies from blue-skies, potentially transformative research in quantum optics to many examples of applied research.”
Meanwhile Heriot-Watt is also part of a second Doctorate Centre group to achieve funding success. The Scottish Doctoral Training Centre in Condensed Matter Physics, to be run in conjunction with St Andrews University and the University of Edinburgh, will, by linking three medium-sized departments, create a cluster which is internationally competitive in research with important implications for areas as diverse as communications, energy and health.
The Centre will provide state-of-the-art training for postgraduate students, using interactive video-conferencing technology for lecture courses. It has also won the support of leading academic collaborators around the world as well as twenty senior industrial collaborators including Cairn Energy, Compound Semiconductor Technology, Edinburgh Instruments, Oxford Instruments, Renishaw and Toshiba.
Professor Richard Warburton, who is leading Heriot-Watt’s involvement in the partnership, said, “the Centre will provide top-level training for PhD students in this important area of physics, ensuring that they are well placed to become the leaders of vital interdisciplinary research in the future. “
Linking the strengths of the three Universities, as well as the support of leading international academics and industrial collaborators, who will both advise on course content and contribute directly to the students via visits and presentations, means a world-class training resource for Scotland and for the leaders of tomorrow in this important field.
“We are delighted at this funding announcement, which is a direct result of the work Scottish Universities Physics Alliance (SUPA) in recent years, without which the proposals could not have been developed and supported.”
November 2008: Professor Gerald Buller and Mr Ryan Warburton have been awarded the 2008 Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) Optoelectronics Premium. [more]
November 2008: Heriot-Watt Physics researchers in finals of THALES Scottish Technology Prize: Dr Robert Thomson, Professor Derryk Reid and Professor Gerald Buller are finalists in the 2008 THALES Scottish Technology Prize [more]
November 2008:
£353,514 from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council. Next generation nanostructured superconducting single photon detectors. Led by Dr R Hadfield and Prof R J Warburton.
November 2008: £375,465 from the Royal Society of Edinburgh. Integrated non-linear optics for optical sensing applications led by Dr H Bookey.
September 2008: EPSRC funding (£354,132) awarded for 'Quantum Digital Signatures'.
Led by Prof. Gerald Buller and Dr Erica Andersson.
Harnessing quantum effects for communication and computation shows great potential in applications such as unconditionally secure cryptography and quantum computation. The latter would allow for faster algorithms for important computational tasks such as factorisation and database search, which can be used in everyday applications, such as internet security and rapid medical diagnosis or DNA searching.
With very few exceptions, however, experiments are far from implementing theoretical results. A notable exception is quantum key distribution (QKD), for which a number of impressive demonstrations exist, with even some primitive systems being commercially available. On the whole, however, experimental proof-of-principle realisations of quantum information protocols remain an important, and in many cases, an ambitious objective.
Digital signatures is an important and widely used application of public key cryptography, and allows one party to securely sign documents so that other parties can be sure of their origin and authenticity. Classical public key cryptography unfortunately relies on unproven assumptions regarding the computational difficulty of reversing a so-called ``one-way" mathematical function in order to break the code. Quantum public key cryptography, on the other hand, can be made unconditionally secure based on information-theoretical limits.
Our main objective is to realise a proof-of-principle experiment for quantum digital signatures. The protocol is an adaption of the scheme by Gottesman and Chuang modified to use coherent states and linear optics. Essentially, the security is guaranteed because it is impossible to perfectly determine the state of a quantum system, if its possible states are non-orthogonal.
August 2008: Research funding (£149,751) awarded from EPSRC for High Efficency Laser Processing Systems (HELPS) led by Prof. Howard Baker.
July 2008: Research funding award £253,856 from the Technology Strategy Board for 'Next-GEM' (Next Generation Encoder Manufacture), led by Prof. Duncan Hand.
July 2008: Physics Graduation - Congratulations to all our graduating students! Some photographs of the event are available on our 'What's On' pages.
June 2008: HWU Lecture Series - The single photon: quantum encryption and remote target identification Thursday, June 19, by Professor G S Buller. [more]
April 2008: EPSRC funding (£972,125) awarded for 'Creating, detecting and exploiting quantum states of light'.
Led by Prof. Gerald Buller.
The last decade has seen a world-wide expansion in investigation into quantum states of light. Much of the expansion in this subject area has been stimulated by the emergence of quantum cryptography or quantum key distribution (QKD) / first proposed in 1984 - which offers unconditionally secure information transport guaranteed by quantum-mechanical laws. Whilst QKD remains a fertile subject of exciting laboratory and field research, experimental progress in free-space and optical fibre transmission media have taken quantum cryptography to the fringes of commercial exploitation and real-world application. Concurrently, a number of other developments in quantum information research have also been highly significant, such as quantum computing algorithms that, if realised, would make today's public-key based data security system obsolete. The building blocks, or quantum components, of these quantum-based systems require considerable research effort and this is the subject matter of this proposal. Significantly and perhaps in a more short-term manner, a number of these components will be utilised in other applications outside the quantum information processing sphere; these applications include including low-light level communications (eg as proposed in the NASA Mars Communications Programme), in remote sensing, imaging and quantum-based metrology.
This Platform Grant application from the Heriot-Watt group centres on leading edge research into the creation, detection and exploitation of the quantum states of light. This project will be used to make strategic decisions regarding research in these fast-moving fields. At the time of application, a number of exciting projects have been highlighted for investigation, although these projects are not meant to represent a comprehensive and exclusive list of research topics. Some areas worth immediate investigation include prototype quantum devices such as quantum dots for entangled photon pair production; or quantum imaging in remote sensing, or single-photon sources constructed from carbon nanotubes. Whilst this grant will not provide the full resources for long-term investigations into all these areas, this project will permit rapid start-up and allow the group to collaborate more effectively with other groups, including overseas researchers.
March - April 2008: 'Sensing with Light' at Edinburgh International Science Festival.
As part of Heriot-Watt's Cyberneering event at Wonderama we're at the Science festival to show how light can be used as sensors. [see Cyberneering 'blog' for details] - This event is now finished.
March 2008: Physics PhD student has been awarded the “Young UK Laser Engineer Prize”.
Fraser Dear has been awarded the “Young UK Laser Engineer Prize” by the Association of Industrial Laser Users (AILU), for his PhD project work, on the laser machining of zirconia ceramic for applications in dentistry, an SMI* project carried out in collaboration with Renishaw plc. “The prize is awarded to an individual for a significant piece of work, conducted in the UK, which has led to real or potential economic gain for the parent organisation and that preferably has wider benefit for the industrial laser community.” The prize will be awarded at the AILU AGM on 8 April.
*SMI is the EPSRC Innovative Manufacturing Research Centre at Heriot-Watt University which is focused on Supporting Manufacturing Innovation.
Febuary 2008: Journal of Optics A: Pure and Applied Optics - Highlights 2007 cites one of our sensors research papers: 'Fibre optics in palladium-based hydrogen sensing' by R Maier, et al.
Febuary 2008: Gusts of over 160 mph on summit of Cairngorm. See Cairngorm AWS pages for details.
January 2008: UK-India Education and Research Initiative:- Ultra short Pulse Laser Waveguide Inscription in Glasses for Integrated Optics
Led by Dr Ajoy Kar - Please contacr Ajoy Kar directly for details.
December 2007: Research Associate position available to work on a collaborative research project between the University of Oxford and Heriot-Watt University to develop a novel particle tracking system for live cell imaging [application deadline passed].
November 2007: A spatio-temporally integrated and nonlinear particle tracking system for live cell imaging, Led by Dr W Lu
Despite recent advances in light microscopy revolutionizing live cell imaging [1-2], the full potential of the increasing high sensitivity and resolution of modern microscopes has yet to be realised. A key barrier is the limited power and scope of image analysis techniques currently available to cell biologists. Although commercial programs promise automated particle identification and tracking and have been successfully used to assist image analysis in high signal to noise ratio environments, our extensive experimental tests have shown that they are inadequate to deal with live cell images that are of low signal to noise ratio, poor and variable contrast, and often comprise multiple particles in close proximity and with inconsistent movement. In many cases, particles can only be tracked "manually" by placing the cursor on objects over time. A major improvement would be to exploit advanced image processing and analysis algorithms to deal with complex time-lapse live cell data, in much the same way that new de-convolution algorithms have significantly improved wide-field imaging in Biology [3]. In this project, we propose to research and develop a nonlinear partial differential equation (PDE) method as a new approach to tracking biological particles in live cells. A key advantage of this method over all commercial software currently available to biologists is to make full use of temporal and spatial relationships in time-lapse data to assist in overcoming severe noise effects and recognition of targets in real biological conditions. Specifically, we will develop a spatio-temporally integrated and nonlinear particle tracking system based on the PDE approach and integrate it to the ImageJ image analysis suite [4] to provide a user-friendly graphical interface to biologists.
This project begins 1 January 2008
October 2007: Ultrafast infrared superconducting single-photon detectors
£230,285 from The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, led by Dr RH Hadfield.
One of Einstein's key contributions to modern science was to recognize that light is fundamentally composed of discrete packets of energy known as photons. A single photon detector is an extremely sensitive device capable of counting these individual quantum objects - at low light intensities the arrival of photons can be distinguished as clearly as the first patter of raindrops on a tin roof. Lower energy (infrared) photons are less strongly adsorbed and scattered by typical transmission media (the atmosphere, optical fibre or even living tissue) than photons at visible wavelengths. Hence infrared single-photon detectors are a crucial enabling technology for a host of scientific applications, ranging from the ultimate in secure communications (quantum cryptography), to new methods of medical imaging. Serious problems are encountered when attempting infrared single-photon counting with conventional semiconductor-based detectors. This technological gap represents a significant obstacle for researchers across a range of fields. This proposal is based upon a new type of single photon-detector capable of registering low energy photons with unprecedented timing resolution. This detector is a product of recent advances in the art of miniaturization -Nanotechnology. It is comprised of an ultra-narrow ('nanoscale') wire, cooled to low temperature such that it enters the superconducting state. Commercial closed-cycle cooling technology now makes this futuristic detector viable for practical applications. This proposal aims to set up a world class research programme in the UK based on improving and exploiting this highly promising new technology. This programme will be carried out at Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, which is one of the leading photonics centres in Europe. Key goals at the outset are to set up an optical test bed for these detectors, to further improve their performance, and to employ them in groundbreaking new single-photon counting applications. This proposal should have a powerful impact in terms of new science and technological applications.
This project begins 01 October 2007.
September 2007: IOP Winter Lecture series details available - see link on 'What's On' pages
September 2007: Welcome to Dr David Townsend as a Lecturer in Physics
August 2007: Quantum optics of single spins in a quantum dot
£130,766 from The Royal Society of Edinburgh. Quantum optics of single spins in a quantum dot, led by Dr B D Gerardot.
August 2007: Scottish Manufacturing Institute - EPSRC Funding
Scottish Manufacturing Renewal, 2008 - 2013 (SMI/IMRC). £7,287,406 from Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council. led by Professor J D C Jones.
July 2007: Congratulations to all our graduating students! View a selection of our Graduation Photos
July 2007: The Physics of Polymer Photonic Devices: Experiment and Theory
EPSRC Funding £257,878, Prof. I Galbraith
Remarkable progress has been made over the last decade in making optical sources such as LEDs and lasers out of flexible, plastic materials. This has a wide range of potential applications, such as roll up TV displays or having data communications systems woven into your clothing. The technology of polymer LEDs has now matured to the degree that plastic light-emitting displays are available as commercial products. Plastic lasers, optical amplifiers and other photonic devices are much less well developed. But these offer huge potential as sophisticated, yet inexpensive, visible light sources. We have reached a stage now where we have demonstrated this potential in the laboratory, and in order to take the next major step forward to practical devices we urgently need a deeper understanding of the behaviour of these materials at the microscopic level. The physics of how the polymer chains interact with intense light involves a rich combination of competing processes. The cumulative effect of these processes in devices is not yet well understood. This proposal seeks to develop this understanding by bringing together the expertise of two groups: one who are experts in measuring the optical performance of these polymers and in their application for photonics, and the other who are experts in the theory of optical materials. Through a combination of theory and experiment we will aim to understand the complex optical interactions of semiconducting polymers, and exploit them in new and more sophisticated ways.
July 2007: Prize for work presented at International Workshop on Adaptive Optics for Industry and Medicine 
Heather Campbell won the “best poster” award at the recent 6th International Workshop on Adaptive Optics for Industry and Medicine, Galway 12-15th June, for the poster entitled “Towards four dimensional particle tracking for biological applications”. Heather explained that "It was a real surprise and the great thing about it (apart from my getting a nifty iPod) was that it really drew a lot of attention to the work, which is after all the main reason that we all go to these conferences. The conference itself was excellent, very well organised and containing a large number of really interesting papers. So it was well worth the trip!" Heather is a member of the Waves and Fields Research Group.
June 2007: EPSRC Funding for Ultracold Quantum Gases research: £214,837 from Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council. Gauge potentials in ultracold quantum gases, led by Dr P Ohberg.
When atoms are trapped and cooled to temperatures only one millionth of a degree above absolute zero, their behaviour becomes dominated by their wave-like quantum nature. How they behave depends on their intrinsic spin. Bosons, having integer spin, tend to occupy the same quantum state and behave coherently. Fermions, having half-integer spin, are forbidden from occupying the same state and behave very differently.
This proposal plans to investigate the effects of light propagating through an extremely cold gas. The light will have some peculiar properties. It can for instance propagate very slowly through the cloud of atoms. In vacuum the speed of light is 300 000 km/s, but when the light propagates through a cold gas the situation can be strikingly different. If the frequency of the light is carefully chosen, then the velocity of the light pulse can be as slow as a walking pace. The light can also have an orbital angular momentum associated with a propensity to induce rotation. This means that the incoming light will have a phase profile which resembles a helical spiral. The combination of light with orbital angular momentum propagating through a quantum gas has some remarkable consequences. It turns out that the interaction between such light beams and the atoms is of the form of a vector potential which in turn opens up a whole new playground for the cold atoms. A vector potential is typically encountered when describing the interaction between charged particles, such as electrons, and magnetic fields. In our case the atoms are neutral and does not feel the presence of a magnetic field like electrons would do. But since the interaction between the atoms and the light is of the same mathematical form as the vector potential for charged particles, we can introduce an effective magnetic field in our neutral cloud of atoms. This has some profound consequences in allowing us to explore fundamental systems with charged particles and magnetic fields, but using neutral atoms. It makes it much easier to control parameters, such as the density, or even interaction strengths between the atoms, compared to standard solid state "charged particle systems". Another remarkable consequence of the effective vector potential is a direct analogy between ultracold quantum gases and gauge theories encountered typically in high energy physics. This will give us a new tool and allows us to study phenomena known from a wide range of different fields, but now with all the advantages the cold atoms are giving.
June 2007: New Chair/Reader/Lecturer in Physics Vacancies We wish to appoint several new members of Physics staff to consolidate our position within the Scottish Universities Physics Alliance SUPA ( http://www.supa.ac.uk). Our existing research strengths lie in the areas of photonics and condensed matter physics (see http://www.phy.hw.ac.uk/). Applications are sought from individuals with strong track records in any area of physics. Candidates should hold a PhD in Physics or a related discipline and have a proven track record of excellence in research. Successful applicants will be expected to establish and lead a vigorous independent research activity supported by external funding and contribute to the development of our teaching at postgraduate and undergraduate levels.
Application deadline has passed (22 June 2007)
April 2007: EPSRC Funding - Nano-Optics Group Nano-Optics Group Research Award: The Nano-Optics research group has recently been awarded EPSRC funding to explore Laser cooling and spin resonance of a single spin in a quantum dot.
March 2007: Former Heriot-Watt PhD student wins the Roy Prize Tim Munt, a former PhD student at Heriot-Watt Physics, has won a prize for his PhD thesis. [more]
March 2007: EPSRC Grant Award for Ultrafast Optics Group - Waveguide fabrication in silicon
Direct-writing of optical waveguides using femtosecond lasers has been the subject of much research since the first demonstration 10 years ago. Despite the great potential of optically-written semiconductor waveguides, there remains an almost universal absence of research in this area. The most likely explanation for this is a practical one: only Ti:sapphire amplifiers can typically provide sufficient pulse energy for waveguide creation but their 800nm wavelength is not transmitted by semiconductors such as silicon, so the creation of sub-surface waveguides is impossible.
We propose to address this problem by developing a new energy-scaling approach to femtosecond optical parametric oscillators based on combining cavity-dumping with extended-cavity operation. In this way we expect to produce near- and mid-infrared pulses with energies around 1µJ which should be sufficient to write waveguides in various materials, and we intend to verify this by concentrating on waveguide creation in silicon wafers. The project combines broad expertise in the Ultrafast Optics Group in femtosecond laser machining, sub-surface silicon microscopy and femtosecond parametric source development.
The project begins 1 April 2007.
Feb 2007: SUPA distinguished visitor at Heriot-Watt
We are pleased to welcome to Heriot-Watt Prof. Aleksei Zheltikov from Moscow State University, hosted by Derryck Reid. Aleksei is here from 31 January – 22 February 2007 as a SUPA distinguished visitor and will be giving a colloquium on Wednesday 7 February. Aleksei’s interests are wide-ranging but recently have included applications and modelling of photonic crystal fibre.
Feb 2007: Putting next generation fusion materials on the fast track
This EPSRC research contract has been awarded to the plasma materials group at Heriot-Watt University and materials modellers at University College London to address the pressing problem of wall erosion in tokamak fusion reactors*. In these reactors, where the ionised gases meet the container walls there are high temperatures combined with high fluxes of charged and neutral species. This environment attacks the walls, producing dust that absorbs the tritium fuel. We intend to coat the plasma-facing components with diamond, a unique material having high temperature stability, radiation resistance, high atomic density and unsurpassed chemical stability in the presence of hydrogen plasmas. If successful, this approach would enable reactors to operate for longer periods before shut-down for maintenance, and would reduce the tritium held in the reactor. The total value of the project including support from UKAEA Culham and two UK manufacturers is ~£1.4M.
* Enormous numbers of energetic neutrons are released when helium is produced by the fusion of deuterium and tritium at high temperatures, as in our Sun. If a controlled version can be carried out on Earth, in which the released neutrons are absorbed to generate heat, this promises to solve the World's long-term energy needs. JET at Culham has been one of the leading experimental reactors for magnetically confined fusion using gaseous plasmas, and has been an important step towards designing the international thermonuclear experimental reactor, ITER.
January 2007: Prize PhD Studentships
Download PDF Flyer
The Scottish Universities Physics Alliance (SUPA) is offering up to 8 fully funded PhD studentships for outstanding students from anywhere in the world.
The alliance brings together internationally leading physics research across Scotland to form the largest physics grouping in the UK. Major research themes being pursued are astronomy, condensed matter and materials physics, nuclear and plasma physics, particle physics, photonics and physics and life sciences.
These prestigious and competitive awards are intended to attract outstanding students to study for a PhD in Scotland. Applicants will be registered for a PhD in physics at one of the participating Universities namely Edinburgh, Heriot Watt, Glasgow, Paisley, St Andrews and Strathclyde. An excellent training environment will be provided by the SUPA Graduate School, giving candidates access to a wide range of courses across Scotland.
Applications should be made at http://www.supa.ac.uk/ by 31 January 2007. Prize PhD Studentships Scottish Universities Physics Alliance (SUPA).
November 2006: First Prize for Physics Student
Amanda Fender, a third year Physics PhD student from the School of Engineering and Physical Sciences, was awarded First Prize for her poster at the 18th International Conference on Optical Fibre Sensors held in Cancun, Mexico in October. Amanda’s poster was judged against student entries from the USA, Europe and Asia.
This was the first international conference in the field of optical fibre sensing and Amanda attended to present her work Dynamic Two-Axis Curvature Measurement Using Multicore Fiber Bragg Gratings.
Amanda is a member of the Applied Optics and Photonics Group (see website below) and is supervised by Dr Bill MacPherson and Dr Jim Barton. Her studentship is funded by EPSRC and AWE plc.
Pictured: Amanda (centre) receiving her award from Janice Walker (The International Society for Optical Engineering) and Dr Robert Lieberman (President Intelligent Optical Systems)
November 2006: The list of this terms Colloquia speakers is now available online. The invitation to attend these colloquia is extended to everyone! [If you plan to travel to Heriot-Watt to attend one of these meetings please confirm that times and dates have not been changed before you travel. Contact Prof. R Warburton or Dr P Ohberg for details]
September 2006: We wish to appoint physicists to consolidate our position in the Scottish Universities Physics Alliance (SUPA) (http://www.supa.ac.uk/) and to strengthen links between science and engineering through the Edinburgh Research Partnership (ERP) with the University of Edinburgh (www.erp.ac.uk/). We intend to complement our existing research activities(www.phy.hw.ac.uk/resrev/general.html) and to develop our undergraduate and postgraduate teaching, particularly in nanoscience. Particulars of positions available can be found on the main University vacancies website. Note: Application deadline was 31 Oct.
August 2006: The new Physics website goes live. We hope that you will be able to find out about our courses, research and activities easily through the new website.
If you find any errors, missing pages or information, or would like to see some additional information on this site please contact Bill MacPherson.
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