Infinitely Curious: Physics and Astronomy Newsletter, Autumn 2018 by Science at Sheffield

Department of Physics And Astronomy.

UNFORGETTABLE EXPERIENCES

SHEFFIELD, CHINA AND CANARY ISLANDS

#INFINITELYCURIOUS

DEPARTMENT NEWSLETTER | AUTUMN 2018

CONT PHYSICS OF THE CIRCUS of our teaching-focussed were able to pull off seemingly ENTS One academics, Dr Matt Mears, has impossible feats of strength.

Physics students visit China

been featured in an exhibition at the University on the history of fairgrounds and the circus. His contributions used Newtonian principles to explain how performers such as Supergirl, pictured below,

Matt plans to bring some of these weird and wonderful examples into his undergraduate teaching, helping to bring abstract physics principles to life in the lecture theatre.

New camera to capture universe

Heatwave boosts solar power

Student story: Marina Sanz Orell

In photos: Astro field trip

GHOSTS IN THE UNIVERSE

Sheffield physicists took part in the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition – one of the UK’s biggest science events.

headsets that let visitors explore the detector, which is located deep beneath a mountain in Japan.

The ‘Ghosts in the Universe’ exhibition on neutrinos included a Lego model of the Super-Kamiokande neutrino detector, and virtual reality

Dr Susan Cartwright, Professor Lee Thompson, and PhD students Jost Migenday and Sam Jenkins from our neutrino research group all helped out.

Anitneutrino detection

Graduate story: Alexander Chilton

Photons and data security

PHYSICS STUDENTS HELP UNIVERSITY FORGE NEW FRIENDSHIPS IN CHINA Two physics undergraduates have been representing the University of Sheffield in China, to help students there prepare for studying in the UK. Benjamin Jolly and Eloisa Paver met students on our BSc Materials Physics ‘3+1’ joint degree with Nanjing Tech University. On this course, students are based in Nanjing and taught by visiting University of Sheffield academics for their first three years. They can then come to Sheffield for their final year. Part of Benjamin and Eloisa’s role was to help 3+1 students currently in Nanjing find out more about living in Sheffield and

studying at the University. They’ve attended student forums and alumni events for former students who have already completed a 3+1 course, to help current 3+1 students prepare for their transfer to Sheffield. Also on the trip were maths students Elizabeth Sheppeck and James Watkins, and chemistry students Jasmine Catlow and George Hunter. As well as spending time with students at Nanjing Tech University, the six Sheffield students also visited Nanjing University, Southeast University and nearby cities such as Shanghai and Suzhou.

L-R: University of Sheffield science students George Hunter, Benjamin Jolly, Eloisa Paver, Elizabeth Sheppeck, James Watkins and Jasmine Catlow.

NEW HIGH-SPEED CAMERA CAPTURES MOVIES OF SPACE

newOF camera that can AATEAM RESEARCHERS LED take more than 1,000 BY A UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD ASTRONOMER IDENTIFIED images perHAS second will NINE MONSTER STARS THAT HAVE revolutionise scientists’ A MASS MORE THAN 100 TIMES understanding of GREATER THAN THE SUN. stars and black holes. HiPERCAM has gone live on the world’s largest optical telescope.

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Above: HiPERCAM installed on the the Gran Telescopio Canarias, La Palma. Right: HiPERCAM’s first light image, the spiral galaxy NGC 4800, 80 million light years away.

The project was led by Professor Vik Dhillon, who runs our undergraduate field trips and year abroad placements at La Palma in the Canary Islands. The island is home to the Gran Telescopio Canarias, where HiPERCAM has been installed. From there, the camera will take high-speed images of objects in the Universe so that the rapid variations in their brightness, caused by phenomena such as eclipses and explosions, can be studied in unprecedented detail. Data captured by the camera, taken in five different colours simultaneously, will let scientists study the remnants of dead stars such as white dwarfs, neutron stars and black holes. These are key objects within astrophysics as their extreme gravities, densities and pressures allow researchers to test theories of fundamental physics, such as general relativity and quantum mechanics.

“Normal cameras installed on large telescopes are only able to capture one picture every minute. HiPERCAM can take one picture every millisecond. The high speed essentially provides a slowmotion view of rapidly varying celestial objects.” Professor Vik Dhillon

By observing objects in our Solar System as they pass in front of background stars, HiPERCAM will also teach scientists about the sizes and shapes of minor planets beyond Pluto’s orbit, and whether they possess atmospheres, rings and satellites. HiPERCAM was developed in partnership with the Science and Technology Facilities Council’s Astronomy Technology Centre (ATC), the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias, and researchers from the Universities of Warwick and Durham.

Turn to p10 to see photos from our students’ recent field trip to La Palma. 5

HEATWAVE BOOSTS SOL The sunshine we’ve had in this summer’s heatwave has led to record levels of solar energy generation. For a short period in June, more of the UK’s power was being generated by solar than by gas power stations, the country’s usual top source of electricity. And in July, Britain passed a significant solar milestone, as figures showed that the country had been powered for more than 1,000 hours without coal this year. Dr Alastair Buckley, our Senior Lecturer

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in Organic Electronics, has been following the numbers closely. As well as running industrial research projects for our students, he’s in charge of Sheffield Solar. The research group runs the UK’s largest database of electricity generation data from rooftop solar panels. Speaking to The Guardian about the impact of the heatwave on the UK’s energy generation, Al said: “This marks the start of subsidy-free solar being economically viable, and I genuinely believe we’ll see bigger changes to the electricity sector in the next 10 years than we’ve seen in the past 10.” When asked about the record levels of solar energy generation, he added: “Some of this increase is due to more

LAR POWER solar having been installed since 2017 but most of the increase is climatic, with summer 2018 being the fifth sunniest on record so far. These figures highlight the growing importance of solar energy as a low-carbon and low-cost source of electricity.” In June and early July, photovoltaic generation peaked at over nine gigawatts each day for a week, and at midday on Saturday 30 June, solar supplied 30% of the national demand for electricity. If that had been a windy day then a further 30% could have come from wind. There have been several days in this period when

“This marks the start of subsidy-free solar being economically viable, and I genuinely believe we’ll see bigger changes to the electricity sector in the next 10 years than we’ve seen in the past 10.” Dr Alastair Buckley more than half the UK’s energy demand has been met with wind and solar. The changing energy landscape means that, in the future, there is likely to be a growing demand for physics graduates who understand the fundamental principles of energy, and the renewable technologies that are becoming the dominant tools of electricity generation.

Above: The solar technology testbed on the roof For information on by 2017 RAS award winners, visit: ofmore our building, run Sheffield Solar. https://www.ras.org.uk/news-and-press/2943-ras-honoursleading-astronomers-and-geophysicists-2017.

SCIENCE CHAMPION Name: Marina Sanz Orell

Marina worked as a University of Sheffield Science and Engineering Course: BSc Physics Champion. The job and Philosophy involves helping out at events to inspire the next Home country: Spain generation of scientists and itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a great way to get extra experience to put on your CV. 8

“I became a Science and Engineering Champion in the second semester of my first year. I had done some babysitting, tutoring and volunteering before but this was the first time I got a job that required signing paperwork, training and even a uniform. It was my first serious job and it will always be special for me. “I consider myself fortunate to have entered the professional world as a Champion, not only because the job suited my skills and interests perfectly but also because the people I’ve worked with and the working environment made it the perfect place to learn and grow into a better version of myself. “I love science and I love talking about it. I find that talking about what makes my course interesting is easy and doing cool scientific demonstrations for a curious and eager audience is very gratifying. And I’ve learned so much from that, from bits of science I found fascinating to presentation skills, time management skills, team work, performance skills, communication skills and many other invaluable transferable skills. “When I think back on the first times I stood in front of a crowd of teenagers and tried to convince them that physics is fun to the way I can do it now, it’s a staggering insight. Having the chance to ignite and witness the spark of scientific curiosity and wonder in students of all ages has been so eye-opening and inspiring. But to me it went beyond doing science outreach; being a Champion felt like the first time I was entrusted with real responsibilities. It was exhilarating and challenging and it made me

STUDENT STORY “I love science and I love talking about it. I find that talking about what makes my course interesting is easy and doing cool scientific demonstrations for a curious and eager audience is very gratifying. “Having the chance to ignite and witness the spark of scientific curiosity and wonder in students of all ages has been so eyeopening and inspiring.” determined to be worthy of this trust. “In a way, besides employable skills, being a Champion has taught me values. The value of doing a job well done, the pride of feeling that people rely on you because they believe in you and recognise your competence, the personal satisfaction of knowing you are doing your best, the humility of receiving praise for your work, and the cost of making a mistake when something matters to you.” “I can honestly say it’s been an inspiring, instructive and rewarding learning experience that has taught me a lot of valuable skills and lessons and helped keep my passion for science alive.”

ASTROPHYSICS FIELD TRIP: LA PALMA Every year, a group of our physics students go on a week-long field trip to the telescope facilities on La Palma, in the Canary Islands. They visit some of the world’s most powerful telescopes and carry out their own observations in one of the world’s premier astrophysics reearch sites, located 2,400m above sea level. These are some of the photos from this year’s trip.

These images of the Milky Way were captured by two of the students on the trip, Cheyenne Polius and Luke Holden.

ANTINEUTRINO DETECTOR TO AID NUCLEAR EFFORTS at the AScientists TEAM OF RESEARCHERS LED University of OF Sheffield BY A UNIVERSITY SHEFFIELD ASTRONOMER IDENTIFIED are part of HAS a major NINE MONSTER STARS THAT HAVE project that will use A MASS MORE THAN 100 TIMES elusive THAN subatomic GREATER THE SUN. particles known as antineutrinos to aid nuclear nonproliferation.

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Above: Researchers at Boulby Underground Laboratory, where the WATCHMAN antineutrino detector will be built.

Researchers plan to build an antineutrino detector that can remotely monitor the activities of nuclear reactors. The aim of the project is is to support the global nuclear non-proliferation community. The WATCHMAN detector, subject to final approval, will be built more than a kilometre underground at the Science and Technology Facilities Council’s Boulby Underground Laboratory. It will be used to monitor activity 25 kilometres away at Hartlepool Nuclear Power Station, before the technology is scaled up to monitor nuclear activity at greater distances. Neutrino physicists from the University of Sheffield will be working alongside US researchers from eight universities and three national laboratories, plus two other UK universities. Dr Matthew Malek, our Lecturer in Experimental Particle Physics is leading the UK and the University of Sheffield’s contributions. He said: “We are taking the techniques that we have been using in neutrino physics for decades to study neutrinos, and using them to monitor nuclear reactors.

How to detect antineutrinos The WATCHMAN detector will be a type of water Cherenkov detector. These detectors are filled with water mixed with the element gadolinium. When an antineutrino collides with a water molecule in the tank, it causes the optical equivalent of a sonic boom, known as Cherenkov radiation. The fission process that takes place in nuclear reactors is known to generate antineutrinos. By tracking incidences of Cherenkov radiation, scientists can monitor antineutrino levels and, therefore, nuclear reactor activity within the detector’s range. Researchers at the University of Sheffield are already involved in several water Cherenkov experiments, including the SuperKamiokande project in Japan. Matthew Malek is pictured inside the detector, deep under a mountain.

“Tracking the nuclear reactor at Hartlepool will allow us to demonstrate the technology and what we can do with it, so that in future we can use this technology in other parts of the world to support nuclear non-proliferation.”

BP-ICAM: COMMS OFFICER Name: Alex Chilton Course: BSc Physics Year of graduation: 2012

â&#x20AC;&#x153;I currently lead and deliver all of the communications and marketing for the BP International Centre for Advanced Materials (BP-ICAM), a $100 million international research partnership between BP and the Universities of Manchester, Cambridge, Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Imperial College London. BP-ICAM enables the application of novel material science know-how to business challenges in the oil and gas industry. Each academic partner provides game-changing capabilities in different

areas, such as structural materials, corrosion, separations, surfaces, deposits, imaging, modelling and selfhealing materials. “My role with BP-ICAM is very diverse and involves planning and delivering strategies and campaigns across our internal and external communications, digital marketing, external affairs, media relations and stakeholder engagement activities. “I work collaboratively on projects with colleagues from BP and our four university partners, as well as with creative agencies and journalists from national and international media organisations. I also manage our presence at external events and have organised sessions at high profile conferences. “One of the great aspects of my role is the opportunity to travel and work in different places around the UK and internationally. As the BP-ICAM partnership is spread across multiple locations over two continents, I spend a significant amount of time working in Cambridge and London, as well as traveling to the US. “I’d always enjoyed writing about science whilst studying at Sheffield and after graduating I took up an opportunity as an Editor for a global scientific content marketing agency. Here, I created engaging editorial content, such as news stories, feature articles and interviews, targeted to an audience of over 60 million users a year, and also led bespoke marketing campaigns for multiple clients worth over $1 million per annum.

GRADUATE FOCUS “People are usually impressed when you say that you studied physics at university and it’s a degree that’s very well respected around the world.” “Although a physics degree is not essential in my current role, my background provides me with a detailed understanding of the fundamental science which underpins the properties and behaviour of materials. Day-to-day, this helps me to easily communicate complex information in a concise way to different stakeholder groups and also engage with scientists and engineers in their own language. “Whilst at Sheffield, I carried out my final year project on the philosophy of science and wrote my thesis on the concept of simplicity in scientific theory and methodology under the supervision of Dr Pieter Kok. I found this project to be a really enjoyable experience and it inspired me to consider roles related to science communication upon graduation. “Other important skills I gained from studying physics, such as the ability to solve problems and analyse data, are important for a whole range of careers beyond a career in science. “People are usually impressed when you say that you studied physics at university and it’s a degree that’s very well respected around the world.”

FASTER PHOTONS KEEP HEADLINE Researchers at the University of Sheffield have solved a key puzzle in quantum physics that could help to make the transfer of data totally secure.

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The team, led by Professor Mark Fox, have developed a way of generating very rapid single-photon light pulses. Each photon, or particle of light, represents a bit of binary code – the fundamental language of computing. These photons cannot be intercepted without disturbing them in a way that would alert the sender

that something was amiss. Transferring data using light passed along fibre optic cables has become increasingly common in recent years, but each pulse currently contains millions of photons. That means that, in principle, a portion of these could be intercepted without detection. Secure data is already encrypted, but if an ‘eavesdropper’ was able to intercept the signals containing details of the code then – in theory – they could access and decode the rest of the message. Single photon pulses offer total security, because any eavesdropping is immediately detected, but scientists have struggled to produce them rapidly

DATA SAFE enough to carry data at sufficient speeds to transfer high volumes of data. Mark is our Professor of Optical Physics and teaches magnetism in first year, and atomic and laser physics in third year. Students can learn more about the kind of quantum technology Mark researches by taking our project-based Quantum Information Laboratory module. The lab is the first of its kind in the UK and students learn about single photon generation, photon statistics, quantum state measurement and photon interference. These principles provide the foundations for a host of new

“This technology could be used within secure fibre optic telecoms systems, although it would be most useful initially in environments where security is paramount, including governments and national security headquarters.” Professor Mark Fox quantum technologies and it’s expected there will be lots of quantum technology jobs for physics graduates in the future. The UK government is investing £270 million in novel quantum technologies, aimed at realising their potential impact across business, government and society.

Above: Students working in our Quantum For more information on 2017 RAS award winners, visit: Information Laboratory. https://www.ras.org.uk/news-and-press/2943-ras-honoursleading-astronomers-and-geophysicists-2017.

IN PHOTOS: GRADUATION 2018

ANNUAL PHYSICS CAREERS FAIR

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FOOTNOTE

WE HOPE YOU’VE HAD A GREAT SUMMER – HERE’S A LITTLE BIT ABOUT WHAT WE’VE BEEN UP TO. In this newsletter you can find out about some of the once-in-a-lifetime opportunities that our students have had the chance to take: from supporting physics students in China to stargazing in the Canary Islands. You can also learn about some of the extra-curricular activites we offer to help you boost your CV, and there’s an interview with one of our graduates who’s now working for a major international research collaboration. There’s lots of science to sink your teeth into as well: using quantum physics to improve data security, building an incredibly fast camera to observe the universe in unprcedented detail, studying neutrinos to detect nuclear activity, and how this summer’s heatwave has helped the UK generate more solar energy than ever before. These are all topics you can learn more about during a physics degree at the University of Sheffield. Until then, contact us on the email address below if there’s anything we can help you with. We’re looking forward to seeing you soon. Professor Paul Crowther Head of Department