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| Events | |||
| group meetings: | |||
| wakefield group: Tuesday 2:30pm RLM 2.216 | |||
| surface group: Tuesday 2:30pm RLM 2.216 | |||
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September 2009 Optics of Surfaces and Interfaces (OSI VIII)
Ischia, Italy The OSI-VIII conference took place on September 7-11th 2009 on the beautiful island of Ischia, the largest island in the Bay of Naples. This conference is the eighth in a series of very successful international meetings held every two years that brings together active researchers and students from universities and institutes throughout the world to discuss recent developments and future directions in different fields of optical spectroscopy at surfaces and interfaces. The goal of OSI is the understanding of the potential of the different optical techniques with respect to interface analysis, their present status and their possible limits. All kind of surface and interface systems may be discussed... [Read more] |
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January 2009 Lasers and Accelerators workshop Prof. Mike Downer gave a series of 4 invited lectures at the workshop on "Lasers and Accelerators: Particle Acceleration with High Intensity Lasers" The main topics of the workshop were: Theory of relativistic
laser-plasma interaction, laser particle acceleration experiments,
high intensity laser technology, strong field quantum electrodynamics,
numerical methods of laser plasma interaction, isotope selective
laser ionization and physics of radioactive particle beams.
Prof. Downer's 4 lectures focused on laser-plasma experiments with the following titles: (click on the title to download presentations) |
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After the workshop, workshop participants took a hiking tour
of the Cape of Good Hope. Then Prof. and Mrs. Downer went on an
open-jeep wildlife safari at the Lalibela Game Reserve near Port
Elizabeith, South Africa. See some PHOTOS
and VIDEOS of these adventures.
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International Workshop on Plasma Shocks
and Particle Acceleration This interdisciplinary workshop assembled astrophysicists and laboratory laser-plasma physicists to explore possible connections between the production of ultra-high energy cosmic rays [1] and laser-plasma-based acceleration of charged particles in the laboratory [2]. Professor M. Hoshino (U. Tokyo) reviewed the field of cosmic ray astrophysics. Cosmic rays with energies up to about e15 eV are thought to be generated by supernova shocks. Energies above e15 eV are believed to originate in active galactic nuclei or gamma ray bursts at cosmological distances. Energies above 6e19 eV have particularly intrigued astrophysicists because the mechanism of their production is not understood, and because the so-called GZK (Greisen-Zatsepin-Kuzmin) cutoff predicts that protons with these energies would lose energy by creating pions in collisions with low-energy photons of the cosmic microwave background, and thus must originate relatively close to our galaxy. In 2002, Chen et al. proposed that a mechanism akin to plasma wakefield acceleration, driven by cosmic magneto waves might be responsible for ultra-high energy cosmic rays [3]. Prof. R. Sydora (U. Alberta, Canada) presented simulations of magneto-wave-induced plasma wakefield acceleration that lend credibility to this proposal, and suggested laboratory experiments to explore it. The workshop featured an active exchange of ideas between these two groups of physicists. At the workshop, Prof. Mike Downer gave an invited presentation entitled Holographic snapshots of laser wakefields, based in part on the Ph.D. project of former student Nicholas Matlis [4], and suggested that this imaging technique could play an important role in future experiments designed to explore the mechanism of astrophysical wakefields. [1] Bertram Schwarzschild, The highest energy cosmic rays appear to come from nearby active galactic nuclei, Search & Discovery section of Physics Today 61, 16 (January 2008) and references therein. [2] C. Joshi and T. Katsouleas, Plasma accelerators at the energy frontier and on tabletops,” Physics Today 56, 47 (June 2003). [3] P. Chen, T. Tajima, Y. Takahashi, Plasma wakefield acceleration for ultra-high energy cosmic rays,” Phys. Rev. Lett. 89, 161101 (2002). [4] N. H. Matlis et al., Snapshots of laser wakefields,” Nature Physics, 2, 749-753 (2006). |
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July 2007 Optics of Surfaces and Interfaces (OSI VII)
Alta, Wyoming The elucidation of the dynamical interaction of atoms and molecule in various charged or excited states with surfaces is a major scientific challenge at the present time. Surface and interface dynamics also form the basis for understanding a number of technologically important issues, including surface and thin film growth, chemical reactions at surfaces and surface phase transitions. Optical spectroscopy of surfaces and interfaces comprises a variety of linear and non-linear optical techniques that have the potential to study optical, electronic, magnetic and vibronic properties at surfaces and interfaces. |