• Question: wuu2 in ur current investigation?

    Asked by bigbubba1 to Andrew, Daniel, Hayley, Natalia, Peta on 16 Nov 2011. This question was also asked by markbarwell.
    • Photo: Andrew Cairns

      Andrew Cairns answered on 15 Nov 2011:

      I am currently in the ESRF (European Synchrotron Radiation Facility) in France about to begin three days of experiment time. I have spent most of the day travelling, which is why I have been slow with a lot of questions!

    • Photo: Hayley Smith

      Hayley Smith answered on 16 Nov 2011:

      In my job there’s not really one “current” investigation, I’m working on many projects all at once – I guess I can try and expand on those a little here:

      I work on a circular particle accelerator called. The beam moves around this circle on a defined orbit. The orbit can be changed by fiddling with magnet settings. One of my current projects is trying to make the beam “bump” out of it’s orbit for a very short period of time at the same point in the circle every time. This is all to help with the Muon Ionisation Cooling Experiment which is a bit crazy – basically they want me to bump the beam for them, so they can dip a target into the proton beam and this will create particles called pions (which are kind of strange “exotic” particles) and after a time these decay into muons (which are like heavy electrons). I don’t really know what they do with them after they catch these muons – I should find out! But I know one of my current jobs is to make a bump in the beam for them as it’s going to really help them do their science!

      Another project I’m working on is to write a computer simulation (in the C++ programming language) to try and predict and model the exact behaviour of a high energy beam of protons. I find this hard work as I’m definitely not a natural at programming….

      There’s also a project I’m working on that’s more engineering based – I’m trying to understand how heat is dissipated within a material we use and if any heat rises are significantly affecting the structure of the material.

      There’s a few other things I’m up to too, but they’re the main ones for now, I guess most days I’d do a bit of work on all of them…

    • Photo: Daniel Scully

      Daniel Scully answered on 16 Nov 2011:

      I contribute to everyone on my experiment’s investigations by improving the computer programs we use to look for particles int he detectors.

      But my investigation…
      Most of the particles go straight through our detector without stopping, but every so often one will interact and stop. There are lot’s of different ways that the particle can interact and I’m looking for a rare one which people haven’t seen before.

    • Photo: Natalia Parzyk

      Natalia Parzyk answered on 16 Nov 2011:

      I’m working on few different project at same time, so for example one of them is at sample preparation for new experiment stage, in case of another material I’m modeling magnetic field inside material stage, different one – just during making presentation of results for conference,… and few more;)

      Basically, at my work I’m trying to understand pairing mechanism in superconductors. What is essential to superconductivity is creation of Cooper pairs – two electron coming together – which is slightly unusual – as electrons normally don’t “like” to be close to each other so I’m trying to get to know how it’s possible. What is already known: there are few different mechanism behind it but question is to find how exactly it is and why is like that.

    • Photo: Peta Foster

      Peta Foster answered on 16 Nov 2011:

      Today i will be mainly investigating electrons acceleration using the Astra Gemini laser and a gas jet puffing jets of helium into a vacuum chamber… I will put up some photos here and on my googleplus page later if you fancy seeing what we’re up to today 😀

      We are focusing the laser down into the Helium… the light pressure is so massive that it instantaneously ionises the Helium and expels the electrons as the light pulse travels through the helium plasma. As the light pulse moves through the expelled electrons rush in behind the pulse, pulled in by the positive charge of the remaining ions and you get a wake in the plasma just like you get a wake in the sea after a boat has gone by… electrons has use this wake to surf up to speeds close to the speed of light!

      A fun days work i think 😀

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