Category: Research

The Dept. of Physics and Astronomy hosted the latest meeting of the Southeastern Laboratory Astrophysics Community (SELAC) from May 13-16, 2019 at the Madren Conference Center. The meeting kicked off on Monday, May 13th with a graduate student symposium featuring graduate student presenters as well as panel discussions from faculty who discussed job and research opportunities in the field of laboratory astrophysics. The full SELAC meeting ran from Tuesday-Thursday and featured speakers from several of our Southeastern colleagues as well as from NIST-Gaithersburg, Los Alamos National Laboratory and the National Ignition Facility. Participants took time for a short outing into the South Carolina Botanical Gardens and the meeting closed with a vibrant discussion of future plans for the community to bring additional laboratory astrophysics opportunities to the Southeast.

Our students continue to excel! Second year graduate student, Jordan Eagle, has been awarded the Chandra X-ray Observatory Predoctoral Fellowship at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. The Chandra X-ray Center is the Science and Operations Center for the Chandra X-ray Observatory, operated for NASA by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA). After completing her coursework at Clemson, she will spend two years doing research at the forefront of high energy astrophysics. Please join me in congratulating Jordan for this well deserved honor.

What does quantum mechanics have to do with a movie from the Marvel Cinematic Universe? Evidently, quite a bit. But do they get quantum mechanics right? Well it’s a comic book movie, so I’ll let you go watch it in lieu of ruining any plot lines. However, the movie has given one of our faculty members, Sumanta Tewari, the opportunity to explain to the public what quantum mechanics is all about. Check it out here.

Work by Clemson faculty has been featured on APOD. The Auroral Zone Upwelling Rocket Experiment (AZURE) aims to understand how the energy from the solar wind is transferred to our atmosphere and gives rise to the aurora. In the process, this experiment generates spectacular views as seen on the APOD post. You can read more about the experiment here and here. Let’s congratulate our colleagues on a successful experiment!

Have you wondered what Biophysics is and what Biophysicists do? This is your week to find out! The Clemson Biophysical Society is hosting Biophysics Week 2019 this week. Thursday at 4:00pm We will have a special colloquium in Kinard G01. Mary Elting will tell us about her research on self-organization of the microtubule cytoskeleton. Friday at 5:30PM we will have a General Public Event at the Watt Center (rm 106). At 5:30 PM Prof. Sanabria will tell us about the single molecule biophysics research occurring at Clemson. Then at 6:00PM there will be a VR show. Then at 6:30PM Delphine Dean will tell us about multi scale bioelectromechanics research occurring at Clemson. Please join us for these stimulating talks and learn more about what Biophysics is all about!

A new paper published by He Huang, a postdoc working with Xian, and collaborators has been featured on the cover of JGR Space Physics. The image shows an ionospheric density map showing a strong asymmetry in the values on either side of the magnetic equator as well as longitudinal structure. Please join me in congratulating He and Xian on their excellent work!

There has been quite a flurry of excitement about quantum mechanics in the news. First there is the paper reported in MIT Review claiming an experiment that “suggests” objective reality does not exist. Massimiliano Proietti at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh and colleagues recreated what is known as the Wigner’s Friend thought experiment in the lab. These authors suggest that, ” that one or more of the assumptions—the idea that there is a reality we can agree on, the idea that we have freedom of choice, or the idea of locality—must be wrong.”

Not to be outdone by proving that an objective reality doesn’t exist, another group of researchers claim to have used a quantum computer to reverse the arrow of time. The authors write that, “Using this algorithm on an IBM quantum computer enables us to experimentally demonstrate a backward time dynamics for an electron scattered on a two-level impurity.” If you are wondering where the semester went, perhaps we can turn back time after all. Or maybe that isn’t objectively true, it just seems like it.

Miguel Larsen and collaborators recently published a paper in Nature Communications titled, “Major upwelling and overturning in the mid-latitude F region ionosphere“.

The sensitivity of the large antenna and high transmitter power of the Arecibo Observatory radar allows them to observe dynamical structure in the upper ionosphere with unparalleled temporal and spatial resolution. The observations described in the paper show the presence of plasma turbulence at heights where conventional theory predicts that such structure should not be able to exist. Using a numerical model they were able to show that the instabilities responsible for the structure are driven by a combination of neutral and plasma dynamics that occurs much lower in the ionosphere but is connected to the higher altitudes via the Earth’s magnetic field lines. The structuring and overturning associated with the phenomenon has implications for our understanding of the physics of the region, as well as some practical implications for satellites and and radio communications that operate in or pass through that region.

Read more about this work at
Hysell, D., Larsen, M., Fritts, D., Laughman, B., & Sulzer, M., Nature Communications, (2018) 9: 3326

Medical Beam Laboratories, LLC, a company co-founded by department faculty Drs. Endre Takacs and Mark Leising, doctoral student Donald Medlin and research associate Leon Zheng, received the 2017 InnoVision Technology Development Award. Congratulations to Medical Beam Laboratories!