| Physics at the University of Virginia | ||||||
| Academics | People | Research | Announcements | Facilities | Administration | Classes |
| Monday, September 20, 1999 | Dr. Merrick DeWitt | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Wayne State University | |
| Physics Building | “The Effects of Nuclear and Electronic Structure on Intense Fields” |
| Monday, October 25, 1999 | Dr. Robert Compton [Host: Jan Harrison] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
University of Tennessee | |
| Physics Building | “Handedness in the Universe: Chirality in Chemisty” |
| Monday, November 1, 1999 | Dr. Chandra Raman [Host: Bob Jones] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
M.I.T. | |
| Physics Building | “Optical Tools for Bose-Einstein Condensates” |
| Monday, November 22, 1999 | Timothy Newman [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
University of Virginia | |
| Physics Building | “New phenomena from solvable models of quantum dynamics ” |
| The rich behavior of the dynamics of quantum systems is still being uncovered, both through theoretical and experimental research. In this talk I will discuss some recent work on simple quantum dynamical models, where exact predictions are possible. Despite their simplicity, these models exhibit curious phenomena, including quantum revivals, quantum carpets, and "the sound of one hand clapping". I will also attempt to answer the contemporary question "why not just solve these models on the computer?" |
| Monday, November 22, 1999 | Professor George Ruff [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
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2:00 PM, Room 313 Note Special Time |
Bates College | |
| Physics Building | “Diode Lasers for Atom Traps” |
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Tuesday, November 30, 1999 Note Special Day |
Prof. Alexander Sergienko [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Boston University | |
| Physics Building | “Polarized Entangled Photons In Quantum Communications and Optical Metrology” |
| A pair of photons (two-photon state) generated in the nonlinear process of type-II spontaneous parametric down conversion (SPDC) is strongly entangled in energy, polarization, time, and space (momentum). Although these two-photon entangled states have primarily been used in fascinating tests of some of the counterintuitive foundations of the quantum theory, their quantum features are also a powerful generator of novel practical applications which either outperform their classical counterparts or do not have any classical analogues at all. We shall discuss a several experimental results in the area of quantum communications and optical measurement. |
| Monday, December 6, 1999 | Dr. Mikhail Lukin [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
ITAMP/Harvard University | |
| Physics Building | “Ultra-Slow Light” |
| Monday, December 13, 1999 | Cass Sackett [Host: T. Gallagher] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
NIST | |
| Physics Building | “Decoherence of Quantum Superpositions Coupled to Engineered Reservoirs” |
| The theory of quantum mechanics applies to closed systems. In such ideal situations, a single atom can exist, for example, in a superposition of being in two different positions at the same time. Real systems, in contrast, always interact with their environment, with the consequence that macroscopic quantum superpositions like Schrodinger's cat are not observed. Moreover, macroscopic superpositions decay so quickly that the dynamics of decoherence can not even be observed. However, mesoscopic systems offer the possibility of observing the decoherence of such quantum superpositions states of the motion of a single trapped atoms. Decoherence is induced by coupling the atoms to engineered reservoirs, where the coupling an state of the environment are under the experimenter's control. We exhibit this with three experiments, finding that the decoherence scales exponentially with the square of the size of the superposition. |
| Monday, January 17, 2000 | Dr. Smair Bali [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Duke University | |
| Physics Building | “The Quest for Quantum Degeneracy in an Optically Trapped Gas of Fermions” |
| A quantum degenerate sample of cold dilute fermions is expected to yield new exciting physics since Pauli's exclusion principle forbids congregation of fermions in the same quantum state. A fascinating possibility is the formation of Cooper pairs, analogous to the BCS phase transition responsible for superconductivity and for superfluidity in liquid He-3. Lithium-6, a stable and naturally abundant fermionic isotope, is an excellent candidate because it has large and attractive interatomic interactions, a necessary requirement for the superfluid transition. However, the lowest lying spin states of lithium-6 are not magnetically trappable. This precludes the use of a magnetic trap, the only kind of trap in which BEC has been achieved for bosonic atoms. The possibility of achieving quantum degeneracy, whether boson or fermion, in an optical trap has been a long sought goal and is of intense current interest. This is because, unlike their magnetic counterparts, optical traps can trap all spin states and offer the possibility of arbitrary control of interatomic interactions via external magnetic fields. However, owing to the presence of unexplained heating rates, optical traps have failed to be stable. We have identified some of the important heating mechanisms. By minimizing their effect we have constructed an ultrastable optical trap consisting of a focused far-detuned CO2 laser beam, in which we confine lithium-6 atoms with a life-time of 300 secs. This is nearly a two order of magnitude improvement in stability over all previous optical traps, rivalling that of magnetic traps. We simultaneously confine the two lowest lying spin states of lithium-6 thus enabling efficient evaporative cooling toward Fermi degeneracy and, possibly, the superfluid transition. Measurements of anomalously large elastic collision cross-sections and observation of evaporative cooling of lithium-6 will be presented. |
| Monday, January 24, 2000 | Tom Killian [Host: Tom Gallagher] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
NIST | |
| Physics Building | “From Laser-cooled Atoms to an Ultra cold Neutral Plasma” |
| Monday, February 14, 2000 | Samir Bali [Host: Louis Bloomfield] | |
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2:00 PM, Room 203 Note Special Time |
Duke University | |
| Physics Building | “Quantum Noise in Simple Atomic Systems” |
| Counter-intuitive predictions of quantum mechanics are most readily explored in the field of optics, where table-top experiments suffice to make sensitive measurements. A single atom, radiating in free space, is the simplest and most fundamental quantum optical system. It is particularly attractive for study of multiple measurements on a quantum system because, quite unlike the situation for a classical radiator, the detection of a radiated photon directly affects the probability of a subsequent emission. Indeed, measurement of fluctuations in the radiated intensity provided the first experimental evidence for such counter-intuitive quantum effects as photon antibunching and sub-Poissonian light. However, quantum fluctuations in the optical phase of the radiated light remain relatively unexplored. Especially remarkable is the fact that "squeezing" in single-atom fluorescence, a phase-sensitive quantum effect first predicted in 1981, has long eluded direct observation despite receiving considerable attention. The reason is that measurement of phase-sensitive nonclassical effects in atomic fluorescence presents severe experimental challenges. In this talk I will describe how we recently overcame these challenges to make the first measurements of single-atom squeezing spectra in the phase-dependent fluorescence of atoms radiating in free space. Our experimental scheme permits a valid comparison of the observations with our predictions, thus yielding a new and simple physical picture of phase-dependent quantum noise in atomic fluorescence. Results of a direct measurement of the two-time field correlations will also be presented. Our measurements help elucidate the basic atomic processes underlying "squeezing". Our observations are especially important because the measurement accuracy in current state-of-the-art cold atom interferometers and frequency standards is limited by quantum noise. Controlling the phase-dependent quantum noise may enable measurement beyond quantum limits. |
| Monday, February 21, 2000 | Cass Sackett [Host: Louis Bloomfield] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
NIST | |
| Physics Building | “Entanglement of Four Particles” |
| Quantum mechanics allows for many-particle wave functions that cannot be factorized into a product of single-particle wave functions, even when the constituent particles are entirely distinct. Such entangled states explicitly demonstrate the nonlocal character of quantum theory, have been suggested for use in high-precision spectroscopy, and are a fundamental element of schemes for quantum communication, cryptography, and computation. In general, the more particles which can be entangled, the more clearly nonclassical effects are exhibited and the more useful the states are for quantum applications. In pursuit of these goals, we have demonstrated a recently proposed entanglement technique applicable to trapped ions. Coupling between the ions is provided by the Coulomb interaction through their collective motional degrees of freedom, but actual motional excitation is minimized. Entanglement is achieved using a single laser pulse, and the method can in principle be applied to any number of ions. We used this technique to generate entangled states of two, and for the first time, four particles. |
| Monday, February 21, 2000 | Robert Hirosky [Host: Brad Cox] | |
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3:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
University of Ilinois, Chicago | |
| Physics Building | “Tevatron QCD and Beyond” |
| The D-Zero Experiment studies the world's most energetic hadron collisions at the Fermilab Tevatron accelerator. The study of such collisions provides our deepest glimpse into the structure of matter. Particularly hard scattering of hadron constituents may be evidenced by the production of hadronic `jets' or plumes of particles. I review several analyses of jet production from the recent collider run at the Tevatron and survey various physics objectives for `Run II' and beyond. |
| Monday, February 28, 2000 | Carlo Dallapicolla [Host: Brad Cox] | |
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3:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
University of Maryland | |
| Physics Building | “Studying CP Violation at the SLAC B- Factory” |
| One of the least-well tested areas of particle physics today is that of CP violation. Although it has been observed in certain particle decays, its origin and magnitude is not well understood. CP violation in particle interactions is a crucial ingredient in the Big Bang model's description of the predominance of matter over antimatter in the universe. A new physics program at the "B-Factory" at the Stanford Linear Accelerator is underway and promises to resolve this important issue. |
| Monday, February 28, 2000 | Malcolm Boshier [Host: Bloomfield] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Centre for Optical and Atomic Physics - University of Sussex | |
| Physics Building | “Optics With Cold Atoms and Bose Condensates” |
| Monday, March 6, 2000 | Ted Liu [Host: Brad Cox] | |
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3:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory | |
| Physics Building | “CP Violation at BaBar -- current status and future prospects” |
| In this talk I first present a brief overview of mixing and CP violation in the charm and beauty sectors. Then, I will present a status report from the BaBar experiment at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center which has been designed especially to measure time-dependent asymmetries in the B meson decays whose interpretation in the Standard Model is directly related to the parameters of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa mixing matrix. At the end, I will comment on the future prospects. |
| Monday, March 20, 2000 | Nickolas Solomey [Host: Brad Cox] | |
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3:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Enrico Fermi Institute - University of Chicago | |
| Physics Building | “Neutrino, Elementary Particle and SuperSTAR” |
| Today there is much concern about the tiny neutral particle the neutrino. It has been in the lime-light in the popular press from science magazines to headlines in the New York Times. This is a great change from when the particle was first postulated to exist. Even its advocates doubted its existence at that point. However, now, the neutrino plays a pivotal role in many major discoveries in elementary particle physics, astrophysics and cosmology, and will continue to be important to study for decades to come. This colloquium will describe the neutrino, discuss its major role in advancing our understanding of elementary particle physics and conclude with the exciting new results we can expect from future experiments currently under construction. |
| Monday, March 27, 2000 | Erics Wells [Host: Robert Jones] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Kansas State | |
| Physics Building | “Very Slow H+ + D(1s) “Half” Collisions.” |
| The dissociation of the HD+(1s sigma) molecular ion from the vibrational continuum produces a H+ + D(1s) “half” collision, typically with a with a kinetic energy release upon dissociation of less than 0.5 eV. The vibrational continuum is populated by single ionization of the neutral molecule, which predominantly leads to creation of HD+ molecular ions, but about 1% of the time reaches the vibrational continuum,resulting in a dissociation. Using this natural particle accelerator, we study the charge transfer and elastic scattering in the H+ + D(1s) system at collision energies ( 0 =< Ek =< 1100 meV) much lower than have previously been obtained. Our experimental results for both channels are compared to our coupled channels calculations. Additionally, the sum of the elastic and charge transfer channels relative to the HD+ channel is also compared to the expected ratio of bound-free to total transitions within the Franck-Condon approximation. |
| Monday, April 3, 2000 | Paul Padley [Host: Brad Cox] | |
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3:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Rice University | |
| Physics Building | “Why Bother with Particle Physics?” |
| As physicists we should continually ask ourselves what we think the most compelling questions to be resolved are. In particle physics we have the "Standard Model" which explains all confirmed experimental results. So, should we even continue to pursue this line of research? This talk will show that there are very important questions that need to be addressed, that in fact the Standard Model is far from complete. Furthermore these questions must be addressed through experiment. I will argue that a program of Hadron Collider physics (in particular the LHC) has the best chance of moving us past the Standard Model. I will also show examples of the many technological challenges that we face in computing and engineering that make the practice of experimental particle physics truly interdisciplinary. |
| Monday, April 10, 2000 | Dr. David J. Wineland [Host: Thomas Gallagher] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
NIST | |
| Physics Building | “Entanglement Experiments with Trapped Ions” |
| Monday, April 17, 2000 | James P. Shaffer [Host: Robert Jones] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
The National Research Council, The Steacie Institute for Molecular Sciences, Ottawa, ON, Canada | |
| Physics Building | “Probing Excited States of Ultracold Molecules Using Photoassociative Spectroscopy” |
| We describe the spectroscopy of highly excited states of ultracold molecules. We use a new photoassociative approach based on resonantly enhanced multiphoton ionization to probe these systems. We excite a large number of rotational states which provides a rich rovibrational spectrum. We are able to use this spectrum to extract not only the first order quadrupole-quadrupole and Van der Waals constants but also sensitive atom-atom interaction parameters such as the spin-spin, spin-orbit, and perturbative constants which arise from interactions between different zeroth order molecular states. This technique also allows information to be obtained about near dissociation collisions. The near dissociation regime is difficult to probe using other techniques. |
| Monday, April 24, 2000 | Michael Robinson | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
University of Virginia | |
| Physics Building | “Spontaneous Evolution of Rydberg Atoms to a Cold Plasma” |
| Monday, September 25, 2000 | Brett DePaola [Host: Bob Jones] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Kansas State University | |
| Physics Building | “Collision physics with a laser-prepared target” |
| Monday, October 16, 2000 | Akira Terasaki [Host: Louis Bloomfield] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Cluster Research Laboratory, Toyota Technological Institute | |
| Physics Building | “Electronic Structures and reactions of transition-metal-cluster ions” |
| From recent extensive studies on atomic and molecular clusters, it has been shown that their physical and chemical properties alter dramatically as a function of the number of constituent atoms (cluster size). Particularly, clusters of transition-metal elements attract attention because they are expected to possess novel characters in magnetism and catalysis. Since these properties originate from the electronic and geometric structures, it is essentially important to investigate their structures by both experimental and theoretical studies. From the experimental side, the laser spectroscopy of size-selected cluster ions is one of the most powerful means for this purpose. From the theoretical side, on the other hand, recent advances in density-functional theory (DFT) provide powerful tools to search for the optimized geometry and to calculate the electronic structures of small clusters. The theoretical approach to the analysis of the experimental results allows understanding of the size-specific properties of those clusters. On the basis of this strategy we have carried out photoabsorption and photoelectron spectroscopies of small cluster ions of cobalt, vanadium and manganese. Discussion is made by focusing on their magnetic properties. Regarding reactivity, our recent experiments on the reaction of nickel cluster ions with a methanol molecule have revealed reaction processes clearly dependent on the cluster size. |
| Monday, November 13, 2000 | Andy Dally & Hontao Zhang | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Photoelectron Spectroscopy of Alkali-Halide by Andy Dally and Magnetic Properties of Clusters by Hongtao Zhang ” |
| Monday, November 27, 2000 | Laburthe Bruno [Host: Tom Gallagher] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Laboratoire Aime Cotton, CNRS Orsay France | |
| Physics Building | “Formation of ultra cold cesium molecules through photoassociation” |
| Monday, December 11, 2000 | Frederick Fatemi [Host: Thomas Gallagher] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
NIST | |
| Physics Building | “Atoms See the Light: Making Molecules From Ultracold Atoms” |
| Photoassociation, the process by which two free atoms absorb a photon to form a bound, excited molecule, is an extremely powerful tool for studying long-range atom-atom interactions. In a sample of trapped, ultracold (T < 1 mK) atoms, the technique is most often used to obtain high resolution spectroscopy of electronically-excited molecules near their dissociation limit. However, we have recently used this technique to monitor and manipulate collisions of ultracold atoms, and to produce weakly bound, translationally cold molecules in their electronic ground state. I will discuss some of these recent interesting results from the Laser Cooling and Trapping Group at NIST. |
| Monday, February 12, 2001 | Jason Ziebel [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
University of Virginia | |
| Physics Building | “Probing the Momentum Distribution of Continuum Wavepackets Using Electron - Ion Recombination” |
| We have used ultrashort, nearly unipolar "half cycle" electric field pulses (HCPs) as a tool to measure the time-dependent momentum distribution of electrons in a Stark induced continuum. Ca atoms in an external field are excited from the ground state into an intermediate 4s4p state with a nanosecond dye laser. A 1 ps laser pulse with a bandwidth of approximately 20cm-1 promotes the 4s4p atoms to the field induced continuum, with an energy just above the saddle point in the Stark potential. At a variable time delay Delta-t following the excitation of the continuum wavepacket, the system is exposed to a HCP which imparts a non-zero linear momentum "kick". The portion of the probability distribution moving antiparallel to the applied kick suffers a reduction in its total energy. The fraction of probability amplitude whose energy is below the saddle-point forms a bound wavepacket. Because the recombination probability depends on the kick strength and distribution of momentum along the kick direction, the time-dependent momentum distribution of the continuum wavepacket can be recovered from measurements of recombination probabilities versus kick strength, orientation of the momentum kick, and time delay Delta-t. |
| Monday, February 19, 2001 | Min Xiao [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Univ. of Arkansas | |
| Physics Building | “Atomic Coherence in Multi-Level Atomic Systems and Its Applications” |
| Atomic coherence effects in multi-level atomic systems, such as electromagnetically induced transparency and enhanced dispersion with reduced absorption, will be presented. I will discuss some interesting applications of such atomic coherence effects in nonlinear optical processes and group velocity reduction in such media. |
| Monday, March 19, 2001 | Santosh Pisharody [Host: O. Pfister] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
University of Virginia | |
| Physics Building | “Stair-Step Decay of Autoionizing Wavepackets” |
| Monday, April 16, 2001 | Cherice Evans [Host: Thomas Gallagher] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Louisiana State University | |
| Physics Building | “Subthreshold photoionization in molecular dopant/perturber systems” |
| Monday, April 30, 2001 | Allen Landers [Host: Bob Jones/Eric Wells] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Western Michigan | |
| Physics Building | “Photoelectron Diffraction Mapping: Molecules Illuminated from Within” |
| Much of our knowledge of the internal structure of matter results from the scattering and diffraction of electrons or X-rays. In many cases, the matter under investigation is in crystalline (or absorbate) form and can therefore be easily oriented in the laboratory. However, there are fundamental questions that may only be addressed through the direct study of single atoms or molecules (i.e. gas phase). It is therefore important that we seek methods which allow the detailed exploration of the orientation dependence of otherwise randomly oriented systems. I will discuss the use of a multiparticle coincidence technique to image the diffraction of an electron wave whose source is a specific site in a free molecule, i.e. core-level photoelectrons are used to illuminate the molecule from within. By choosing photons (and therefore photoelectrons) of appropriate energy, we can cause the photoelectron to resonate as it emerges through the molecular potential. This results in a richly structured electron diffraction pattern in the body-fixed frame of the randomly oriented molecule in the gas phase, and ultimately provides a unique "fingerprint" of the molecular potential. |
| Monday, July 9, 2001 | Frank Laloe [Host: Peter Arnold] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Ecole Normale Superieure | |
| Physics Building | “Effect of the interactions in the Bose Einstein condensation of gases” |
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Wednesday, July 11, 2001 Note Special Day |
Itzik Ben-Itzhak [Host: Robert Jones] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
J. R. Macdonald Laboratory, Kansas State University | |
| Physics Building | “Imaging Dissociating Metastable He2+2” |
| Monday, October 15, 2001 | Robert Levis [Host: Robert Jones] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 313 | Wayne State Univ. | |
| Physics Building | “Strong-Field Chemistry: Teaching Lasers to Selectively Break and Make Bonds” |
| Monday, November 12, 2001 | Brian King [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 313 | NIST | |
| Physics Building | “BEC...With a View Towards Neutral - Atom Quantum Information Processing” |
| Monday, March 18, 2002 | Wenhui Li [Host: L. Bloomfield] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
University of Virginia | |
| Physics Building | “Microwave Spectroscopy of Cold Rydberg Atoms” |
| Monday, May 13, 2002 | Doug Chrisey [Host: Ian Harrison] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 313 Note Special Time |
US Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, D. C. | |
| Physics Building | “Laser Processing of Films: From High Tc Superconducting Films to Engineered Tissue Constructs” |
| Monday, October 7, 2002 | Francois Bondu [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
CNRS-Observatoire De La Cote Dazur | |
| Physics Building | “Interferometric detection of gravitational waves: technical issues and Challenges” |
| The detection of gravitational waves, predicted by general relativity, requires to detect the relative motion between masses at rest. An interferometric setup such as the one selected by VIRGO (project between France and Italy) or LIGO (US observatory) should have the required sensitivity to see severe astrophysical events. This requires to be able to control seismic noise, the thermal noise of the masses, the frequency noise of the laser, the shot noise on the photodiode detector, and to have high specifications on the mirrors (roughness, losses). Advanced interferometers will call for even advanced technologies: squeezed light, cryogenic mirrors, all reflective optical setups, advanced seismic isolations... |
| Monday, October 21, 2002 | Mike Chapman [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Georgia Tech | |
| Physics Building | “TBA” |
| Monday, April 7, 2003 | Bruno Laburthe-Tolra [Host: Thomas Gallagher] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
NIST | |
| Physics Building | “A Bose-Einstein condensate in optical lattices: study of a quantum gas in reduced dimensionalities” |
| Monday, April 14, 2003 | Albert Stolow [Host: Bob Jones] | |
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2:30 PM, Room 210 Note Special Time |
NRC Canada | |
| Physics Building | “Molecules in Non-Perturbative Laser Fields: Dynamics and Control” |
| Monday, April 21, 2003 | Olivier Pfister [Host: Robert Jones] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Introduction to Nonclassical Light” |
| Monday, April 28, 2003 | Sheng Feng [Host: Bob Jones] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Generation of Nonclassical Light States with An Ultrastable Optical Parametric Oscillator” |
| Monday, September 1, 2003 | Cass Sackett [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
UVA - Department of Physics | |
| Physics Building | “Things You Should Pay Attention To As A Graduate Student in AMO Physics” |
| Monday, September 8, 2003 | Cass Sackett and Jessica Reeves [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Sackett: Saturated Absorption Spectroscopy and Laser Frequency Locks and Jessica Reeves: Stable Operation of a Dichroic Atomic Vapor Laser Lock” |
| Monday, September 15, 2003 | Louis Bloomfield and Forrest Payne [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA - Department of Physics | |
| Physics Building | “ Bloomfield - A Brief Introduction to Magnetism in Clusters of Atoms. Payne - Considerations in the Development of an Atomic Cluster Source” |
| Monday, September 29, 2003 | Thomas Gallagher and Wenhui Li [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Resonant Energy Transfer Among Rydberg Atoms” |
| Monday, October 6, 2003 | Olivier Pfister and Sheng Feng [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Quantum Interference of Ultrastable Twin Beams” |
| Monday, October 13, 2003 | Uli Eichman [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | Max Born Institute in Berlin | |
| Physics Building | “Excitation routes and ionization dynamics of two-electron atoms in laser fields” |
| Monday, November 3, 2003 | Bob Jones [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Multi-Photon Processes” |
| Monday, November 10, 2003 | Bob Jones [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Multi-Photon Processes” |
| Monday, November 24, 2003 | Thomas Gallagher/Haruka Maeda [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Non dispersing Wave packets” |
| Monday, December 1, 2003 | Olivier Pfister/Raphael Pooser [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Heisenberg-limited interferometry with twin boson modes: not such a bad idea after all...” |
| In this talk, we'll introduce the fundamental limits to interferometric (and spectroscopic) measurements and discuss the particular technique of Bayesian twin-mode interferometry, introduced by Holland and Burnett [1,2]. We will present new results of numerical simulations that show that, contrary to what had been predicted thereafter [3], experimental feasibility is quite promising, indeed.
[1] M.J. Holland and K. Burnett, Phys. Rev. Lett. 71, 1355 (1993). [2] T. Kim, O. Pfister, M.J. Holland, J. Noh, and J.L. Hall, Phys. Rev. A 57, 4004 (1998). [3] T. Kim, Y. Ha, J. Shin, H. Kim, G. Park, K. Kim, T.-G. Noh, C.K. Hong, Phys. Rev. A 60, 708 (1999). |
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Thursday, January 22, 2004 Note Special Day |
Enam Chowdhury [Host: Bob Jones] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
University of Delaware | |
| Physics Building | “Ultra-Intense Field Physics:Atomic Response” |
| There is a paradigm shift from high fields (below ~1016 W/cm2) to ultra-high fields, in terms of basic atomic response to the light field. Electron motion becomes relativistic, dipole approximation breaks down, magnetic fields of the light play an important role. What happens to an atom/ion in such an intense field? How are electron correlation effects (e.g. 2 electron wave-packet dynamics) modified? I will try to shed light on some of these topics. Also, I will discuss some novel techniques that we have developed to facilitate the achievements of such fields in table top experiments. |
| Monday, February 2, 2004 | Bob Jones [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Electronic Wavepackets” |
| Monday, February 9, 2004 | Kevin Mitchell [Host: Bob Jones] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | College of William & Mary | |
| Physics Building | “Chaos induced pulse trains in the Ionization of Hydrogen” |
| Monday, February 9, 2004 | Professor Theodor Hansch [Host: Department of Physics] | |
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7:00 PM, Room 203 Note Special Time |
Director of Max Panck Institute | |
| Physics Building | “Ultra-Precise Laser Spectroscopy: Counting the Ripples of a Light Wave” |
| Monday, February 16, 2004 | Olivier Pfister [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Ultrastable lasers and optical parametric oscillators” |
| Monday, March 15, 2004 | Cass Sackett [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “The Bloch Sphere” |
| Monday, March 22, 2004 | Olivier Pfister [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “The Second-quantized Bloch Sphere: The Schwinger Representation” |
| Monday, March 29, 2004 | Cass Sackett [Host: Paul Fishbane] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | University of Virginia | |
| Physics Building | “Atom Interferometry & Pulse Diffusion” |
| Monday, April 5, 2004 | Richard Barnes [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Quantum error Correction With continuous Variables” |
| Monday, April 19, 2004 | Jessica Reeves [Host: Olivia Pfister] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “BEC: Production: How To make A Condensated” |
| Monday, April 26, 2004 | Ofir Garcia [Host: Paul Fishbane] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “A New Type Of Interferometer Using BEC” |
|
Tuesday, May 18, 2004 Note Special Day |
Wei Yang [Host: Thomas Gallagher] | |
|
2:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
College of William & Mary | |
| Physics Building | “Characterization of the transient behaviour in a colliding pulse mode locked laser” |
|
Thursday, August 5, 2004 Note Special Day |
Goran Pichler [Host: Tom Gallagher] | |
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4:00 PM, Room 313 Note Special Time |
Institute of Physics, University of Zagreb | |
| Physics Building | “New Aspects in Detention and Formation of Ultracold Molecules” |
| Monday, September 13, 2004 | Cass Sackett | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | University of Virginia | |
| Physics Building | “The Two - Level Atom” |
| Monday, September 27, 2004 | Haruka Maeda [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Classical Manipulation of Rydberg Atoms” |
| Monday, October 4, 2004 | Lou Bloomfield | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Feedback and Servos” |
| Monday, October 18, 2004 | Tom Gallagher | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Rydberg Wavepackets” |
| Monday, October 25, 2004 | Bob Jones | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVa | |
| Physics Building | “Molecular Dynamics in Intense Laser Fields” |
| Monday, October 25, 2004 | Dan Pinkham | |
|
4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
UVa | |
| Physics Building | “Transient Molecular Alignment” |
| Monday, November 8, 2004 | Forrest Payne [Host: Lou Bloomfield] | |
|
4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Magnetism in Clusters” |
| Monday, November 8, 2004 | Songbai Ye [Host: Lou Bloomfield] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Cluster Electronic Dynamics” |
| Monday, November 15, 2004 | Bret Sickmiller [Host: Bob Jones] | |
|
4:00 PM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
UVA | |
| Physics Building | “HHG in Hollow Core Waveguides: Phase-Matching and Molecular Alignment Effects” |
| Monday, November 15, 2004 | Bob Jones | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “High-Harmonic Generation in Gases” |
| Monday, November 22, 2004 | Jietai Jing [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Generation of Multipartite Entangled States and its Applications ” |
| Monday, November 29, 2004 | Olivier Pfister | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Multipartite Continuous-Variable Entanglement From Concurrent Nonlinearities” |
| Monday, December 6, 2004 | John Yukich [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | Davidson College | |
| Physics Building | “Photodetachment From Trapped Ions in External Fields” |
| What are negative ions, and why should we be interested in them? And what is photodetachment? In this talk I briefly present some of the pertinent background to negative ions and the field of photodetachment dynamics. I will then describe several experiments spanning the areas of continuum electron wavepackets, detachment in external electric and magnetic fields, and precision detachment spectroscopy. |
| Monday, January 17, 2005 | Vladimir Akulin [Host: Thomas Gallagher] | |
|
11:00 AM, Room 204 Note Special Time |
Laboratoire Aime Cotton - Orsay, France | |
| Physics Building | “Non-holonomic Control and Coherence Protection by the Zeno Effect ” |
| Monday, January 24, 2005 | Kareljan Schoutens [Host: Paul Fendley] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | University of Amsterdam | |
| Physics Building | “Phases of Rotating Bosons” |
| We discuss states of matter that arise when ultra-cold, Bose-condensed atoms are made to rotate. For not-too-high rotation, triangular vortex lattices have been observed. We discuss the nature of similar lattices for the case of bosons with 2 or 3 degenerate components. We also discuss the atomic quantum Hall states that are expected to form after a quantum melting of the vortex lattice at ultra-high rotation, and present experimental signaturesof such states. |
| Monday, January 31, 2005 | AVAILABLE | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | ||
| Physics Building | “TBA” |
| Monday, February 7, 2005 | Raphael Pooser [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Multipartite Continuous Variable Entanglement Using Concurrent Nonlinearities” |
|
Sunday, February 13, 2005 Note Special Day |
AVAILABLE | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | ||
| Physics Building |
| Monday, February 14, 2005 | Iddo Ussishkin [Host: Paul Fendley] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | Minnesota | |
| Physics Building | “The Nernst Effect in High-temperature Superconductors” |
| One of the puzzles of high-temperature superconductivity concerns the nature of the non-superconducting state above the critical temperature T_c. Recently, a measurement of the Nernst effect, a transverse thermoelectric response, revealed an anomalously large Nernst signal above T_c which is very different from that observed in conventional materials. In this talk, I discuss the theory of the Nernst effect in the cuprates. I will argue that at least in a part of the phase diagram, corresponding to the overdoped cuprates, the puzzle can be explained within the theory of superconducting fluctuations. For the underdoped case, I will consider the limitations set by the Nernst effect measurements on possible theoretical scenarios. |
| Monday, February 21, 2005 | AVAILABLE | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | ||
| Physics Building | “TBA” |
| Monday, February 28, 2005 | Bob Jones | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “The Stark Effect” |
| Monday, March 14, 2005 | Olivier Pfister | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Ultra-high Resolution Molecular Spectroscopy: Hyperfine Interactions and Internal Symmetry Breakings” |
| Monday, March 21, 2005 | Robert Jones | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “The Stark Effect” |
| Monday, March 28, 2005 | Olivier Pfister | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “The Two-photon Raman Laser” |
| Monday, April 11, 2005 | Paul Tanner [Host: Tom Gallagher] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Dipole-dipole and van der Waals Interactions in Frozen Rydberg Gases” |
| Monday, April 18, 2005 | Jeremy Murray-Krezan [Host: Robert Jones] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “New Impulse Momentum Retrieval Techniques and Measurements” |
| Monday, April 25, 2005 | Daruo Xie [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Production of Non-classical Light of Squeezed State by OPA” |
|
Tuesday, April 26, 2005 Note Special Day |
Edgar Vrendenbregt [Host: Thomas Gallagher] | |
|
4:00 PM, Room 313 Note Special Time |
Eindhoven University of Technology - The Netherlands | |
| Physics Building | “A Cold Atom Electron Source” |
| Monday, May 2, 2005 | Mike Timmins | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “The Zel'dovich Effect and Evolution of Atomic Rydberg Spectra Along the Periodic Table” |
| In 1959 Ya. B. Zel'dovich predicted that the bound-state spectrum of the non-relativistic Coulomb problem distorted at small distances by a short-range potential undergoes a peculiar reconstruction whenever this potential alone supports a low-energy scattering resonance. However documented experimental evidence of this effect has been lacking. Previous theoretical studies of this phenomenon were confined to the regime where the range of the short-ranged potential is much smaller than Bohr's radius of the Coulomb field. We go beyond this limitation by restricting ourselves to highly-excited s states. This allows us to demonstrate that along the Periodic Table of elements the Zel'dovich effect manifests itself as systematic periodic variations of the Rydberg spectra with a period proportional to the cubic root of the atomic number. This dependence, which is supported by analysis of experimental and numerical data, has its origin in the binding properties of the ionic core of the atom. |
| Monday, August 1, 2005 | Mark Hillery [Host: Olivier Pfister] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | Hunter College at the City University of New York | |
| Physics Building | “Entanglement Conditions for Two and Three Mode States” |
| This will be a chalkboard talk based on very recent work of the author and Suhail Zubairy from Texas A&M (see http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0507168 for more details) about finding new ways of detecting entanglement, with connections to experimental physics. |
| Monday, August 29, 2005 | AVAILABLE | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | ||
| Physics Building |
| Monday, September 5, 2005 | Cass Sackett | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Introduction and Atomic Units” |
| Monday, September 19, 2005 | Jessica Reeves | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Bose-Einstein Condensation and Atom Interferometry” |
|
Thursday, September 29, 2005 Note Special Day |
Thomas Pattard [Host: Thomas Gallagher] | |
|
4:00 PM, Room 313 Note Special Time |
Dresden | |
| Physics Building | “Ultracold Neutral Plasmas” |
| Recent advances in trapping and cooling of neutral atomic gases have permitted achieving ultralow temperatures far below 1K. With this, a wealth of new research fields has opened up, not at all limited to the realization of Bose Einstein condensation and related questions. In this talk, I will introduce one of these research topics, namely the physics of ultracold neutral plasmas. The fact that the plasma is many orders of magnitude colder than "conventional" plasmas leads to some remarkable properties, akin to conditions realized in exotic astrophysical environments. A theoretical description of these systems relies on methods and concepts bridging the gap between traditional atomic physics, plasma physics and nonequilibrium thermodynamics. On the other hand, this also means that the study of cold plasmas can provide new stimulus for all of these fields. |
| Monday, October 3, 2005 | *****READING DAY***** | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | ||
| Physics Building |
| Monday, October 10, 2005 | Russell Minns [Host: Bob Jones] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Battling Decoherence in Rydberg Quantum Bits” |
| Monday, October 31, 2005 | Olivier Pfister [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Continuous Variables in Qubits and Qudits: What's the Difference?” |
| Monday, November 21, 2005 | ****THANKSGIVING BREAK**** | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | ||
| Physics Building |
| Monday, November 28, 2005 | Olivier Pfister [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “The Schwinger Representation (or second-quantized Bloch sphere) and Quantum Interferometry” |
| Monday, December 5, 2005 | Ed Shuman [Host: Thomas Gallagher] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Revisiting the Core Polarization Model” |
| Monday, February 27, 2006 | RESERVED [Host: JKG] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “TBA” |
| Monday, March 6, 2006 | ****SPRING RECESS**** | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | ||
| Physics Building |
| Monday, March 20, 2006 | Wei Jiang [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Metal Cluster Magnetism” |
| Monday, March 27, 2006 | "RESERVED" [Host: JKG/SACKETT] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | "RESERVED" | |
| Physics Building | “"RESERVED"” |
| Monday, April 3, 2006 | Xiaodong Zhang [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Microwave Ionization of Sodium at High Scaled Frequency” |
| Monday, April 10, 2006 | Ben Deissler [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Atom Interferometry with Bose-Einstein Condensates” |
| Monday, April 17, 2006 | Xiangdong Zhang [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | UVA | |
| Physics Building | “Probing Time-Dependent Electron Interaction in Doubly-Excited Electron Wave Packets” |
| Monday, April 24, 2006 | Eun Oh [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | Naval Research Laboratory | |
| Physics Building | “NRL's Effort on Magnetic Guiding and Manipulation Using Atom-Chip and Permanent Magnets” |
| Monday, September 4, 2006 | Cass Sackett [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | University of Virginia | |
| Physics Building | “An Introduction to AMO Physics” |
| Monday, September 11, 2006 | Cass Sackett [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | University of Virginia | |
| Physics Building | “An Introduction to AMO Physics” |
| Monday, September 25, 2006 | Russell Minns [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | University of Virginia | |
| Physics Building | “Probing Dissociation Dynamics through a Conical Intersection in Ammonia” |
| Monday, October 9, 2006 | Reading Day [Host: N/A] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | N/A | |
| Physics Building | “N/A” |
| Monday, October 30, 2006 | Amber Post [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | University of Virginia | |
| Physics Building | “An Overview of Atomic Clocks” |
| Monday, November 6, 2006 | Chandra Raman [Host: Cass Sackett] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | The Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech) | |
| Physics Building | “Rings and Vortices in Matter Wave Experiments” |
| Quantum gases are rich systems that possess many parallels with condensed matter. Atomic physicists can avail themselves of many tools for shaping these gases and tailoring their properties. For example, one can create beautifully ordered lattices of quantized vortices within a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) by magnetic or optical "stirring" of the gas, similar to those observed in superconductors and liquid helium-3. In our laboratory at Georgia Tech we have used Bragg scattering to probe the momentum distribution of arrays of these vortices. In addition, I will also discuss our efforts to use optical forces to tailor the matter wave expansion of a BEC, with applications to atom optical focusing and guiding. |
| Monday, November 13, 2006 | John McCune | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | SNL Financial | |
| Physics Building | “Alternative Careers for Physicists” |
| Monday, November 20, 2006 | Thanksgiving Recess [Host: N/A] | |
| 3:30 PM, Room 204 | N/A | |
| Physics Building | “N/A” |
| Thursday, December 14, 200 |