Research in Physical Science and Technology

The Institute for Physical Science and Technology is a research institute where research in interdisciplinary areas that fall outside the boundaries of traditional academic departments is the primary mission.

Atom Optics and Quantum Information
The role of neutral atoms in quantum information and other atom-based technologies depends on the development of robust and flexible elements for atom-optics. The atom waveguide is a fundamental element upon which more complex components can be built. Recent work has shown that carefully crafted hollow laser beams can be conduits for guiding neutral atoms for many meters. The first neutral beam switch and divider formed with Bessel modes have also resulted from this work.
Contact: Dr. Wendell Hill: (301) 405-4813, wth@ipst.umd.edu

Biophysics
The Biophysics Program was officially initiated this fall in IPST with generous support from the Department of Chemistry. In addition to the research component we have begun drafting a graduate program. Currently we are getting an official web site in place in the hope that potential graduate students will begin applying for studies in the fall of 2005. Several participating faculty from the university are discussing plans for possible courses.

In terms of research four IPST faculty are most directly involved in research in Biophysics. Briefly the areas of their interest are:
George Lorimer: He is interested in understanding the mechanism of how molecular chaperones help proteins fold.
M. E. Fisher: He has been doing extensive research on the function of molecular motors.

W. Losert: He has developed novel optical imaging techniques for probing polymerization of actin and collagen.
D Thirumalai: For a number of years he has worked on a variety of problems in biophysics with current focus on early events in the onset of Alzheimer's disease and RNA folding. There is an active collaboration between D. Thirumalai and George Lorimer.
With the start of the Biophysics initiative faculty from other colleges are participating in the weekly Biophysics Seminars that are held on Mondays at 4 p.m. It is expected that this will result in campus wide collaboration among experimentalists and theorists. The stage is being slowly built for a diverse Biophysics program at the University that is being lead by IPST faculty.
Contact: Dr. Dave Thirumalai: (301) 405-4803, thirum@glue.umd.edu

Chaos and Nonlinear Dynamics
Fundamental ideas of chaos, a study of complex nonlinear systems that behave in unpredictable manner, find application in such diverse disciplines as biology, economics, chemistry, engineering, fluid mechanics, and physics, just to name a few. The importance of this field of study grew with a widespread availability of computers for numerical simulations and the demonstration of chaos in various systems. IREAP has active experimental and theoretical programs in the study of weather, earth’s magnetic core, lasers, particle beams, granular media, and biological systems. In 2000, US News and World Report ranked the Maryland Chaos Program number one in the US. Contact: Dr. Daniel P. Lathrop: (301) 405-1594 dpl@complex.umd.edu

Electron Correlation in Atoms and Molecules
While there are many theories that address the correlated motion of electrons in atoms and molecules, direct experimental measurements have yet to be achieved. Using electron impact double ionization, this group has, for the first time, identified and isolated the double ionization mechanisms that can be used to measure electron correlation. The research has required advanced charged particle optical devices, fast, multiple-coincidence electronics and sophisticated noise reduction techniques. A spectrometer for routine electron correlation measurements has been designed and will soon be under construction.
Contact: Dr. Michael Coplan: (301) 405-4858, coplan@glue.umd.edu

Interaction of Intense Laser Pulses with Matter
In general, these processes are being investigated in a variety of novel plasmas with emphasis on laser-cluster interactions. This work has led to an understanding of the evolution of the exploding cluster dipole moment, which then led to the discovery of intense pulse self-focusing in cluster gases. A new experiment to explore the role of multiple intense laser fields on the restraining of cluster explosions is now in construction. Other experiments in intense pulse optical guiding in plasma waveguides for laser-plasma acceleration research, and laser-droplet interactions for EUV sources for advance semiconductor lithography are underway.
Contact: Dr. Howard Milchberg: (301) 405-4816, milch@ipst.umd.edu

Laser Cooling and Trapping
The group of William D. Phillips has its laboratories on the campus of the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg. They study laser cooling and trapping of neutral atoms, with applications including Bose-Einstein condensation, atom-wave optics, optical lattices, collisions and photoassociation of ultracold atoms, atomic clocks and quantum information processing. In addition, optical tweezers are used for optical manipulation of objects such as microspheres, liposomes and living cells, with biological applications.
Contact: Dr. William Phillips: (301) 975-6554, william.phillips@nist.gov

Space and Plasma Physics Research
The sun and its interaction with the planets and the nearby interstellar medium is a dynamically rich environment which serves as a laboratory for addressing fundamental problems in space and astrophysics. On a practical level eruptions from the sun are the driver of "space weather", which impacts spacecraft systems, global communications and power networks. The space physics group in Physics and IPST is a national leader in the construction of satellite and balloon-based instrumentation for measuring energetic charged particles and for using this data to understand the dynamics of the solar corona, the interaction of the solar wind with planetary magnetospheres and the interstellar medium. The theory group has developed powerful computational tools for exploring the nonlinear dynamics of space plasma systems and has played a leadership role in understanding "magnetic reconnection", the mechanism that explosively releases magnetic energy in solar flares, coronal-mass-ejections and storms in the Earth's magnetosphere.
Contact: Dr. Glenn Mason: (301) 405-6203, Glenn.Mason@umail.umd.edu; or Dr. James Drake: (301) 405-1471, drake@plasma.umd.edu

Statistical Physics
The research group of J. R. Dorfman is studying a variety of problems related to transport phenomena in chaotic systems. Problems under investigation include theories for diffusion, viscosity, and thermal conductivity in systems which have chaotic properties. The central issue is to replace the stochastic approximations of traditional theories by exact results due to a careful analysis of the deterministic chaos of such systems. This work is also being extended to quantum systems whose classical counterparts are chaotic. At present, two Ph. D. students, Arseni Goussev, and Matthew Reames, are working with Prof. Dorfman on these topics.
Contact: Dr. J. R. Dorfman: (301) 405-4804, rdorfman@umd.edu

Ultrafast Atomic and Molecular Dynamics
Current studies use ultra-short laser pulses (25 - 100 fs) with focused intensities of 1014 - 1016 W/cm2 to multiply-ionize small molecules. The loss of electrons leads to Coulomb explosions with the measured momenta of the ejected charges containing information about collective atom motion and the molecular geometries prior to the explosion.
Contact: Dr. Wendell Hill: (301) 405-4813, wth@ipst.umd.edu

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