Gretchen Campbell Receives PECASE

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Published: Monday, January 13 2014 09:42

The 2013 Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers were announced on Monday, December 23rd. Gretchen Campbell, Adjunct Assistant Professor, was among the honorees. Campbell currently runs two experiments on ultracold atoms. One currently focuses on using a toroidal shaped Bose-Einstein condensate to build atomic analogs to electron-based superconducting circuits--so-called atomtronics. Her other experiment, currently in the building phase, will use strontium atoms to perform quantum simulations.

Campbell received a Ph.D from MIT in 2006, where she worked with Wolfgang Ketterle and Dave Pritchard. There, she used Rb BECs in optical lattices to study atom interferometry, nonlinear atom optics and the superfluid – Mott insulator phase transition. These experiments included the first direct observation of the atomic recoil momentum in dispersive media. More recently, she worked as a postdoctoral researcher with Jun Ye on precision measurements and frequency metrology with an 87Sr optical lattice clock.

See more at: http://jqi.umd.edu/news/jqi-fellow-gretchen-campbell-receives-pecase#sthash.7nceQz8C.dpuf

LUX Experiment in Nature's 2013 Year in Review

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Published: Friday, December 20 2013 09:03

The first results from the LUX dark matter experiment are featured in Nature magazine's 2013 Year in Review. The Maryland LUX group consists of graduate students Attila Dobi, Richard Knoche, and Jon Balajthy, and is led by Associate Professor Carter Hall.

Cosmic neutrinos named Physics World 2013 Breakthrough of the Year

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Published: Friday, December 13 2013 08:50

The Physics World award for the 2013 Breakthrough of the Year goes to "the IceCube South Pole Neutrino Observatory for making the first observations of cosmic neutrinos."

UMD contributors to the IceCube collaboration include Greg Sullivan and Kara Hoffman; faculty and staff members Erik Blaufuss, John Felde, Jordan Goodman, Henrike Wissing, Alex Olivas, Donald La Dieu, and Torsten Schmidt; and graduate students Elim Cheung, Robert Hellauer, Ryan Maunu, and Michael Richman.

Mohapatra to Serve on Nuclear Physics B Editorial Advisory Board

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Published: Monday, December 02 2013 00:00

Rabindra Mohapatra was chosen to serve on the editorial advisory board of Nuclear Physics B.

Professor Mohapatra is a Distinguished Scholar Teacher and researcher in our Elementary Particle group. He will serve on the board for three years.

Ellen Williams Nominated to Key Administration Post

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Published: Wednesday, November 13 2013 08:39

Ellen Williams has been nominated by President Obama to the key administration post of Director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, Department of Energy. ARPA-E was created to nurture high risk high payoff research that has the potential to make a large impact for the nation especially in the area of technology, jobs, energy, and sustainability.

The White House press release states that "Dr. Ellen D. Williams is the Chief Scientist for BP, a position she has held since 2010. She is currently on a leave of absence from the University of Maryland where she has served as a Distinguished University Professor in the Department of Physics and the Institute for Physical Science and Technology since 2000. Dr. Williams has served as a Professor in the Department of Physics at the University of Maryland since 1991. She founded the University of Maryland Materials Research Science and Engineering Center and served as its Director from 1996 through 2009. Dr. Williams received a B.S. in Chemistry from Michigan State University and a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the California Institute of Technology.”

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2013/11/06/president-obama-announces-more-key-administration-posts

Ellen will still be a member of the Department and IPST, on leave from the University.