AOPP
25 October 2016
Physics Colloquia Series Presents: Professor Séamus Davis, Cornell University, entitled 'Visualizing Quantum Matter'
Everything around us, everything each of us has ever experienced, and virtually everything underpinning our technological society and economy is governed by quantum mechanics. Yet this most fundamental physical theory of nature often feels as if it is a set of somewhat eerie and counterintuitive ideas of no direct relevance to our lives. Why is this?
25 October 2016
Physics Colloquia Series Presents: LIGO Special by Professor Gabriela Gonzalez entitled 'Searching for - and finding! Gravitational Waves'
On September 14 2015, the two LIGO gravitational wave detectors in Hanford, Washington and Livingston, Louisiana registered a nearly simultaneous signal with time-frequency properties consistent with gravitational-wave emission by the merger of two massive compact objects. Further analysis of the signals by the LIGO Scientific Collaboration and the Virgo Collaboration revealed that the gravitational waves detected by LIGO came from the merger of a binary black hole system. This observation, followed by another one in December 2015, marked the beginning of gravitational wave astronomy.
22 September 2016
Colloquia Series Hilary Term 2017
The following lectures will be given at 3.30pm on Fridays in the Martin Wood Lecture Theatre, Clarendon Laboratory, Parks Road (unless otherwise stated). Tea will be served in the Physics Common Room at 4.30 pm.
The aim of the colloquia series is to share with members of the department the latest information on physics research and developments. Undergraduates, graduates, postdocs, faculty members and support staff are all encouraged to attend these lectures.
The Dynamics of Rotating Fluids
A meeting on the theme of "The Dynamics of Rotating Fluids" will be held on Friday 25 September 2015 in the Dobson Room (1st Floor of the Atmospheric Physics building on the Oxford Science Area). The programme is as follows:
1.00pm Mike Bell (Met Office) + Pedro Peixoto, John Thuburn and Andy White
Instabilities of zonal flows: numerical and/or non-geostrophic
1.25pm Megan Stamper (Cambridge)
Numerical simulations of submesoscale instabilities at an idealised ocean front
Peter Read: p.read1@physics.ox.ac.uk or Paul Dellar: dellar@maths.ox.ac.uk
8 September 2016
Honorary Doctorate for Tim Palmer
Tim Palmer was awarded an Honorary Doctorate Degree by the University of Bristol at the University Congregation on 21st July 2016. In his acceptance speech, Tim noted the important role that collaboration with scientists around Europe had played in his career. He warned of the damage that Brexit may cause in the future, in particular for UK scientists’ ability to play leadership roles in collaborative EU projects.
Colloquia Series Trinity Term 2016: Lobanov- Rostovsky Lecture - Professor Raymond Pierrehumbert - “The origins and evolution of exoplanet astmospheres and oceans”
Atmospheres are dynamic entities, formed from the volatile substances that accrete when a planet is formed and later in its history, cooked out in the hot-high pressure interior of the planet, and exchanging with the interior through crustal processes (for planets which have a solid surface) or mixing into the deep interior (for fluid planets). Loss of atmosphere to space is also a major mechanism whereby the chemical composition of entire planets evolve.
Niámh Coll - Niamh.Coll@physics.ox.ac.uk
Colloquia Series Trinity Term 2016: Professor Bruce Remington - “Frontier Science on the National Ignition Facility (NIF)”
The combination of high energy density (HED) facilities around the world spanning microjoules to megajoules, with time scales ranging from femtoseconds to microseconds, enables new regimes of plasma science to be experimentally probed. The ability to shock and ramp compress samples at Mbar pressures and simultaneously probe them allows dense, strongly coupled, Fermi degenerate plasmas relevant to planetary interiors, as well as solid-state lattice dynamics and plastic flows, to be studied.
Niámh Coll - Niamh.Coll@physics.ox.ac.uk
Hurricanes and Climate Change
Oxford Climate Research Network Annual Lecture
In conjunction with the Met Office Academic Partnership
Professor Kerry Emanuel (MIT)
In his talk, Kerry will explore the pressing practical problem of how hurricane activity will respond to global warming, and how hurricanes could in turn be influencing the atmosphere and ocean.
For further information and to reserve a place go to: http://oxfordclimatenetwork2016.eventbrite.co.uk
Final Dennis Sciama Memorial Lecture
The Final Dennis Sciama Lecture will be delivered by Professor David Deutsch FRS on Thursday 3rd March 2016 @ 17:30 in the Martin Wood Lecture Theatre.
Leanne O'Donnell
Leanne.odonnell@physics.ox.ac.uk
01865 613973
6 October 2015
AOPP Photo Competition 2015 - results
ATMOSPHERIC PHYSICS:
Winner: Kylash Rajendran, “The Goal"
Runner up: Nathalie Schaller
OCEANIC PHYSICS:
Winner: Ben Bronselaer
Runner up: Joe Hitchen, “The Pacific Ocean meets Isabela Island"
PLANETARY PHYSICS:
Winner: Peter Read, “Going, going, gone … "
Runner up: Bethan White, "Double exposure of the lunar eclipse taken from Brill”
The winners and runners-up can be viewed in this attachment. The winning photos from each category will also be framed and displayed in the department.
