Past Events

What's new? Isn't fusion energy always 30 years away?

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Abstract: Fusion energy is a promising technology for producing clean, limitless, zero-carbon energy. Recently, there has been a paradigm shift where today, privately funded research dominates over the historic government-funded fusion program. Private research and development paths to fusion have very short timelines, and some future milestones appear speculative. I will discuss plasma and nuclear physics constraints that experiments will face as they progress toward the fusion goal.

Illuminating exotic chemistry and physics with single-quantum-state spectroscopy

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Molecules are amongst the most complex objects that can be controlled and studied at the individual quantum state level. In this talk, I will introduce some of the extraordinary advances made in the last decade by the application of AMO physics tools, including cavity-enhanced optical frequency comb and microwave techniques, to such quantum-state-resolved spectroscopy.

Entanglement optimization in quantum trajectories

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Abstract: In this talk I present a method to solve the equations of motion of open quantum many-body systems. It is based on a combination of generalized wave function trajectories and matrix product states. More specifically, we developed an adaptive quantum stochastic propagator, which minimizes the expected entanglement in the many-body quantum state, thus minimizing the computational cost of the matrix product state representation of quantum trajectories.

Gravity Wave Variations and Their Influence on Atmospheric Coupling Processes during Stratospheric Sudden Warmings

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Abstract: Understanding atmospheric coupling from the troposphere/stratosphere to the upper atmosphere is important for improving climate simulations and space weather forecasts. Gravity waves are one of the key elements in driving atmospheric coupling from the troposphere/stratosphere to the mesosphere and thermosphere. Owing to uncertainties caused by gravity wave parameterizations in general circulation models, it is important to advance our understanding and representation of gravity waves.

Electron Dynamics throughout the Solar System

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Abstract: Electron-scale physics is often the key ingredient that helps to disentangle complex plasma measurements. In this seminar, I highlight the synergies between in-situ observations, simulation models and laboratory experiments, characterizing the role that localized plasma processes can have in regulating the large-scale dynamics and evolution of a macroscopic system. I focus on modeling the kinetic interaction of bodies immersed in plasma using different numerical approaches.

Soft X-ray Generation Using Mid-Infrared Femtosecond Lasers at High kHz Repetition Rates

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AbstractHigh harmonic generation is a unique short wavelength light source with high spatial and temporal coherence, enabling ultrafast pump-probe studies of dynamics in chemical reactions, biological systems, and technologically relevant materials. For soft x-ray generation, this requires ultrafast lasers operating at high pulse energy and high repetition rate in the mid-infrared spectral region, which remain a challenging technology.