High Power Lasers Conference - HPL

What a week it's been! Had five hours of lab during the start of the week, did some French revision for my exam on Thursday and on Wednesday I went to my very first academic conference! :) :O It was the COOLEST thing! It had a cool name too: High Power Laser Conference #HPL - anything with lasers in the name just screams AWESOMENESS! :) 

Hazel Lowe, a PhD student (soon-to-be-doctor!) mentioned that she was going to do a talk at #HPL and I was so excited for her! To me, a puny undergrad, this was the coolest thing - she was presenting her work at a conference! #Awesomeness (I think that hashtag will appear numerous times in this post! ;) ) After talking to her and wanting to watch her talk she kindly offered me to come over, after a quick agreement with Prof. Smith the head of the Plasma Group at Imperial it was all sorted and I was off to #HPL ! I packed my bag a day in advance (!) and didn't sleep a wink the night before! #ExcitementOverload 

After waking up at 5 am, getting dressed and getting some breakfast down me I was at the train station with my destination set for Abingdon in Oxfordshire!

After a two hour journey I arrived in Abingdon and was super excited to get my day full of plasma/shock/laser physics started! After a short bus journey I ended up in the beautiful Abingdon high street:

Radley station with typical English weather

These houses look so cute - very different to London ones!

Abingdon high street

Christmas decorations decorate the town #FeelingFestive

GIANT CHRISTMAS TREE!

Cute roads

Thought this house looked cute

After taking lots of snaps of the town I arrived at The Cosener's House where all the lovely plasma peeps were, just in time for a quick (second) breakfast. Shortly after, we walked down the road to the main venue of the conference. And it was SO POSH! All the bushes were neatly cut, there were statues and cute patios:

A little scary, to be honest.

Note the statue with a cute Christmas hat!

It was so pretty and I don't think I've ever been to somewhere so snazzy - the inside was even snazzier!

I arrived at the conference venue in time for the 9:30 am start and was buzzing with excitement - I didn't really know what to expect. I went through a quick check with one of the event organisers if I could take pictures and I got the okay - woo! :)

I sat down inside the lecture theatre which was so fancy - it even had red curtains just like in musical theatres! 

Almost Hollywood-glamour like curtains!

I got my notebook out ready for taking notes and jotting down any cool, new physics that I haven't been taught at uni. The coolest part of the conference was knowing that all the work that was presented was fresh! It had mostly been done within the last few months/year(s)!!

Notebook and pen at the ready! 

Shortly after a brief introduction from Adam Noble, Andy Higginbotham from the University of York presented a short tutorial talk on shock compression of matter. It was pitched to first year PhD students but he used analogies so I found it quite okay to follow and he used a nice analogy of relating a shock wave to a snow plough:

Starting off simply

He said something along the lines of: A shock is a travelling pressure/density/temperature discontinuity (you can think of it as a very abrupt change in something) in a medium (i.e: a substance).

Perfect analogy for this time of year! 

A great analogy for a shock is that of a snow plough - think of the snow plough as a piston which squishes all this snow - the snow is like the 'shock wave'. More and more snow builds up, with the snow at the very front travelling faster than the snow plough - in reality this corresponds to a wave travelling faster than the local speed of sound. This is a shock wave. Check out some animations here.

He went on to explain how lasers can be used to generate SHOCK WAVES! Anything with lasers to me screams #Awesomeness so I was captivated by his talk !!


So how do they do it? Well, a laser can be used to heat something up really quickly and to high temperatures, a plasma is created and its expansion generates a shock wave! Here's a paper on laser induced shock waves to read for those who are interested. :)

After this nice, easy to comprehend introduction, the talk marathon began - a record number (well at least for me - in a day) of 22 different talks in one day were lined up! All the talks were about various different experiments and theoretical work relating to high power lasers! #Awesomeness (yes, I did just use that hashtag again! ;) 

Here are the talks summed up in pictures:

Any Higginbotham, University of York - talking about laser driven shock waves. On the left is a schematic of how a shock wave can be created using a laser and on the right are some interferograms for targets with different thicknesses, I believe.

Next up was, Hersimerjit Padda from the University of Strathclyde where he spoke about working on the Vulcan laser at the Central Laser Facility (which you can bring your school students to visit as part of a school trip if you like or come to the Harwell Campus Open Days in the summer and see all the facilities there!)
Padda also worked on creating (2D EPOCH) simulations of laser-solid interactions and how to make proton rings!

Talk 3 by Joel Magnusson from the Chalmers University of Technology probably had one of the most Christmassy talks of the day! He began with explaining his work on simulating target normal sheath acceleration (TNSA) which is essentially just firing a powerful laser at a foil, a plasma is formed and electrons/ions are accelerated! Find out more here.

Joel was super enthusiastic about his work, which I loved and he couldn't resist creating a simulation of laser fields striking a 10 micron xmas tree target! #Awesomeness

Check out an awesome video of the simulation here! It's too good to miss! And here and here are some other cool simulations of the different targets he fired his theoretical laser at!

Next up was Qunicy van den Berg who used coding to model the effect on dense plasmas created by free electron lasers - which are just lasers that consists of electrons being twisted and turned with a magnetic structure, when something changes direction or speeds up, it is accelerated and when a charged particle accelerates, radiation is given off. This is how the laser light is produced! The magnetic structure can be altered to give off different colours of laser light #Awesomeness 

After this there was a short (20 mins) break where tea and biscuits were served - mmmmm..... tasty :) And it was here where I saw Ceri Brenner, the Application Development Scientist for High Power Lasers at STFC - she is a keen Outreacher just like myself and is into lasers and plasma physics too! To show how dedicated to Outreach and inspiring young women to take on STEM she brought an A level student with her to allow her to experience an academic conference! I got to meet at #HPL and she was in year 12 so I got her email address so I could tell her about how cool Imperial College is and how cool physics can be, although that bit was easy because she was super keen already! Awww, it's so nice to see the younger generation as enthusiastic about physics as I am and she was arty too just like me so she felt like a mini me - I hope to see her at Imperial and maybe even climbing up the academia ladder to become a pioneering women in STEM!  #Awesomeness #WomenInPhysics

Ceri was going to do a talk in the afternoon and I was so excited to see a woman in physics doing her thing! #ThisGirlCan #Inspiration I do look up to her and hopefully one day i can follow in her footsteps and do a PhD and maybe even stay on in academia!

After that lovely break, the talks resumed and Laura Chen from Imperial College's Institute of Shock Physics was up next! So glad to see an Imperial Women in Physics presenting her work - I had seen her around college so it was nice to finally find out what cool physics she was doing!

Laura Chen, Institute of Shock Physics, Imperial College London - her work consisted of learning more about how the dynamic behaviour of materials was dependent on temperature and strain rate. Her work has applications in geological studies including meteoroid break-up, planetary defence and Earth impact. So she could probably save us from a meteor impact #Awesomeness #Inspiration #WomenInPhysics

Talk 6 - Brendan Kettle studied the effects of extreme ultra violet/x-ray abbreviated to XUV lasers on cold and warm dense matter aluminium.

He used the Vulcan laser at the Central Laser Facility and this was his set up! Doesn't it look cool! #Awesomeness

His talk ended with lovely Christmas wishes and of course, he couldn't finish without a cheeky picture of Star Wars!

Next up, Andrew Maxwell, yes his surname is Maxwell, just like the great creator of the Maxwell equations! #Awesomeness (okay, I think I've mentioned this hashtag a few too many times - sorry)

His work was based on double ionisation - a process where two electrons are ejected from a neutral atom/molecule when a high power laser is shined onto it! #Awesomeness

The graphs above reminded me of snowflakes which was perfect for this time of year #FeelingFestive

This one reminded me of Christmas trees and here are ...

the stars to put on top of the Christmas trees! ;)

Following on from Andrew were four theoretical physicists - I must say most of their work went over my head because it was so specialised and my knowledge wasn't sufficient enough since I haven't graduated yet but I gathered that they were working on simulating different systems some of which were multi-electron systems and/or testing different equations. So after those talks my brain was pretty fried and it was time for lunch #PerfectTiming

Lunch!

My stomach was full and my brain was refreshed for some more interesting and cool physics! Woo! :) I was very much looking forward to the next session since three people from Imperial that I worked with this summer for the #popomatic project (check out previous posts for more info) were giving talks! This session was ran by another keen Outreacher, Kate Lancaster, that I met briefly at Imperial College - it was so lovely to see her again! And it was also time for Ceri Brenner to shine :)

Kate Lancaster #InHerElement giving a brief intro for the speakers.

This session began with an Imperielle (a female studying/working at Imperial) - Toni Das

She was looking at shifts in interference patterns from macroscopic high-harmonic spectra of diatomic molecules.

Remi Capdessus from the University of Strathclyde, studies fast electron filamentation in warm dense matter. He's worked on the Vulcan laser system in the Central Laser Facility and the laser system in the GSI Group in Germany.

Next up were three people that I worked with closely at Imperial during my summer placement this year and last year! I honestly felt like a proud parent watching them up there on the grand stage showing their work that they spent years on! But also the work that I saw them doing whilst I was doing my summer placement - there were numerous times where I spotted a familiar apparatus or graph or data #ProudMoment

It was such a privilege to attend the conference and see the work of the wonderful Imperial peeps :)

Sam Giltrap, Imperial College a.k.a. my lab neighbour spoke about his optical levitation system! yes, he makes things levitate with just light! It's basically like shining a torch onto a ping pong ball and causing it to levitate - except on a much smaller scale!

I got to see this picture in real life and its's just as amazing if not more amazing in real life! That little dot of green light is the levitated object! #AWESOMENESS

In essence, the particle is levitated using radiation pressure but also a gradient force.

#LaserPointerSkillsOnFleek

Lasers are just the coolest thing! Look at this system! It's BRILLIANT!

The orange images show the glass spheres that he was trying to levitate/trap. I am loving the cool green images of the silicon oil.

Next up was the wonderful, amazing, lovely, super intelligent Hazel Lowe, Imperial College of whom I worked quite closely with at Imperial during my summer placement. She's honestly one of my best female role models in Physics at Imperial!

Her work concentrated on developing a nice x-ray back-lighter source by irradiating a cluster gas medium - a cluster is basically a group of atoms.

By irradiating Xenon clusters she was able to image a fly wing! #AWESOMENESS I remember that day very well - she was searching around the lab floors for a creature to image and I remember her being so excited to find a fly wing and now I know why! :)  It was honestly the coolest thing to see some of the processes required to get this image - a real privilege to have seen it at Imperial.

Her presentation could only be complete with some Christmas penguins, of course! #Sweet

George Hicks from Imperial College was next and he's from the Plasma Group too - I remember him telling me all about PhD life and giving me the much needed encouragement to pursue it if I wanted to! Thanks George!

George works with JAI (John Adams Institute for Accelerator Science) which is a centre of excellence in the UK for cutting-edge work in accelerator science. 

His work concentrated on observing ion acoustic waves in near critical density plasmas. 

George had some very sexy data - in the words of some professors! George has just finished handed in his thesis and done his viva so he'll soon be Dr. Hicks! Congrats!

Ellie Tubman studies magnetic reconnection - which is essentially where the arrangement of magnetic fields is altered. This happens near the sun and generates large amounts of energy! #RealWorldApplication #Awesomness #WomenInPhysics

Another interval for some tea and this time a heavenly brownie!! Mmmmm... #Scrumptious 

WOOO! Time for Ceri Brenner! 

Her presentation illustrated her work with the Central Laser Facility and how she was developing laser-driven x-ray and neutron sources for industrial application of plasma accelerators! #AWESOMENESS

Her slides were super cool! #Awesomeness Loved all the cool images and dark background for added coolness!

Peta Foster shared her work on plasma mirrors. So what is a plasma mirror? A plasma mirror can be formed from glass. If a laser is shone onto glass it is normally transmitted but if you use a high power laser it can heat it up enough until a plasma is formed! The refractive index changes and now the laser beam is reflected! HOW COOL IS THAT?! #Awesomeness #WomenInPhysics

Next up, Dr. Suzuki-Vidal - he was my demonstrator at uni for second year lab and now I'm watching him talk at a conference! 

His work deals with radiative shocks using high-power lasers ...

...this can be translated to astronomical systems and so his field of work is cleverly known as LABORATORY ASTROPHYSICS! #Awesomeness Here you can see two shocks in Xenon gas/plasma from opposite sides hitting each other!

He's so enthusiastic about his work and I'm so glad he could share it with us - you know what they say enthusiasm is contagious - what a way to end #HPL !! Go Francisco! :)

Yes, I'm afraid the day came to an end people were going home and it's almost time for the end of my blog (sorry for probably one of my longest posts!). Before I end this blog I'd like to say keep your connections close and don't feel afraid to show your enthusiasm - it was because of my enthusiasm that I got to have this unbelievable opportunity that undergrads don't normally get to have. Keep doing what you love and the sky is not the limit! Aim high and be the best that you can be!  

I had a wonderful time at #HPL and am ever so grateful for the opportunity! Be brighter than this light and shine always! x

Shout out to all those at Imperial that made this trip to #HPL possible! And a lovely thank you to all the Imperial peeps that have made my time with the Plasma Group amazingly fun: Prof. Smith, Hazel Lowe, Sam Giltrap, Timothy Robinson, Sid Patankar, Chris Price, Nick Stuart, Dom Hill, Reuben Hill, Savio Rozario, Emma Ditter, Elias Gerstmayr, Sam Eardley, Henry Watkins, Francisco Suzuki-Vidal and the rest of the Plasma Group too. :)