Departmental Safety handbook

Can all those members of staff who have not yet read this year’s safety handbook please do so. Then print out and sign the front page to say you have read it and return to G. Wilkinson’s pigeon hole. It our legal duty to provide you with guidance on how to stay safe whilst at work, this document is part of this process.

Shonah Ion

 

Engineering External Seminar

Tokamak Energy Fusion Development

Speaker: Dr. Alan Costley
Venue: Management School LT4
Date and Time: 12th December 2018 – 14:00

Abstract:
Two recent developments in fusion research promise to open a faster route to fusion power.  A re-examination of the ITER confinement databases has shown that for tokamaks the fusion gain, Qfus, depends only weakly on device size implying that, at least from a physics perspective, a high fusion performance can be obtained in relatively small devices.  Reduction factors of three or four in power and at least an order of magnitude in volume appear feasible from a physics perspective.  The main size drivers are found to be engineering and technological aspects rather than physics considerations.  The magnets are a major size driver and high-temperature superconductors (HTS) appear to offer significant advantages over low-temperature superconductors as used in current devices.  These developments combine well in the spherical tokamak (ST), which is a tokamak with a relatively low ratio of the plasma major radius to minor radius, i.e. a tokamak with a shape that resembles a cored-apple rather than the traditional doughnut.  An approach based on STs fitted with HTS magnets is being pursued by Tokamak Energy Ltd, a privately funded company based in Oxfordshire; rapid and promising progress is being made.  Details of both developments will be presented and the opportunities and challenges of this alternative route to fusion, including the Tokamak Energy development programme, will be outlined.

Alan Costley: Short Bio.

Alan Costley, a PhD graduate of the Physics Department at Imperial College, has worked in fusion for more than 40 years and published extensively in the field. He has held senior positions at the JET project, Culham Laboratory, and on the international ITER project in Cadarache, France.  Since retiring from ITER in 2009, he has consulted for government and private organisations.  He now works mostly as a consultant to Tokamak Energy Ltd, a private UK company attempting to find a faster route to fusion power.

Sam Murphy

 

Condensed Matter Seminar

Cavendish Colloquium
Monday 10 December 2018
3:00pm to 4:00pm

Advanced Josephson junction circuits: The coherence in thermal transport

Speaker: Prof. Francesco Giazotto

Sergey Kafanov

 

Astrophysics Seminar

C36 Physics
Tuesday 11 December 2018
3:00pm to 4:00pm

eMERLIN Legacy Surveys – a new window on the radio Universe

Speaker: Alasdair Thomson

Steven Williams

 

Astrophysics Seminar

C36 Physics
Friday 14 December 2018
11:00am to 12:00pm

Unveiling the properties of luminous galaxies in the epoch of re-ionisation

Speaker: Jorryt Matthee

Steven Williams

 

Condensed Matter Seminar

Physics C36
Friday 14 December 2018
3:00pm to 4:00pm

Nanobridges as Josephson junctions: Shapiro steps as a probe of overheating

Speaker: Dr. Connor Shelly

Sergey Kafanov

 

Research Software Forum – 17th December, 12-2pm

We will be hosting our second Research Software Forum.  This is a place for researchers to meet and exchange ideas on using software for research, how software can support/enhance research, programming practices that can aid research or anything else at the intersection of research and software.  This will take place on Monday 17th December from 12:00-14:00 in C36 in the Physics Building, light lunch will be provided so please register so we know numbers and dietary requirements.

The event is aimed at all researchers and postgraduates who meet ANY of the following criteria:

Do you use software in your research?

Do you write bits of code?

Do you supervise people who write code?

We will start with a short (15-20 min) key note talk given by Dr. Andrew Wharton from physics(title to be confirmed) and then have a series of lightning talks (3-5 minutes) on just about anything related to using software or computers for research. Please feel free to submit a talk.
Suggestions for talks include:

– a request for help with a programming issue / request for appropriate software / advice.
– a piece of software and how you use it in your research
– a module/library/package you have found helpful
– your git workflow
– some software that you think more people should use
– an introduction to concepts such as testing or debugging
– or even just something that you think might be useful for researchers using software to know.

If it is related to research, software, and computing then please submit something – if you think it could help someone, present it! These are not aimed to be comprehensive talks, but to start conversations (inside or outside the meeting).

To register please go to:
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/research-software-forum-tickets-53132456608

You can see details of the previous event here:
http://wp.lancs.ac.uk/research-software-forum/rsf-i-22-11-2017/

Robin Long

 

Scouts Christmas Post

Stamps for the local Scouts Christmas Post and a collection box facility are available from Stephen Holt C504 Physics Electronics Workshop Ext 93648.
Stamps are priced at 30p each and the last collection date in the Department will be the Thursday13th December.

Stephen Holt

 

CancerCare Fundraising Ball

Friday 14th December – Lancaster Town Hall

“Two local dance organisations, Lancaster Lindy Circle and Bay Balboa, are co-hosting a Winter Swing Dance Ball with live music and a Strictly Come Dancing-style competition. The ball is 7pm-midnight on Friday 14th December and will be held in the Ashton Hall at Lancaster Town Hall. All proceeds will go to CancerCare North Lancashire and South Cumbria! Put on your Gatsby-style glad-rags, dig out your best dancing shoes and come to relive the glamour of the 1930s and 1940s, all for a great cause. You don’t need to be a dancer to come and enjoy this event – everyone is welcome and who knows, you might even pick up a dance step or two from our friendly Lancaster Swing Dancers!! Drinks are being provided by Lytham Fizz and cakes from Filbert’s. So, join us in aid of a great cause, and celebrate the 80th anniversary of swing music going mainstream. This will be a great festive night out, so why not bring along your family or workmates for a Christmas knees up?

Tickets should be bought in advance and are currently available at £25 (early bird price). They can be bought online from TicketSource (plus a booking fee) or, if you prefer, you can buy tickets directly from Chris Arridge (c.arridge@lancaster.ac.uk) or Gabbi Burley (g.burley@lancaster.ac.uk) – just get in touch!

Chris Arridge

 

IOP Institute of Physics – Lancashire and Cumbria Branch

Lancashire Lecture Programme 2018 – 2019

• 12 Dec 2018 – Lancaster – Pluto’s ‘desert’: Methane ice dunes on a glacier on an airless world – Dr Matt Telfer (Plymouth) – POSTPONED
• 16 Jan 2019 – Preston – The Physics of Thunderstorms Prof Paul Hardaker (IOP)
• 15 Feb 2019 – Lancaster – Mercury – first rock from the Sun – Dr Suzie Imber (Leicester) – Note this is a Friday talk.
• 13 Mar 2019 – Preston – What we can learn from Gaia about the origin and structure of galaxies – Prof James Binney (Oxford)
• 10 April 2019 – Lancaster – Galaxy formation and evolution: nature vs nurture – Dr David Sobral (Lancaster)
• 15 May 2019 – Preston – Asteroseismology: A New Keplerian Revolution Prof Don Kurtz (UCLan)
• 12 June 2019 – Lancaster – Infinite Differences: Lessons on Diversity from Women in Physics – Dr Frankie Doddato (Lancaster)

Start Times: 18:00 (refreshments) for 18:30

Venues:

• Preston: Lecture Theatre 2 or 3, Foster Building, University of Central Lancashire
• Lancaster: Cavendish Colloquium Room, Faraday Lecture Theatre Complex, Lancaster University

Chris Bowdery