Facility for Rare Isotope Beams

We will review what has been learned about the neutrinos and about leptonic mixing since the discovery of neutrino oscillation. We will then describe the See-Saw picture of the origin of neutrino masses. This picture hypothesizes the existence of superheavy neutrinos, and we will explain how CP-violating decays of these superheavy neutrinos in the early universe may have given rise to the universe's observed matter-antimatter asymmetry. As we will emphasize, this explanation of the asymmetry requires that nature not conserve the Lepton Number that distinguishes antileptons from leptons, and that nature violate CP symmetry in the leptonic sector. We would establish that the first requirement is met by observing nuclear neutrinoless double beta decay, and that the second one is met by observing CP violation in neutrino oscillation. The degree to which the latter CP violation and the one in the early universe are related will be discussed.

Neutrinos are the most common matter particles in the universe, and yet there are many fundamental questions about them that remain unanswered. They are a critical part of our understanding of everything from cosmology and astrophysics to nuclear reactors and particle accelerators. The absolute neutrino mass scale is one of those unanswered questions, and the most sensitive direct measurements of it are made by tritium beta-decay experiments. I will discuss two complementary experiments that will greatly increase our understanding of neutrino mass: the Karlsruhe Tritium Neutrino Experiment (KATRIN), and Project 8. KATRIN is currently being built and commissioned at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Karlsruhe, Germany. We seek to improve the sensitivity to the neutrino mass scale by an order of magnitude over the previous generation of tritium beta-decay experiments. Project 8 is an experiment that will use radio-frequency techniques to detect and measure the energies of beta-decay electrons. We will use this technique to detect the radiation created from the cyclotron motion of the electrons in a strong magnetic field. As this technique involves a measurement of a frequency in a way that is non-destructive to the electron, we can, in principle, further improve the sensitivity to the neutrino mass. I will describe both experiments, and how we seek to make measurements of the neutrino mass that will increase our knowledge of the properties of neutrinos and help us to better understand their role in the universe.

In 1981, experimenting on leftover Thanksgiving turkey, my IBM colleagues and I discovered excimer laser surgery, laying the foundation for the laser refractive surgical procedures, LASIK and PRK, procedures which more than 25 million people have undergone to correct myopia, astigmatism, and hyperopia. For this discovery, in 2013 we were awarded both the National Medal of Technology and Innovation and the National Academy of Engineering's Russ Prize. In 1983, while irradiating the skin of live guinea pigs, my colleagues and I discovered that far ultraviolet radiation from an argon fluoride (ArF) excimer laser failed to remove (ablate) tissue after bleeding commenced. The explanation is that the ArF laser radiation is strongly absorbed by an aqueous salt solution, as found in blood, through the process of electron photodetachment from hydrated chloride ions. Such an electronic excitation does not produce heat. We now apply this knowledge to propose a novel technique to debride necrotic tissue associated with burns, decubitus, venous stasis, and neuropathic ulcers, without causing collateral damage to adjacent and underlying viable tissue. We envision a "smart scalpel," enabled by the intrinsic advantage afforded by non-thermal absorption of ArF laser light by aqueous chloride ions.

In this talk I will discuss the role of low-energy particle and nuclear physics probes in our quest for physics beyond the Standard Model. After a general pedagogical overview of the field, I will focus on the role of precision beta decay measurement and their interplay with searches at the Large Hadron Collider.

Cristiano will discuss the status of direct dark matter searches and the prospects for the DarkSide Program

The development of the Standard Model has been one of the crowning achievements in modern physics, and is the cornerstone of current subatomic studies. Despite its success, the Standard Model is known to be incomplete, and providing limits on possible physics beyond the Standard Model (BSM) is crucial to our understanding of the physical universe. Although they are generally complex, nuclear systems can be exploited as a laboratory for these studies through the use of rare-isotope beams (RIBs) and world-class experimental facilities. These studies are extensive, and include probing CKM unitarity via superallowed Fermi beta decay, and examining nuclear matrix elements (NMEs) of neutrinoless double-beta decay. This seminar will explore the impact that such measurements have had on fundamental tests of the Standard Model, and outline possible directions this work will take in the future.

The neutrinos and neutrons emitted in nuclear beta decay can be precisely studied using radioactive ions confined in a radiofrequency-quadrupole ion trap. When a radioactive ion decays in the trap, the recoil-daughter nucleus and emitted particles emerge from the ~1-mm3 trap volume without scattering and propagate unobstructed through vacuum. This allows the momentum and energy of particles that would otherwise be difficult (or even impossible) to detect to be reconstructed from the momentum imparted to the recoiling nucleus. Measurements of beta-neutrino angular correlations can be made by taking advantage of the favorable properties of the 8Li and 8B beta decays and the benefits afforded by using trapped ions to allow an accurate determination of the direction and energy of each emitted neutrino. Beta-delayed neutron spectroscopy can be performed by circumventing the many difficulties associated with direct neutron detection and instead reconstructing the neutron emission probabilities and energy spectra from the time of flight of the recoiling nuclei. These novel techniques will have an important impact on improving our understanding of fundamental electroweak theory and the origin of the elements and will benefit applications of nuclear science such as nuclear energy and stockpile stewardship.

The neutron is an electrically neutral, strongly interacting, long-lived but unstable particle that can be used either as a probe or an object of study. Experimentation using neutrons is an integral part of studies spanning fields as diverse as nuclear and particle physics, fundamental symmetries, astrophysics and cosmology, and gravitation. It can also be used as an important tool for applications such as imaging and quantum information. The talk will give a brief overview of some of the types of work performed with neutrons at NIST and also discuss recent work done on measuring the neutron lifetime using a cold beam. Experimental improvements, specifically recent advances in the determination of absolute neutron fluence, should permit an overall uncertainty of 1 second on the lifetime in a new experiment under development.

Noble gas solids (NGS) are a promising medium for the capture, detection, and manipulation of atoms and nuclear spins. They provide stable & chemically inert confinement for a wide variety of guest species. Because NGS are transparent at optical wavelengths, the guest species can be probed using lasers. Longitudinal and transverse nuclear spin relaxation times of a guest species can be made very long under well understood and feasible conditions. Potential applications include measurements of rare nuclear reactions and tests of fundamental symmetries. In this talk, I will present the results of our optical spectroscopic study of ytterbium atoms embedded in a frozen neon matrix, the prospects of optical single atom detection for studying rare nuclear reactions, and the prospects of optically pumping Yb-171 nuclei in solid neon.

In the last decades we have witnessed an incredible development of both computer hardware and software. Scientific problems that were previously solved on large special-purpose machines with special-purpose software can now be easily handled in general-purpose, interactive environments on standard PCs with the bonus of immediate visualization of the results. Surprisingly, the use of computers to solve mathematical problems still has little impact on university education around the world, particularly at the undergraduate level. Given today's dominance of numerical simulations in research and industry, we think it is paramount to integrate numerical tools at all levels in the educational system. A fundamental challenge to our undergraduate programs is how to incorporate and exploit efficiently these advances within the standard curriculum in mathematics and the natural sciences, without detracting the attention from many of the classical topics. This brings with it the major organizational challenge of how to get university teachers in a variety of different fields and departments to work together towards such a reform. Furthermore, if students are trained to use such tools from the earliest stages in their education, do such tools really enhance and improve the learning environment? In addition, and perhaps even more importantly, does it lead to better understanding and insight? Although we don't have answers to all these topics, I will in this talk present one possible approach: Computational topics are gradually introduced in the undergraduate curriculum in several bachelor of science programs (undergraduate studies) at the University of Oslo (where I spend the fall semester), as an integral supplement to the classical scientific syllabus. Computations are introduced from the very first semester of study and linked up with the mathematics courses in the first and subsequent semesters. Furthermore, computational problems are integrated in basically all compulsory undergraduate physics courses, allowing university teachers to strengthen research-based teaching at a very early level of study. A particular achievement of the Computing in Science Education project in Oslo is that we have managed to implement the computer-based methods by modifying existing science courses. I will present several examples from this project, with examples from courses across undergraduate programs as well as possible links to similar ongoing activities at MSU and potential applications.

A neutron star's life cycle can pass through several different epochs which can be associated with internal (thermo) dynamical processes, sometimes intrinsic to the star, sometimes stimulated by external interactions with a companion star. The observable consequences of these processes can help shed light on the interior structure and dynamics of the star and the microphysics that underlies them. In this talk, I will examine a number of observables thought to probe in some way the dynamical and thermal properties of the crust and its coupling to the neutron star core, and their potential for setting constraints on the nuclear symmetry energy around nuclear saturation density. I will touch upon the following topics: (i) The cooling rate of the neutron star in Cassiopeia A, (ii) the upper limit of the observed periods of young X-ray pulsars, (iii) glitches from the Vela pulsar, (iv) the frequencies of quasi-periodic observations in X-ray tail of light curves from giant flares from soft gamma-ray repeaters, (v) the upper limit on the frequency to which millisecond pulsars can be spun-up due to accretion from a binary companion, and (vi) tentative observations of precursor electromagnetic flares a few seconds before short gamma-ray bursts.

The DRAGON recoil separator is located at the ISAC facility at TRIUMF, Vancouver. It is designed to measure radiative alpha and proton capture reactions of astrophysical importance. Over the last years, the DRAGON collaboration has measured several reactions using both radioactive and high-intensity stable beams. For example, the production and destruction of 18F in novae was studied by measuring the 17O(p,g) and 18F(p,g) cross sections at astrophysically relevant energies. Both reactions strongly influence the abundance of 18F in classical novae, which - due to its relatively long lifetime - is a possible target for satellite-based gamma-ray spectroscopy. In addition, the recent measurements of the 16O(a,g) and 26mAl(p,g) reactions will be discussed.

The High Resolution Array (HiRA) was developed as a collaboration between Washington University, NSCL, Indiana University, and INFN Milano. In this talk I will discuss its use in nuclear-structure studies of light isotopes via invariant-mass spectroscopy. In this method, particle-unstable levels of light nuclei (ground and excited states) are observed via the detection of their decay products. We have studied such levels with up to 5 particles in their exit channel. In the talk we will first discuss the advantages and disadvantages of this method. Next we will concentrate on the two-proton decay of proton-rich ground and isobaric analog states and their relationship to the two-neutron halo nuclei. Finally we will discuss what information can be gleaned from the correlations between the momenta of the decay fragments in 3-body exit channels.

Dark Matter (DM) direct detection experiments are currently limited in sensitivity by the presence of in-situ radioactive backgrounds and their future discovery potential will ultimately be constrained by the flux of solar neutrinos. In a first part of the talk, we will scrutinize the most prominent of tentative signals (anomalies) that have been observed in direct detection: the DAMA collaboration claims a firm detection of DM from a 2% modulating signal rate. We show that the presence of 40K decays via electron capture to the ground state of 40Ar, as well as other backgrounds, poses a challenge to this interpretation in terms of a DM model with a modulation fraction as small as 2%. We point out that the respective 40K decay mode has not yet been verified experimentally, and a dedicated measurement is called for. In a second part, we will take on the discussion of other direct detection anomalies and show that the elastic nuclear recoil signal may not only be interpreted as coming from the interaction of nuclei with light DM but also from the scattering of new species of MeV-energy neutrinos. The most promising model for the latter case is a neutrino that interacts with baryon number, and with a flux sourced by the oscillations of regular solar neutrinos. In contrast to the light-DM interpretation of various anomalies that is now seriously challenged by the negative results of the LUX experiment, the neutrino interpretation remains a viable explanation to most of the anomalies.

The presentation will concentrate on recent applications with exciting results of Penning traps in atomic and nuclear physics with cooled and stored exotic ions. These are high-accuracy mass measurements of short-lived radionuclides, g-factor determinations of the bound-electron in highly-charged, hydrogen-like ions and g-factor measurements of the proton and antiproton. The experiments are dedicated, e.g., to astrophysics studies and to tests of fundamental symmetries in the case of mass measurements on radionuclides, and to the determination of fundamental constants and a CPT test in the case of the g-factor measurements.

The Advanced Electron-Photon Facility (ALPHA) at Indiana University is currently under construction for applications in extreme environment radiation effects experiments. The compact 20m storage ring with tunable momentum compaction factor will be used for debunching and accumulation of 50-100MeV electrons injected at full energy from a linear accelerator. The design, construction, and test of a compact low-frequency ferrite-loaded rf cavity utilized in the storage ring will be discussed, and a study of bunch broadening with longitudinal particle distribution uniformity using phase modulated harmonic cavities will be introduced.

The destiny of the Universe is strongly coupled to the history of space and time. In particular the age of the Universe allows to constrain our models about the future. If the expansion of the Universe is accelerated it is currently older than if it would collapse again at some point in the distant future. Nuclear astrophysics provides tools to determine the age of the Universe independent from astronomical observations. This history of the Universe is imprinted in the isotopic abundance pattern of stable and, in particular, long-lived unstable nuclei. If the half-life of such isotopes is comparable to the Hubble time, they can be interpreted as cosmo-chronometers. A promising isotope is 87Rb, which decays on a time scale of 50 Gyr to 87Sr. The interpretation of this isotope as a cosmo-chronometer is currently hampered by the unknown neutron capture cross section of 85Kr, which decays with a half-life of 10 yr. The measurement of this cross section will soon be possible at the FRANZ facility at the Goethe University Frankfurt/Germany, which is currently under construction.

The (isospin-mirror) radiative nucleon captures, 7Li(n, γ)8Li and 7Be(p, γ)8B, are subjects of long-standing interest for astrophysics. In this talk, I combine ab initio quantum-Monte-Carlo (QMC) calculations with the Halo-Effective-Field-Theory (Halo-EFT) framework to study them in the low-energy region. The 8Li (8B) nucleus is considered as a shallow neutron+7Li core and neutron+7Li*_(proton+7Be core and proton+7Be*) p-wave bound state. 7Li*_and 7Be* are the core excitations. The scattering and bound states can be studied in Halo-EFT, in which both core and nucleon are treated as fundamental degrees of freedom. The couplings in the EFT Lagrangian are not known a priori and are difficult to extract from experiment. They can, however, be obtained from QMC calculations of the 8Li and 8B nuclei. In our leading order calculation, we use asymptotic normalization coefficients from QMC calculations to fix the parameters in our EFT Lagrangian, which we then apply to study radiative capture reactions. This reduces the need to employ numerically intensive QMC methods to directly compute radiative capture separately at each reaction energy, while still incorporating the ab initio information on nuclear dynamics that these methods provide in the calculation. Our results for both captures compare favorably with available data on total cross sections and branching ratios, within the estimated theoretical uncertainty. I will emphasize the important role of proton-7Be scattering parameters in determining the energy dependence of the cross section (S factor), and demonstrate that their present uncertainties significantly limit attempts to extrapolate data to stellar energies. *Electronic address: zhangx4@ohio.edu

The electron beam ion trap (EBIT) was developed at LLNL to study highly charged ions. It is able to produce and trap any charge state of any element, including fully stripped uranium. Observations of x-ray emission from electron-ion interactions have provided many unique measurements of cross sections, transition energies, and other properties, including tests of QED in high fields. In some cases, measurements of nuclear properties and interactions are possible. Future 100-fold improvements in performance appear likely.

Since the discovery that electrons in graphene behave as massless Dirac fermions, the single-atom-thick material has become a fertile playground for testing exotic predictions of quantum electrodynamics, such as Klein tunneling and the fractional quantum Hall effect. Now add to that list atomic collapse, the spontaneous formation of electrons and positrons in the electrostatic field of a superheavy atomic nucleus. The atomic collapse was predicted to manifest itself in quasistationary states which have complex-valued energies and which decay rapidly. However, the atoms created artificially in laboratory have nuclear charge only up to Z = 118, which falls short of the predicted threshold for collapse. Interest in this problem has been revived with the advent of graphene, where because of a large fine structure constant the collapse is expected for Z of order unity. In this talk we will discuss the symmetry aspects of atomic collapse, in particular the anomalous breaking of scale invariance. We will also describe recent experiments that use scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) to probe atomic collapse near STM-controlled artificial compound nuclei.

The challenging theoretical study of a quantum mesoscopic system such as the atomic nucleus is usually realized by combining two strategies, i.e. the most (yet doable) reductionist approach with a more effective level of description. This leads in low-energy nuclear theory to the formulation of ab initio quantum many-body methods on the one hand and of effective many-body approaches on the other hand. While the former provide a more fundamental perspective, the applicability domain of the latter is much more extended. In the last ten years, several high-quality ab-initio many-body methods have been developed to address nuclei made of several tens of nucleons, recently achieving converged calculations with realistic two- and three-nucleon interactions. A pivotal work was the re-introduction of coupled cluster techniques to nuclear theory after a long period of intense development in quantum chemistry. Alongside, self-consistent Green's function theory and in-medium similarity renormalization group techniques have provided quantitatively analogous results, opening new paths to mid-mass nuclei. Although impressive, these developments were limited until very recently to doubly closed-shell nuclei, plus those accessible in their immediate vicinity via the addition and the removal of 1 or 2 nucleons. These systems eventually represent a very limited fraction of the nuclei at play in problems of current interest and of the nuclei to be studied with the upcoming generation of nuclear radioactive ion beam facilities. In this context, I will discuss the extension of these many-body methods to genuinely (singly) open-shell systems that is now being undertaken and that opens up the ab-initio description of several hundred mid-mass nuclei for the first time.

A prominent theme in the study of the nuclear structure of exotic isotopes has been the disappearance of the shell closures found at stability and the appearance of new shell closures. The shell closure at N=28 is of particular interest because it is the first shell closure that arises due to the strong spin-orbit splitting which is responsible all higher shell closures. N=28 has been shown to disappear at large isospin, and this disappearance is particularly clear at 42Si (N=28,Z=14). This region is particularly difficult for shell model calculations with phenomenological interactions because they depend on cross-shell matrix elements which are poorly constrained by experimental data. Nonetheless, effective interactions have been developed which reproduce the collective observables around 42Si, while their microscopic predictions differ. In this talk, I will discuss the use of single-nucleon knockout reactions to investigate the disappearance of the N=28 shell gap from a single-particle perspective.

With the availability of spectrally pure lasers and the ability to precisely measure optical frequencies, it appears the era of optical atomic clocks has begun. In one clock project at NIST we have used single trapped atomic ions because uncertainties in systematic effects are smallest, reaching a fractional error of *f/f0 = 0.8 x 10-17. At this level, many effects, including those due to special and general relativity, must be calibrated and corrected for.

For one month every year the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, Geneva stops its Higgs search and by colliding ultra-relativistic heavy ions recreates conditions similar to those last seen a few microseconds after the Big Bang. The fireballs created have temperatures thousands of times hotter than the sun’s core (T~2 x 10^12 K), and normal nuclear matter melts into a Quark-Gluon Plasma (QGP) consisting of liberated quarks and gluons. In ALICE we are focused on understanding the QGP's properties and how it expands, cools and finally freezes out into the hadrons that stream into our detector. I will present an overview of the current ALICE results and discuss how they fit into the picture that is emerging of this unique state of matter.

Certain light nuclei are known to have inherent cluster structuring, and there is much discussion about the nature of the triple-alpha structure in the Hoyle state of 12C. Clustering in neutron-rich nuclei is of particular interest as such work could shed light on how neutrons affect alpha clustering, making 14C a logical candidate for such a study. In this talk, I will discuss work done at the University of Notre Dame with the prototype Active Target-Time Projection Chamber (AT-TPC). A 37.8 MeV secondary beam of 10Be was incident on a gaseous 4He active target. Elastic and inelastic scattering are observed, and resonant states in 14C are observed. Further analysis to assign spin-parity states to the resonant states is currently underway.

There are networks in almost every part of our lives: the Internet, the power grid, the road network, networks of friendship or acquaintance, ecological networks, biochemical networks, and many others. As large-scale data on these networks have become available in the last few years, a new science of networks has grown up combining observations and theory to shed light on systems ranging from bacteria to the whole of human society. The field has borrowed heavily from physics and this talk will give a physicist's overview of some of the most important discoveries, how those discoveries were made, and what they can tell us about the way the world works.

Planet Formation theory has come a long way. After initial miss guidance from our own solar system, we now have compiled at last a plausible story how dusty-disks around young stars turn into planetary systems. The models have become so sophisticated that we cannot only test various model assumptions about the various formation steps against the observed distributions of Exo-Planets --- we can now also ask for correlations between the properties of the host star, especially mass and chemical composition and the characteristics of the resulting planets in terms of mass, orbit, and chemical composition. This opens a venue to determine how planet formation relates to chemical evolution, and addresses the question when the first planets in our galaxy where born.

In this talk, I will discuss two of the key questions in nuclear physics, namely, understanding atomic nuclei with their diverse properties from first principles (tied to the underlying physics foundation) and the origin of simple patterns emerging in the complex nuclear system. In particular, I will talk about the multi-facet challenges -- and the way our innovative symmetry-guided framework has addressed key limitations -- of a large-scale first-principle modeling of atomic nuclei, from well-known stable to experimentally inaccessible rare isotopes, crucial for advancing our knowledge about the element formation and stellar evolution. Within this framework, our recent findings unveil a feature common to the low-energy structure of nuclei that has heretofore gone unrecognized in other first-principle studies; namely, the emergence, without a priori constraints, of simple orderly patterns that favor strongly deformed configurations and low spin values -- a feature that points to a novel approximate symmetry that underpins nuclear dynamics and is central to expanding the reach of first-principle studies to heavier nuclei.

Extending ab-intio methods to medium mass nuclei represents a fundamental challenge for nuclear theory. The recently developed In-Medium Similarity Renormalization Group (IM-SRG) has shown promise towards this end, producing accurate ground state calculations for closed-shell nuclei and providing a microscopic framework for deriving shell model Hamiltonians from realistic two- and three-nucleon interactions. In this talk, we discuss the first steps towards extending the IM-SRG to calculate excited states using equation of motion (EOM) methods. Ground state and excited state properties are calculated for 2D quantum dots, as a means of benchmarking the IM-SRG.

Over the past few decades, systematic research has shown that many physics students express essentially the same (incorrect) ideas both before and after instruction. It is frequently assumed that these ideas can be identified by research and then addressed through "interactive" teaching approaches such as hands-on activities and small-group collaborative work. In many classrooms, incorrect ideas are elicited, their inadequacy is exposed, and students are guided in reconciling their prior knowledge with the formal concepts of the discipline. Variations of this strategy have proven fruitful in science instruction at all levels from elementary through graduate school. However, this summary greatly over-simplifies the use of students' ideas as the basis for effective instructional strategies. Examining what students have actually learned after using research-based curriculum is essential for improving the curriculum and validating its effectiveness. I will illustrate the process with examples from introductory physics.

Helium capture reactions are taking place during various phases of stellar evolution, from the Helium burning phase of a star to the alpha-process during the thermonuclear runaway of an X-ray burst. In some environments, (a,n) reactions provide the neutrons needed for the s-process. The vanishingly small cross section of those reactions at relevant energies may be influenced by the presence of resonances close to, or below, the threshold. In this talk, a variety of experimental methods used for the investigation of Helium capture will be discussed. Direct and indirect studies will be presented along with technical developments for future studies.

Phase measurements from a pair of electromagnetic pickups probes provide sufficient information for inferring the time of flight. A method of using this to measure the time of flight accurately and in an autonomous way is simple in principle but not straightforward in practice. Two beam position monitors (BPMs) at the ReA3 accelerator have been tested for use in this context, with applications toward cavity phase calibration and beam energy measurements. In this talk, I will present the basic principle of the method and discuss the challenges we were faced with in applying it using ReA3 BPMs.

Technological advances in fabricating optical cavities and quantum heterostructures at the nanoscale have allowed us to hybridize electronic excitations with photons in studies on macroscopic quantum states and emergent non-equilibrium phenomena in condensed matter. Optical excitations in a semiconductor microcavity lead to a 2D coupled electron-hole-photon (e-h-photon) system, in which BCS-BEC (Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer superconductor-Bose-Einstein condensate) crossover physics can be studied with varying particle densities and particle-particle interactions. In the BEC-like regime, a light-mass composite boson formed by admixing of photons with dipole-active excitations of the medium called a polariton comprises the basics for recent experiments on a high-temperature dynamic condensate. The Coulomb many-body interactions in polaritons lead to the formation of a dynamic macroscopically coherent polariton state that exhibit phenomena analogous to a Bose-Einstein condensate or superfluid, such as macroscopic occupation of polaritons in energy and momentum space, long-range spatial coherence, and vortices. In the BCS-like regime, light-induced e-h pairs are theoretically predicted to form and lead to a superfluid-like state. Experimentally, a spin-dependent multicomponent condensate of exciton-polaritons has not been much explored. We present our studies of a spin-polarized polariton state at high densities in a semiconductor microcavity both at room temperature and cryogenic temperatures. Our results not only can stimulate activities to exploit spin and many-body effects for fundamental studies of quantum light-matter fluids, but also facilitate developments of spin-dependent optoelectronic devices. We also discuss experimental aspects in addressing the BEC-BCS-lasing crossover problem in a 2D coupled e-h-photon system.

The LEBIT (Low Energy Beam and Ion Trap) facility utilizes the Penning trap mass spectrometry (PTMS) technique, the method of choice for high-precision atomic mass measurements on both stable and unstable isotopes. High-precision measurements of atomic masses are of importance in nuclear structure studies, tests of the standard model, nuclear astrophysics, etc. LEBIT was successfully recommissioned in 2013 with rare isotope beam from NSCL’s upgraded beam stopping facility and is currently being prepared for mass measurements of iron and cobalt isotopes beyond N=40. To obtain increased sensitivity for beams with low production rates, reduce the measurement time that is especially important for the short-lived isotopes, and help in using the beam time more efficiently, we are in process of implementing some new developments in LEBIT program, such as a modified ejection optics with a position sensitive detector, a minitrap and single ion Penning trap (SIPT).

Quantum magnets are natural realizations of gases of interacting bosons, specifically magnons, whose relevant parameters such as dimensionality, lattice geometry, amount of disorder, nature of the interactions and particle concentration can vary widely between different compounds. The particle concentration can be easily tuned by applying an external magnetic field, which plays the role of a chemical potential. This rich spectrum of realizations offers a unique possibility for studying the different physical behaviors that emerge in interacting Bose gases from the interplay between their relevant parameters. I will discuss bosonic phases that can emerge in quantum magnets, of which Bose-Einstein condensation is the most basic ground state. The possibility of using controlled theoretical approaches has triggered the discovery of unusual effects induced by frustration, dimensionality or disorder [1]. SrCu2(BO3)2, a spin-1/2 Heisenberg antiferromagnet in the archetypical Shastry-Sutherland lattice, exhibits a rich spectrum of magnetization plateaus and stripe-like magnetic textures in applied fields. We observed new magnetic textures, via optical FBG magnetostriction measurements conducted in magnetic fields up to 100 Tesla, at 73.6 T and at 82 T [2] which we attribute, using a density matrix renormalization group approach, to a 2/5 plateau and to the long-predicted 1/2-saturation plateau respectively. Electronic density functional theory (DFT) is used to quantify the dependence of the Cu-O-Cu bond angle on the magnetic state of Cu-dimers, and the effects of such dependence on the crystal lattice. Work at the NHMFL was supported by the National Science Foundation, the US Department of Energy Office of Basic Energy Science through the project "Science at 100 Tesla,'' and the State of Florida.

One might wonder what the study of exotic nuclei has to do with the study of a rare kind of asteroids. The answer is simple, as both can be produced in fragmentation reactions, although these reactions happen at vastly different scales. The talk will focus on my transformation from being a nuclear physicist to an observational astronomer. Asteroids are leftover pieces from the formation of the solar system that did not coalesce into a major planet. As such they hold clues to the formation of the solar system and therefore are important research objects. However, even in large telescope they appear just like stars, making them a challenge to study. Most of them orbit in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. To us on Earth the more interesting ones are those that cross our planet’s orbit. These Near Earth Asteroids have the potential of catastrophic impact. The good news is that we are certain that no asteroid larger than 1km in diameter – threshold for a global catastrophe - will impact within the next 100 years. However, as we have seen with the airburst event in February 2013, smaller impacts, from previously undetected objects, leading to localized or regional damage can still occur. My presentation will focus on the different kind of studies of asteroids one can pursue. While focusing on the work done at the Egan Observatory at Florida Gulf Coast University, I will also demonstrate the work that can be done with other telescopes. From small backyard telescopes to the 10m Keck telescope utilizing adaptive optics, to the Arecibo radio telescope, highlighting the very effective way that amateurs and professionals collaborate on the study of asteroids.

In the field of nuclear astrophysics, a better understanding of the r-process is needed to explain the abundance of the heavy elements in the universe. The r-process occurs in stellar environments in which there is a large density of neutrons - conditions that allow a nucleus to capture many neutrons before undergoing beta decay back to the valley of stability. Thus accurate modeling of the r-process requires knowledge of properties related to the beta decay of these exotic neutron-rich nuclei such as beta-decay half-lives and beta-delayed neutron emission probabilities. Many of these properties are related to the beta-decay strength distribution which can provide a sensitive constraint to theoretical models. The technique of total absorption spectroscopy is a powerful technique to accurately measure quantities needed to calculate the beta-decay strength distribution. In this talk, I will discuss preliminary results of the first test of total absorption spectroscopy of 76Ga with the Summing NaI(Tl) (SuN) detector and will present plans for future experiments on r-process nuclei.

Reflecting the sum of all interactions inside a nucleus, its mass is an important ground-state property. Precisely known nuclear masses are used to benchmark and improve nuclear mass models and to study the nuclear structure. Penning-trap mass spectrometers are well-suited to provide model-independent mass data with highest precision. At TRIGA-TRAP, the nuclides of interest will be either produced by thermal neutron-induced fission of e.g. 235U at the research reactor TRIGA Mainz or ionized off-line by a non-resonant laser ablation ion source. The latter was recently upgraded with a miniature radio-frequency quadrupole device resulting in an efficiency gain of more than one order of magnitude enabling for the first time direct mass measurements of long-lived transuranium nuclides. In this talk the Penning trap mass spectrometer TRIGA-TRAP within the TRIGA-SPEC collaboration will be introduced. Furthermore, the latest mass measurement results on the long-lived transuranium nuclides 241,243Am, 244Pu, and 249Cf will be presented and their impact on nuclear structure studies as well as the Atomic-Mass Evaluation will be discussed.

Coupled cluster (CC) theory has become a standard method in nuclear theory for realistic ab initio calculations of medium mass nuclei, but remains limited by its requirement of a Slater determinant reference state which reasonably approximates the nuclear system of interest. Extensions of the method, such as equation-of-motion CC, permit the calculation of nuclei with one or two nucleons added or removed from a doubly magic core, yet still only a few dozen nuclei are accessible with modern computational restrictions. In order to extend the applicability of ab initio methods to open-shell systems, the superfluid nature of nuclei must be taken into account. By utilizing Bogoliubov algebra and employing spontaneous symmetry breaking with respect to particle number conservation, superfluid systems can be treated by a single reference state. An ab initio theory to include correlations on top of a Bogoliubov reference state has been developed in the guise of standard CC theory. The formalism and first results of this Bogoliubov coupled cluster theory demonstrate the viability of the method. After displaying preliminary results for the oxygen isotopes, an outlook regarding future applications and formal developments will be presented.

We will review what has been learned about the neutrinos and about leptonic mixing since the discovery of neutrino oscillation. We will then describe the See-Saw picture of the origin of neutrino masses. This picture hypothesizes the existence of superheavy neutrinos, and we will explain how CP-violating decays of these superheavy neutrinos in the early universe may have given rise to the universe's observed matter-antimatter asymmetry. As we will emphasize, this explanation of the asymmetry requires that nature not conserve the Lepton Number that distinguishes antileptons from leptons, and that nature violate CP symmetry in the leptonic sector. We would establish that the first requirement is met by observing nuclear neutrinoless double beta decay, and that the second one is met by observing CP violation in neutrino oscillation. The degree to which the latter CP violation and the one in the early universe are related will be discussed.

Our research program involves microscopic studies of low-energy nuclear reactions, in particular heavy-ion fusion and quasifission, using time-dependent density functional theory (TDDFT). The dynamic calculations are carried out on a 3-D lattice. There are no adjustable parameters, the only input is an effective nucleon-nucleon interaction. After a brief outline of the TDDFT formalism, I will present various applications: First I will concentrate on fusion reactions involving exotic neutron-rich nuclei which can be studied at Radioactive Ion Beam Facilities. While fusion cross sections at energies above the barrier can be calculated with the standard Time-Dependent Hartree Fock (TDHF) method, calculations at sub-barrier energies require a new approach which we call the Density Constrained TDHF (DC-TDHF) method. This method allows us to calculate microscopically the ion-ion interaction potentials V(R) which determine the fusion cross sections. Some of the effects included in our dynamic approach are: neck formation, deformation of the fragments, average multi-nucleon transfer, and dynamic excitation energies. Specifically, I will show results for fusion reactions of 132Sn + 40,48Ca, and for 40,48Ca + 40,48Ca, with comparison to experimental data. I will briefly discuss a nuclear astrophysics application (very low-energy fusion of stable and neutron-rich C+O and O+O isotopes in the neutron star crust). The final topic will be a study of capture cross sections for 40,48Ca + 238U, leading to superheavy element formation. In this context, I will present some very recent studies of quasifission which is the main competing process.

The structure of nuclei near the doubly magic nucleus 56Ni has provided a sensitive probe of configuration mixing across the N=Z=28 shell gap. The shell model description of nuclei in this region is well established, with the gxpf1 interaction accurately reproducing the energy levels and transition strengths of nuclei in the vicinity of 56Ni[1]. However, there remain open questions as to the effects of higher lying orbitals beyond the pf shell. In this talk the structure of even-even nuclei in the upper pf shell will be discussed, focusing on preliminary results of lifetime measurements performed at the NSCL. The B(E2) values, which can be derived from the lifetimes of excited states, reflect the effects of configuration mixing and possible contributions from intruder orbitals. Especially of importance in this region are the B(E2; 4+ → 2+), as the effects of high l orbitals may be enhanced. In particular the only prior measurement of the B(E2; 4+ → 2+) of the stable nucleus 58Ni, which used the Doppler Shift Attenuation Method (DSAM), resulted in a B(E2; → 4+ → 2+) three times larger than that predicted by a shell model calculation using the gxpf1 interaction[1][2]. In order to resolve this discrepancy, a second measurement of the lifetime of 58Ni was undertaken at the NSCL during the Gamma-Ray Energy Tracking In Beam Nuclear Array (GRETINA) campaign. The Recoil Distance Method (RDM) was employed in this measurement. The preliminary results for the 4+ lifetime of 58Ni from this experiment will be shown together with the impact of the addback analysis of the GRETINA array[3]. In addition, preliminary gamma ray spectra for new lifetime measurements of excited states of the N=Z nucleus 60Zn will be presented. Further perspectives for studies in the region will also be discussed, with a focus on a possible experiment to measure isospin non-conserving terms via lifetime measurements of the excited states of 58Zn, the mirror nucleus to 58Ni. References [1] M. Honma et al. New effective interaction for pf-shell nuclei and its implications for the stability of the N=Z=28 closed core Phys. Rev. C 69 034335 (2004) [2] O. Kenn et al. Measurements of g factors and lifetimes of low lying states in 58-64Ni and their shell model implications Phys. Rev. C 63 064306 (2001) [3] S. Paschalis et al. The performance of the Gamma Ray Energy Tracking In-beam Nuclear Array GRETINA Nucl. Instrum. Meth. A 709, 44 (2013).

Jon Gertner's wonderful history of the first ~60 years of Bell Labs (1925-1984) celebrates a number of the unique aspects of the Bell Labs culture that made working there such a memorable experience. I arrived in 1982, just before the consent decree broke AT&T apart, and, over the next 30 years, was witness to the changes that led people to declare, somewhat prematurely, that "Bell Labs is dead". Drawing examples from my own experience, I'll describe some of the principles that formed the essence of Bell Labs and, hopefully, spark a discussion about the role of research in today's corporations.

I will present recent advances in computing nucleon structure from first principles on a lattice and discuss their connection to current experiments. Quantum Chromodynamics is generally accepted as the fundamental theory of hadron constituents, quarks and gluons. However, making reliable predictions from it requires numerical methods. After decades of development of theory and computing, lattice QCD is now capable of calculations with realistic parameters. Calculating structure of the proton and the neutron is critical to both validating lattice QCD methods and providing theory counterpart to modern experimental efforts to study hadron structure, with proton charge radius, electromagnetic form factors, and proton spin origin being the most notable. In addition, nucleons and nuclei are natural laboratories to search for deviations from the Standard Model. Sensitivity of such detectors to new physics can often be evaluated only on a lattice.

So far, ab initio calculations in nuclear physics are restricted in several aspects, (i) they require three-body forces, (ii) they are limited to relatively light systems, and (iii) they neglect Lorentz invariance, a basic symmetry of the underlying QCD. Relativistic Brueckner-Hartree-Fock theory should, in principle, be able to bypass all these problems. In the past, however, it has only been used for the study of homogeneous infinite nuclear matter. Now this theory is applied for the first time for finite nuclear systems. Starting from a realistic bare nucleon-nucleon (NN) force adjusted to nuclear scattering data, the G-matrix is obtained as an effective interaction by solving the Bethe-Goldstone equation in an Harmonic oscillator basis. This G-matrix is inserted in a relativistic Hartree-Fock code for finite nuclei and in each step of the iteration a new G-matrix is calculated by solving the Bethe-Goldstone equation for the Pauli-operator derived from the corresponding Fermi surface in the finite system. The self-consistent solution of this iteration process allows to calculate ground state properties of finite nuclei without any adjustable parameters. No three-body forces are needed. First results are shown for doubly magic nuclei between 16O and 48Ca. Their ground state properties, such as binding energies or charge radii are largely improved as compared with the results obtained from non-relativistic Brueckner-Hartree-Fock theory. It is discussed that this theory provides a method to study also the ground state properties of heavy nuclei in ab initio calculations. *supported in part by the DFG Cluster of Excellence “Origin and Structure of the University (www.university-cluster.de)

Nuclei with extreme neutron-to-proton ratios have very different structures compared to the stable ones. Moving toward more and more exotic nuclei and getting at (or even beyond) the proton and neutron driplines, unexpected phenomena are discovered; new magic numbers, halo structures and new types of radioactivity are just a few examples of the surprises that exotic nuclei have to offer. These discoveries were possible due to the development of radioactive beam facilities around the world combined with advanced detection systems. This talk will focus on one such successful combination: The MoNA-LISA detector and the Coupled-Cyclotron facility at Michigan State University. Recently this setup has given us many new exciting findings along the neutron dripline such as the first observation of dineutron decay and two-neutron radioactivity. In this talk I will present the physics of the most neutron-rich nuclei; I will describe how we can travel beyond the neutron drip line and what we find there.

The nuclear quasi-continuum region covers typically the excitation region from a few MeV and up to the particle separation energy. Due to the high level density, conventional spectroscopy cannot resolve the individual states. Instead, other experimental techniques should be applied in order to measure average quantities. The most fruitful statistical concepts in the quasi-continuum regime are nuclear level density (NLD) and -ray strength function (SF). The Oslo method, which is based on particle- coincidences, allows the determination of primary (or first generation) -ray spectra for all the excitation bins below the neutron separation energy. This set of  distributions are exploited in an iterative 2 technique, which provides simultaneously, and from one and the same experiment, the NLD and SF. In this talk, recent results for the actinide region are presented [1-4]. The NLD is directly connected to the entropy of the nuclear system from which thermodynamic properties can be deduced. In particular, we will discuss the observed micro-canonical temperature and heat capacity. In neutron capture reactions above the neutron separation energy the  decay competes with other reaction channels. In particular, the -decay branching ratio is of crucial importance in the simulations of the nucleosynthesis, fuel cycles in fast reactors and transmutation of nuclear waste. We observe scissors and pygmy resonances carrying significant strengths superimposed on the tail of the GDR. In order to study the impact of the recently observed NLDs and SFs on the (n, ) cross section, we have performed Hauser-Feshbach calculations with the TALYS code. The agreements for known cross sections are very good and indicate a high predictive power for many of the actinides where the cross section cannot be directly measured. References: [1] M. Guttormsen et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 109, 162503 (2012). [2] M. Guttormsen et al., Phys. Rev. C 88, 024307 (2013).
 [3] M. Guttormsen et al., Phys. Rev. C 89, 014302 (2014).
 [4] T. G. Tornyi et al., Phys. Rev. C 89, 044323 (2014).


This talk will provide strategies to ensure diversity is represented as a connecting thread throughout the Department of Physics by valuing similarities and leveraging differences to sustain organic growth. This includes pipeline recruiting, formal mentoring, blending of funds, and collaborating partnerships. When cultivating an environment that values the richness of diversity, inclusive opportunities are not limited to any one person and are sustained within the infrastructure.

An enhanced probability for low-energy -emission at high excitation energies (the upbend) has been observed for several light and medium-mass nuclei close to the valley of stability [1-3]. Very recently, this unexpected enhancement has been proven to be of dipole nature for 56Fe [4]. Also, two recent theoretical works have proposed it to be of E1 [5] or M1 [6] nature; at present neither of these explanations can be excluded. The impact of this enhancement, if present also in very neutron-rich, exotic nuclei, could greatly increase the (n,) reaction rates relevant for r-process conditions away from (n,)-(,n) equilibrium [7]. Moreover, the so-called M1 scissors mode represents another mechanism for enhancing -decay probabilities for low-energy -rays, and has been rather well studied for stable nuclei [8,9]. However, it has so far not been studied in neutron-rich nuclei, although mass models (e.g. Ref. [10]) predict rather large ground-state deformations, for example for neutron-rich Kr, Sr, and Ru isotopes. Thus, it is possible that both the upbend and the M1 scissors mode are present in neutron-rich, deformed nuclei, consequently increasing the (n,) reaction rates and potentially changing the achieved element abundances in large-network calculations. In this talk, the present status of the upbend will be presented. Experiments at radioactive-beam facilities that allow for the study of the upbend and possibly the M1 scissors mode will be briefly discussed. Preliminary reaction-rate calculations for (n,) r-process rates, including the M1 scissors mode, will also be shown. [1] A. Voinov et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 93, 142504 (2004). [2] M. Guttormsen et al., Phys. Rev. C 71, 044307 (2005). [3] M. Wiedeking et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 108, 162503 (2012). [4] A. C. Larsen et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 242504 (2013). [5] E. Litvinova and N. Belov, Phys. Rev. C 88, 031302(R) (2013). [6]. R. Schwengner, S. Frauendorf, and A.C. Larsen, Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 232504 (2013). [7] A. C. Larsen and S. Goriely, Phys. Rev. C 82, 014318 (2010). [8] K. Heyde, P. von Neumann-Cosel, and A. Richter, Rev. Mod. Phys. 82, 2365 (2010). [9] M. Guttormsen et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 109, 162503 (2012). [10] S. Goriely, N. Chamel, and J. M. Pearson, Phys. Rev. Lett. 102, 152503 (2009).

The In-Gas Laser Ionization and Spectroscopy (IGLIS) technique is employed at the Leuven Isotope Separator On-Line (LISOL) facility to produce highly-pure radioactive beams and obtain important information on their ground- and excited-state properties, as e.g. mean-square charge radii, magnetic dipole moments and nuclear spins. In-gas-cell laser spectroscopy studies have been performed on neutron-deficient copper, silver, and very recently, actinium isotopes. These last experiments on the heavier mass region have allowed us to efficiently produce beams of 212Ac to 215Ac, in the N=126 shell closure, and resolve the hyperfine structure of these nuclei for the 2D3/2 4P5/2 transition at 438 nm. Unlike in-gas cell laser spectroscopy studies, laser ionization in a low-temperature and low-density supersonic gas jet allows eliminating the pressure broadening and improving the spectral resolution by at least one order of magnitude, as recently demonstrated in off-line experiments at LISOL on the stable copper isotopes. In this talk the most recent results obtained at LISOL will be presented. In addition, the experimental developments required to perform in-gas-jet laser spectroscopy studies on exotic nuclei in the IGLIS setup that will be linked to the Superconducting Separator Spectrometer (S3) of the SPIRAL2 facility (GANIL) will be summarized.

Reaction models for extraction of baryon parameters from measured observables have made significant advances recently and have shown the importance of coupled-channels effects when extracting the masses of resonance poles from experimental data. These coupled-channels effects are not small. For example, the transition magnetic moment which governs the Electromagnetic decay rate of the Delta resonance is off by 30% or more from predictions of the non-relativistic quark model, yet when coupled-channels effects of the nucleon’s “pion cloud” are included, the decay rate is predicted correctly. Similar loop diagrams for two-pion photoproduction include a purely hadronic (p,2p) vertex, which must be constrained by hadronic-beam data. Hence, extraction of nucleon resonance poles using two-pion production data from Jefferson Lab is inextricably linked to the need for higher-precision (p,2p) reaction from J-PARC. The world database for (p,2p) data on the nucleon is paltry and a new experiment has been approved at J-PARC to remedy this situation. The new experiment at J-PARC will be described in this talk. Together, new high-precision data from both JLab and J-PARC will work together to ensure that coupled-channels effects are properly constrained in the search for the spectrum of nucleon resonances.

Heavy-ion collisions provide an important probe of reaction dynamics and the underlying nuclear equation of state. We explore the reaction dynamics of heavy reaction systems, below the Fermi energy, with an eye towards the influence of the symmetry energy. A multi-dimensional analysis technique has been recently explored (theoretically) to enhance our analysis of experimental observables and, thus, improve our ability to constrain the nuclear equation of state. Future work will be directed towards applying the multi-dimensional analysis technique to experimental data for indirect comparison.

For the purpose of effective on-line beam tuning, linear thin-lens model for all elements in Linac Segment has been developed and reported in the last seminar. Recent upgrades and further study on FRIB on-line model has been made. This report contains two parts. Part one describes the development of a simple solenoid model which can calculate focusing strength and Larmor angle at the same time. Part two shows further study of influence of quadrupole components of RF cavities on beam dynamics, and a simple and more effective way of quadrupole components compensation by fine tuning of solenoid polarity using Genetic Algorithm is proposed.

The breakdown of the neutron magic number N=28 below 48Ca has attracted much attention in recent years [Cau14]. An intermediate-energy Coulomb excitation measurement on 44S28 provided the first direct experimental evidence of collectivity at N=28 more than 15 years ago [Gla97]. However, information on the level schemes of the neighboring S isotopes is scares, particularly for the odd-A isotopes. Presented are measurements of previously unobserved transitions in neutron-rich sulfur isotopes produced in the fragmentation of 48Ca and 46Ar beams at the Coupled Cyclotron Facility at the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory. The measurement was performed using the GRETINA/S800 setup. This is part of a program which will broaden in the future to measurements of low-energy Coulomb excitation of neutron-rich sulfur isotopes using the new SeGA/JANUS experiment setup. These low-energy Coulomb excitation measurements will be sensitive to the quadrupole moment of the nucleus and therefore to nuclear shape, whereas intermediate-energy Coulomb excitation measurements are sensitive only to the transition matrix elements [Cli69,Gla98,Gad08]. Rapid shape transitions are predicted near the N=28 shell gap, which these measurements with reaccelerated beams will be able to quantify. Preparations for this program will be presented. [Cau14] E. Caurier, F. Nowacki, and A. Poves, Phys. Rev. C 90, 014302 (2014). [Gla97] T. Glasmacher et al., Phys. Lett. 395, 163 (1997). [Cli69] D. Cline et al., Nucl. Phys. A 133, 445 (1969). [Gla98] T. Glasmacher, Annu. Rev. Nucl. Part. Sci. 48, 1 (1998). [Gad08] A. Gade and T. Glasmacher, Prog. in Part. Nucl. Phys. 60, 161 (2008).

High spin spectroscopy of nuclei near shell closure remains a subject of current interest in nuclear physics. In particular, the high spin states of nuclei near 90Zr provide an ideal testing ground for the newly available shell model interactions in the f5 / 2pg9 / 2 model space. Further, the properties of different high-j orbitals across the 50 shell gap which play crucial role in shell evolution far away from the stability line, can be studied from their contribution at high spin states near the shell closure. With these motivations, high spin states of 88,89Zr were studied with 13C(80Se,xn) fusion evaporation reaction using the Indian National Gamma Array (INGA) at TIFR-BARC Pelletron-LINAC facility, Mumbai. Comparison of the measured excited states with JUN45 and jj44b interactions have been performed. Lifetime measurements of various states of 88,89Zr have been carried out and the same have been compared with the shell model calculations. A regular cascade of around ten ϒ rays of fast M1 character has been observed in 89Zr where the shell model calculation deviates progressively at higher spin indicating excitations across the shell gap.

The scattering cross-section is the key observable in particle physics experiments, such as the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. In quantum field theory, the cross-section is expressed in terms of the scattering amplitude, which traditionally is calculated as a sum of Feynman diagrams. When many particles are involved in a process -- as for example in multi-gluon scattering -- the Feynman diagram approach becomes very difficult, even at leading order (tree-level). In recent years, it has been realized that amplitudes possess a very interesting mathematical structure that can be exploited to find more efficient calculational methods. Surprisingly, it also turns out that some amplitudes have interpretations as volumes of certain abstract geometric objects. Not assuming prior knowledge of quantum field theory or Feynman rules, I will review the background and recent progress in this exciting field of research.

The quest to synthesise Super-heavy elements is at the frontier of nuclear physics research. These elements can only be formed by the fusion of two heavy nuclei. The repulsive electrostatic energy between such nuclei is extremely large and more often than not, the system re-separates prematurely into two heavy fragments, intermediate in mass compared to the original nuclei. This non-equilibrium process is called quasifission and it hinders fusion by several orders of magnitude. Only occasionally does fusion occur, resulting in the formation of a compound nucleus. Finding the variables determining the competition between quasifission and fusion is a problem currently challenging experimentalists and theoreticians. Systematic and comprehensive measurements have been performed at the ANU's 14UD Accelerator facility using the CUBE detector to study heavy ion reactions. The large angular coverage of the CUBE fission spectrometer was used to obtain wide-ranging mass-angle distributions, at energies spanning the Coulomb barrier. I will present results from these experiments that investigate the dependence of nuclear reaction dynamics on entrance channel mass-asymmetry, charge of interacting species, deformation and specifically shell effects in the exit channel. I will also present results from theoretical work on these reactions.

In the natural environment of the cell, proteins are crowded by other biomacromolecules and assemblies from t-RNAses and ribosomes to carbohydrates and other proteins. Crowding means a reduction in available volume. In addition, proteins can interact with crowders through weak "quinary" interactions. Available volume and 'stickiness' of the environment affect how proteins fold and functions. I will consider examples ranging from small proteins in vitro to large proteins in cells, using physical characterization techniques to discuss how stability, folding speed and function are affected by crowding and sticking.

The periodic elastic motion of mechanical elements can be regarded as an ensemble of acoustic phonons, described as a phonon coherent state in quantum mechanics. An electromechanical resonator is one of the most ideal phonon cavities, where the phonon ensemble survives much longer than the oscillation period. The long-lived phonons at different normal modes have larger probability for mutual interaction and the precise manipulation of mechanical oscillation through the nonlinear dynamics becomes possible. GaAs/AlGaAs parametric resonators allow us to electrically control the nonlinear coupling of different mechanical modes and provide an excellent platform for the experiments of nonlinear phononics. In this talk, I will present our approaches on the nonlinear phononics experiments using the semiconductor-based electromechanical resonators. Starting from the basic mechanism of nonlinear interaction in our devices, the concepts of single/multi-mode and red/blue-sideband parametric amplification will be described. As the examples of their implementation, I will talk on our recent results on the coherent control [1,2], phonon lasing [3], and 2-mode thermal noise squeezing [4]. The highly controllable mechanical devices open up a new direction in the study of the fundamental phonon dynamics, as well as the realization of novel kind of electromechanical systems, including high-speed sensors and actuators, high-frequency filters, and ultra-high energy-efficient phonon processors. References [1] H. Okamoto, A. Gourgout, C.-Y. Chang, K. Onomitsu, I. Mahboob, E. Y. Chang, and H. Yamaguchi, "Coherent phonon manipulation in coupled mechanical resonators" Nature Phys. 9, 481 (2013). [2] H. Yamaguchi, H. Okamoto, and I. Mahboob, "Coherent control of micro/nanomechanical oscillation using parametric mode mixing" Appl. Phys. Express 5, 014001 (2012). [3] I. Mahboob, K. Nishiguchi, A. Fujiwara, and H. Yamaguchi, "Phonon lasing in an electromechanical resonator" Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 127202 (2013). [4] I. Mahboob, H. Okamoto, K. Onomitsu, H. Yamaguchi, "Two-mode squeezing in an electromechanical resonator" arXiv:1405.5270

The first advanced gravitational wave detectors are slated to begin operations in 2015, and will bring one of the most anticipated discoveries of the century: the direct detection of gravitational waves. The premier gravitational wave sources are the mergers of two compact objects, involving either two neutron stars or a neutron star and a black hole. While the gravitational wave signal will give insight to the basic properties of compact objects, a coincident detection at electromagnetic wavelengths will significantly leverage the event by providing precise sky localization and an association to a galaxy. The main challenge will be how to identify the correct electromagnetic counterpart amidst an otherwise dynamic sky. In this talk, I present ongoing efforts to characterize the electromagnetic signatures from compact object mergers. In particular, I present observational evidence linking mergers to two distinct counterparts: short-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) and long-lived transients powered by the nucleosynthesis of heavy elements ("kilonovae"). Such observations are crucial in setting the stage for the upcoming revolutionary era of gravitational wave discovery.

This work details the study of nuclear decay in the region of doubly magic 78Ni using the Versatile Array of Neutron Detectors at Low Energy (VANDLE). This detector system uses the time-of-flight technique to measure the energy of beta-delayed neutrons. VANDLE uses a fully digital data acquisition system equipped with timing algorithms developed as part of the experimental work. The experiment examined nearly 30 beta-delayed neutron precursors produced at the Hollifield Radioactive Ion Beam Facility at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. This work discusses two of these nuclei: 77Cu and 84Ga. Results from the experiment provide details of the Gamow-Teller decay in neutron rich nuclei near 78Ni.

The rising importance of advanced analytics for businesses, where the growth of "big data" and predictive models is driving new insights and capabilities across all industries, has exposed a growing talent gap for American companies. Using my career journey from NSCL to business leadership as evidence, I will argue that the uniquely broad skill set of research scientists, and particularly experimental physicists in large collaborations, can bridge the talent gap for truly innovative companies. I'll also make recommendations for how science departments can recruit and prepare students for diverse career paths in business.

The increased use of beams stopped in gas from the A1900 fragment separator requires an accurate determination of the beam rigidity after the separator. The beam rigidity is calculated from the magnetic field and bending radius in each A1900 dipole, but the variation with rigidity of the bending radius of the dipoles can introduce an error of as much as 1% into the rigidity calibration. We have performed absolute time-of-flight measurements on the beam from the A1900 fragment separator over a broad rigidity range (1.5-4.5 Tm), which will then be used to improve the rigidity calibration of the A1900 to about 0.1%. This improve calibration can be used to further the understanding of the A1900 magnets which will be reused in the FRIB fragment separator.

This year the Abrams Planetarium is celebrating its 50th anniversary and is doing so in style. After 20 years, the Digistar II projector has been retired and we upgraded to a digital fulldome Digistar 5 system from Evans and Sutherland. This system comes equipped with beautiful visualizations of scientific data across disciplines and easily integrates video and audio. We will show everyone this new system and its capabilities. We will take you an adventure through the universe and give you a sense of what it can do for outreach and visualization for the Physics and Astronomy department. Come and say hello to the new Abrams and enjoy the view!

The plasma astrophysical S factor for the 3He(d, p)4He fusion reaction was measured for the first time at temperatures of few keV, using the interaction of intense ultrafast laser pulses with molecular deuterium clusters mixed with 3He atoms. Different proportions of D2 and 3He or CD4 and 3He were mixed in the gas jet target in order to allow the measurement of the cross-section for the 3He(d, p)4He reaction. The yield of 14.7 MeV protons from the 3He(d, p)4He reaction was measured in order to extract the astrophysical S factor at low energies. Results of the experiment performed at the Center for High Energy Density Science at The University of Texas at Austin will be presented [PRL, 111, 082502]. The possibility to use the same technique to investigate other reactions of astrophysical interest will be also discussed.

In this talk we will revisit the flow of energy through the climate system and some differences in recent estimates of the overall energy balance, at the top-of-atmosphere, for the atmosphere, and the surface. The energy imbalance associated with climate change has consequences for where the heat goes. Changes in the disposition of heat relates to the recent "hiatus in global warming". We also consider the natural fluctuations in the energy imbalance and how that relates to temperatures. At the surface, there are major discrepancies among climate model estimates of the energy balance manifested in the global precipitation estimates that will be better tied down with the new Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) mission.

Very precise measurements in nuclei can offer demanding tests of the Standard Model of particle physics. In particular, “superallowed” nuclear beta-decay between 0+ analogue states is a sensitive probe of the vector part of the weak interaction, and the measured strength (i.e. ft-value) of each such transition yields a direct measure of the vector coupling constant, GV. To date, the ft-values for fourteen 0+ → 0+ transitions have been measured with ~0.1% precision or better, and these results yield fully consistent values for GV, thus confirming the conservation of the vector current to a part in ten thousand. The resultant GV in turn yields an experimental value for Vud, the leading diagonal element of the quark mixing matrix, the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa (CKM) matrix. Not only is this the most precise determination of Vud, it is the most precise result for any element in the CKM matrix. The CKM matrix is a central pillar of the Standard Model and, although the model does not predict values for the matrix elements, it demands that the matrix itself be unitary. The experimental value for Vud obtained from superallowed beta-decay leads to the most demanding test available of CKM unitarity, a test which it passes with flying colors: the unitarity sum of the top-row elements as determined from experiment is 0.9999 ± 0.0005. The determination of a transition’s ft-value requires the measurement of three quantities: its Q-value, branching ratio and parent half-life. To achieve the 0.1% precision obtained for the superallowed transitions, each of these quantities had to be measured to substantially better precision, a challenging standard which has led to special techniques being developed. I will describe some current experiments in the field, and overview the up-to-date results from a new 2014 survey of world data.

One of the overarching questions posed by the recent community report entitled “Nuclear Physics: Exploring the Heart of Matter" asks How Does Subatomic Matter Organize Itself and What Phenomena Emerge? With their enormous dynamic range in density, neutron stars provide ideal laboratories to answer this challenge. Indeed, a neutron star is a gold mine for the study of physical phenomena that cut across a variety of disciplines, from particle physics to general relativity. Although the most common perception of a neutron star is that of a uniform assembly of neutrons packed to enormous densities, the reality is far different and much more interesting. In this presentation – targeted to students - I will focus on the dynamics of neutron-rich matter with special emphasis on its impact on the structure and composition of neutron stars. In particular, I will discuss the myriad of exotic states of matter that are speculated to exist in a neutron star and the role of laboratory experiments in elucidating their fascinating nature. *This work is supported in part by United States Department of Energy under grant DE-FD05-92ER40750.

Nuclear structure databases contain fundamental nuclear structure information of all known nuclides, as directly measured or deduced from nuclear physics measurements, such as level energies, lifetimes, decay modes, and other associated properties. These databases are not only at the core of basic nuclear structure and nuclear astrophysics research, but they are also relevant to many applied technologies, including nuclear energy production, reactor design and safety, medical diagnostic and radiotherapy, health physics, environmental research and monitoring, safeguards, material analysis, etc. The primary mission of the United States Nuclear Data Program (USNDP) is to provide current, accurate, authoritative data for workers in pure and applied areas of nuclear science and engineering through the compilation, evaluation, dissemination, and archiving of extensive nuclear datasets. The USNDP also addresses gaps in the data, through targeted experimental studies and the use of theoretical models. This presentation will give an introduction to the nuclear structure data evaluation and major nuclear structure databases maintained by USNDP, such as ENSDF and XUNDL, as well as related research activities at the Argonne National Laboratory.

A century of coherent experimental and theoretical investigations have uncovered the laws of nature that underly nuclear physics. Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) and Quantum Electrodynamics (QED), both quantum field theories with a small number of precisely constrained input parameters, dominate the dynamics of the quarks and gluons - the underlying building blocks of protons, neutrons, and nuclei. While the analytic techniques of quantum field theory have played a key role in understanding the dynamics of matter in high energy processes, they encounter difficulties when applied to low-energy nuclear structure and reactions, and dense systems. Expected increases in computational resources into the exa-scale during the next decade will provide the ability to determine a range of important strong interaction processes directly from QCD, with quantified uncertainties, using the numerical technique of Lattice QCD. This will complement the nuclear physics experimental program, in particular FRIB at MSU and the JLab 12 GeV program, and in partnership with new thrusts in nuclear many-body theory, these combined experimental and theoretical efforts will enable unprecedented understanding and refinement of nuclear forces and, more generally, the visible matter in our universe. In this presentation, I will discuss the state-of-the-art Lattice QCD calculations of quantities of interest in nuclear physics, progress that is expected in the near future, and the anticipated impact.

Neutrinos are all around us, yet many of their properties remain a mystery. The study of neutrinoless double beta decay can shed light on the properties of neutrino mass and whether or not the neutrino is its own anti-particle. In addition, because neutrinoless double beta decay violates lepton number conservation, its discovery would lead the way to physics beyond the Standard Model. The Enriched Xenon Observatory (EXO) program is aimed at searching for this decay in Xe-136. I will discuss the current status of double beta decay with special emphasis on recent results from EXO-200 which has made the most precise measurement of the two-neutrino double beta decay of any isotope and has placed one of the most stringent limits on the absolute neutrino mass to date.

In the world of moderate Reynolds number, everyday turbulence of fluids flowing across planes and down pipes, a velvet revolution is taking place. Experiments are almost as detailed as the numerical simulations, DNS is yielding exact numerical solutions that one dared not dream about a decade ago, and dynamical systems visualization of turbulent fluid's state space geometry is unexpectedly elegant. We shall take you on a tour of this newly breached, hitherto inaccessible territory. Mastery of fluid mechanics is no prerequisite, and perhaps a hindrance: the talk is aimed at anyone who had ever wondered why - if no cloud is ever seen twice - we know a cloud when we see one? And how do we turn that into mathematics?

In the last 25 years a new way to study the stars has become available: the analysis of stardust in the laboratory. Primitive meteorites contain tiny dust grains that condensed in stellar outflows and explosions. These grains can be isolated from the meteorites and studied in detail in the laboratory. The stellar origin of these grains is evidenced by their isotopic compositions, which are completely different from those of the Solar System. We can measure the isotopic ratios of the major elements, as well as of many minor and trace elements, with secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) in single grains that range in size from a couple of 100 nm to several µm. Such detailed isotopic analysis of individual stardust grains has provided a wealth of information on stellar nucleosynthesis, stellar mixing, and galactic chemical evolution. Many measurements have 1) confirmed existing theories of nucleosynthesis and stellar models (e.g., the s-process signatures in silicon carbide grains agree well with models of nucleosynthesis in AGB stars); 2) led to refinements of models (e.g., the O and Al isotopic ratios in oxide grains give evidence for extra mixing in AGB stars); or 3) led to new insights into supernova models (e.g., the Mo and the S isotopic ratios in SiC grains from supernovae could be explained by a short neutron pulse during explosive nucleosynthesis). Despite those new insights, there continue to exist challenges in the form of discrepancies between theoretical models and isotopic measurements on grains; examples are the following: 1) the positive correlation between 12C/13C ratios and the inferred 26Al/27Al ratios in supernova SiC grains disagree with predictions from SN models; 2) the 29Si/28Si ratios in such grains are much higher than theoretical models predict; 3) the lack of 54Fe excesses in supernova SiC grains with large 28Si excesses contradicts SN models. Such observed discrepancies will undoubtedly stimulate the development of new theoretical models and constrain existing ones. Advances are made both on the experimental and theoretical fronts, and are expected to provide a better picture of the stellar production of the elements.

Teachers tend to teach as they were taught. From this perspective the introductory physics course is of primary concern in the preparation of physics teachers. Modeling Instruction is an active learning strategy built on the premise that science proceeds through the iterative process of model construction, development, deployment and revision. We describe the role that participating in 'authentic' modeling has in learning and then explore how students engage in this process in the classroom. In this presentation we provide a theoretical background on models and modeling and describe how these theoretical elements are enacted in the introductory university physics classroom. We provide both quantitative and video data to link the development of a conceptual model to the design of the learning environment and to student outcomes.

While theoretically predicted, the existence of a neutron rich outer shell, or neutron skin, of the Lead-208 nucleus was previously unmeasured. The thickness of the neutron skin provides constraints on models of nuclei, which can in turn be used to improve predictions for other dense nuclear matter such as neutron stars. The Lead Radius Experiment (PREX), run at the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility, provided a model-independent measurement of the neutron r.m.s. radius by measuring the helicity-dependent scattering asymmetry of polarized electrons weakly scattering off Lead-208. Measuring the weak scattering asymmetry of electrons off Lead-208 required electron detectors, designed and tested at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, that could accurately measure small changes in the scattering flux between electron helicity states. From a measurement of the parity violating scattering asymmetry of electrons scattering from a Lead-208 nucleus, we extracted the neutron r.m.s radius and neutron skin thickness of the Lead-208 nucleus with a precision of 3%. In this talk I will present an overview of the PREX, covering the detector design and results of the experiment.

Isobaric Analog States (IAS) of ground state nuclei have been evaluated for the first time as part of the Atomic Mass Evaluation (AME). These states in light‐ to medium‐weight nuclei are of interest for mass modelling and are used to test Wigner's Isobaric Multiplet Mass Equation (IMME) where members of the same multiplet may generally be described by an isospin dependent quadratic equation. Experimental IAS masses have been evaluated for isospin multiplets T=1/2 to T=3 for masses A=8 to A=60 and the corresponding IMME coefficients extracted. These new results lead to a clearer and more precise view of the isospin dependence of nuclear mass for nuclides around N=Z. In this presentation, after a short introduction to Isobaric Analog States and the IMME, the basic methods of experimental evaluation will be discussed. The overall tendencies observed for this first complete evaluation will be presented, and the impact on current experimental and theoretical research considered. Particular attention has been paid to render this subject accessible to students of all ages, but also to provide complete and up‐to‐date information of interest for both experimentalists and theorists alike.

In the condensed-matter, atomic, and molecular physics, density functional theory (DFT) is a universal approach to compute ground state and excited configurations of many-electron systems. At present, the DFT strategy is also intensely studied and applied in the area of nuclear structure. The nuclear energy density functional (EDF) – a natural extension of the self-consistent mean-field theory – is a tool of choice for computations of ground-state properties and low-lying excitations of medium-mass and heavy nuclei. Over the past thirty-odd years, a lot of experience was accumulated in implementing, adjusting, and using the EDF methods in nuclei, and this research direction is still actively pursued. In particular, current developments concentrate on (i) attempts to improve the performance and precision delivered by the nuclear EDF methods, (ii) derivations of density functionals from first principles rooted in the low-energy chromodynamics and effective theories, and (iii) including effects of low-energy correlations and symmetry restoration. The seminar will give an overview of foundations and recent achievements gained within the nuclear EDF methods.

High atomic charge states can significantly influence nuclear decay rates. An obvious example is the electron capture (EC) decay probability, which depends strongly on the number of bound electrons. One of the straightforward motivations for studying the beta-decay of highly charged ions (HCI) is that stellar nucleosynthesis proceeds at high temperatures, where the involved atoms are highly ionized. Furthermore, HCIs offer the possibility to perform basic investigations of beta decay under clean conditions: The decaying nuclei having, e.g., only a single bound electron, represent themselves well-defined quantum-mechanical systems, in which all interactions with other electrons are excluded, and thus the complicated corrections due to shake-off effects, electron screening etc. can be removed. Largest modifications of nuclear half-lives with respect to neutral atoms were observed in beta decay of fully ionized nuclei. Presently, the ion-storage ring ESR at GSI in Darmstadt is the only tool in the world for addressing radioactive decays of HCIs. There, the radionuclides produced at high kinetic energies as HCIs and purified from unwanted contaminants can be stored in the cooler-storage ring ESR. Due to the ultra-high vacuum of about 10-10 mbar, the high atomic charge states of stored ions can be preserved for extensive periods of time (minutes, hours). The decay characteristics of electron cooled stored HCIs can accurately be measured by employing the highly sensitive non-destructive time-resolved Schottky spectrometry technique. Recent experiments with stored exotic nuclei that have been performed at the ESR will be discussed in this contribution. A particular emphasis will be given to two-body beta decays, namely bound-state beta decay and orbital electron capture. As an outlook, the perspectives of future experiments with HCIs at existing storage ring facilities (ESR in Darmstadt and CSRe in Lanzhou) as well as at the planned facilities (TSR@ISOLDE, FAIR, HIAF, RI-RING) will be outlined.

Increased beam intensities at the NSCL, as well as advances in experimental techniques, using a two-stage separator, allowed to observe new nuclei along the neutron drip-line [1,2]. In a recent experiment, production cross sections for a large number of neutron-rich nuclei produced from the fragmentation of 76Ge (130 MeV/u) and 82Se (139 MeV/u) beams were measured [3,4], including 21 new isotopes of the elements 17 ≤ Z ≤ 26. Enhanced cross sections of several new nuclei were compared to a simple thermal evaporation framework [2], and also have been well reproduced by the LISE++ Abrasion-Ablation model [5] with masses derived from the full pf shell-model space with the GXPF1B5 effective interaction [6]. It seems that the systematic trends in the production cross sections demonstrate changes in the nuclear mass surface, that can be explained with a shell model that predicts a subshell closure at N=34 around Z=20. In this contribution based on the pre-fragment analysis it will be discussed why projectile fragmentation is so sensitive to changes in the nuclear mass surface close to the neutron drip-line, and a new dBE production cross section systematics will be presented. [1] T.Baumann,et. al, Nature (London) 442, (2007) 1022. [2] O.B.T., T.Baumann et al., Phys. Rev. C 75 (2007) 064613. [3] O.B.T., M.Portillo et al., Phys. Rev. C 87 (2013) 054612. [4] O.B.T., D.J.Morrisey et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 102 (2009) 142501. [5] O.B.T. and D. Bazin, Nucl. Instrum. Methods Phys. Res., Sect. B 266 (2008) 4657. [6] Y.Utsuno et al., Phys. Rev. C 86 (2012) 051301(R).

Protein folding, the process by which an amino acid chain finds the stable structure integral to its function, has been a well-defined problem for more than 50 years but a predictive solution has continued to elude us. It is clear that the physical interactions within the chain and with the surrounding water determines which structure has the lowest free energy but neither computation nor experiment can completely describe the path a protein might take to find it, in part because there is a huge range of timescales on which important folding events can occur. Additionally, understanding protein folding in a cell also requires understanding how folding competes with aggregation, which leads to diseases such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. The complexity and dynamics of unfolded protein ensembles may be the ultimate speed limit of folding and play a crucial role in aggregation. In my lab over the past several years we have investigated the reconfiguration dynamics unfolded proteins by measuring the rate of intramolecular diffusion, the rate one part of the chain diffuses relative to another. We have measured diffusion coefficients ranging over three orders of magnitude and observed that aggregation-prone sequences tend to fall in the middle of this range. In this talk I shall present our experiments on alpha-synuclein, the protein that aggregates in Parkinson disease, and the Alzheimer's peptide. We correlated intramolecular diffusion of the disordered protein with solution conditions that promote aggregation. Finally we have begun measurements on small molecule aggregation inhibitors and found that some can prevent aggregation by shifting intramolecular diffusion out of the dangerous middle range.

National security and nuclear energy programs both require detailed knowledge of neutron-induced reactions on nuclei ranging from the lightest elements to the actinides. The Los Alamos Neutron Science Center (LANSCE) provides an intense source of neutrons for directly studying these reactions on long-lived nuclei. A comprehensive suite of instrumentation has been coupled to this facility to perform precision measurements on such quantities as neutron-induced reaction cross sections, prompt fission neutron and gamma-ray spectra, fission mass yields, and gamma-ray strength functions. An overview of the scientific program will be presented, with particular attention given to recent developments in the Detector for Advanced Neutron Capture Experiments (DANCE) and Chi-Nu (prompt fission neutron spectrum) projects.

The 12C + 12C heavy ion fusion reaction is an important part of many astrophysical processes including carbon burning in massive starts, the ignition phase of type Ia supernovae, and superbursts in x-ray binary systems. Experimentally studying this reaction is difficult due to the low cross sections at astrophysically interesting energies. This experimental challenge is further complicated by resonance-like structures seen at deep sub barrier energies first discovered by Almqvist et al. [1] in 1960. Spillane et al. [2] recently measured a new resonance-like structure at Ec.m. = 2.14 MeV, which is within the Gamow window. Previous works, such as the study by Aguilera et al. [3], have attempted to describe these resonances as enhancements on a non-resonant fusion excitation function. Recent coupled channels calculations by Esbensen et al. [4], led Jiang et al. [5] to propose a very different solution. They suggested that these structures are not resonances, but rather the excitation function exhibits “dips” which are the result of the large spacing and small widths of the energy levels in 24Mg compound nucleus. New experimental techniques capable of accurately measuring the cross section at low energies, near the 2 MeV Gamow energy, are necessary to better understand the origin of these resonances in 12C + 12C heavy ion fusion. [1] Almqvist et al. Phys. Rev. Lett. 4, 515 (1960). [2] Spillane et al. . Phys. Rev. Lett.98, 122501 (2007). [3] Aguilera et al. . Phys. Rev. C 73, 064601 (2006). [4] Esbensen et al. . Phys. Rev. C 84, 064613 (2011). [5] Jiang et al. . Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 072701 (2013).

The radioisotope, 26Al, is a fingerprint of ongoing nucleosynthesis in the Galaxy, and although its origin is not yet confirmed, the main contribution is thought to come from massive stars. A recent sensitivity study by Iliadis et al. investigated the nuclear reactions that affect the abundance of 26Al in massive stars and found the reactions 26Al(n,p)26Mg and 23Na(a,p)26Mg to be among the most influential. In this talk, I will outline the astrophysical importance of 26Al and report on a recent study of states in 27Al, relevant to the 26Al(n,p) and (n,a) reactions, using a new experimental setup at the Split-Pole spectrometer at IPNO, Paris. In addition, preliminary results from a direct measurement of the 23Na(a,p)26Mg reaction using the TUDA array at TRIUMF will also be presented.

Electron acceleration of electrons using intense laser pulses that excite tens of gigavolt per meter fields in plasmas will be discussed and the path forward to practical machines. The potential impact of compact laser plasma accelerators (LPA) ranges from providing the capability of producing high energy, ultra-short electron bunches and associated radiation pulses for forefront science in a small laboratory setting, to medical and homeland security applications, to the development of high energy particle colliders for fundamental science into the origin of matter and energy. Two experiments are underway at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory that address key challenges for the development of high energy electron accelerators with beam quality sufficiently good to drive free electron lasers and gamma ray sources, or serve as building blocks for a future laser plasma accelerator based colliders. The first one is an experiment on staging two LPAs where electron beams produced by a first LPA are injected into a second LPA that is powered by a separate laser pulse. This would be essential for building future colliders. The second experiment uses the new high repetition rate (1Hz) Petawatt BELLA laser aimed at reaching 10 GeV in less than a meter long accelerator are underway. Such an LPA could serve as a driver for a hard x-ray FEL or serve as a module for a collider. Progress on both experiments will be presented including the demonstration of multi-GeV electron beams with the BELLA laser. Since most applications require operation at higher repetition rate and hence higher average power lasers than currently available, a new concept for incoherent combining of laser pulses to drive plasma wakes will also be discussed.

Neutron stars are composed of the densest observable matter in nature and occupy the intellectual frontier between astrophysics and nuclear physics. Within the next decade, current and planned nuclear experiments on heavy nuclei, X-ray observations, and, perhaps, gravity wave observations of neutron stars will be exploring the nature of dense matter from complimentary approaches. Many observed neutron stars accrete hydrogen- and helium-rich matter from a companion. During the slow compression to nuclear density the accreted matter is transmuted from being proton-rich to being proton-poor. These reactions affect many observable phenomena -- from energetic explosions on the neutron star's surface to thermal relaxation of the surface layers -- that in turn inform us about the nature of the deep interior of the neutron star. In this talk, I shall describe what recent astronomical observations and nuclear physics experiments tell us about the nature of matter at nuclear densities, and highlight how this work has led to a growing mystery in our understanding of explosions on the neutron surface.

The Momentum Acromat Recoil Spectrometer (MARS) [1] has been in operation at the Cyclotron Institute at Texas A&M University since 1991. The MARS spectrometer combines a Momentum Acromat for magnetic rigidity selection with a velocity filter for recoil selection. MARS is capable of producing and separating rare isotope beams in-flight for use in experiments that are attached to the end of the MARS beamline. With the primary beam energies typically available at the Cyclotron Institute, rare isotope beams from 5 MeV/u to 40 MeV/u have been produced. Over the years, various programs have been used to model the beam optics of the MARS spectrometer including TRANSPORT and similar programs. A simple model of MARS was also included in LISE++. Recently, this model has been expanded and updated with the LISE++ “extended configuration” feature and now includes details of the MARS dipoles, quadrupoles, cut slits and relevant distances. Measurements of the MARS magnets for field vs. current, in particular for the quadrupoles, were also conducted and included in the LISE++ model. Finally, in collaboration with Dr. Oleg Tarasov, the compensating dipole block in LISE++ was updated such that it also could be included as part of the MARS “extended configuration”. With these improvements, the new LISE++ model of MARS is capable of predicting the optics tune for rare isotope beams and reproduces the data observed at the focal plane detector of MARS. In this talk, I will present an overview of the MARS spectrometer and discuss the development of the “MARS extended configuration” in LISE++. I will compare results obtained from the model with actual rare isotope beams developed for users during the previous year. I will also show some possibilities for improvements to MARS that would be necessary for planned experiments with neutron-rich light nuclei. [1] R.E. Tribble, R.H. Burch, C.A. Gaglairdi, Nucl. Instr. and Methods in Phys. Res. A 285, (1989) 441-446. [2] LISE++, lise.nscl.msu.edu, versions 9.8.56 and later.

The shape coexistence and shape transition at N = 60 in the Sr, Zr region is the subject of substantial current experimental and theoretical effort. An important aspect in this context is the evolution of single particle structure for N 60 leading up to the shape transition region, which can be calculated with modern large scale shell model calculations using a 78Ni core or Beyond Mean Field Models. One-neutron transfer reactions are a proven tool to study single-particle energies as well as occupation numbers. Here we report on the study of the single-particle structure in 95-97Sr via (d, p) one-neutron transfer reactions in inverse kinematics. The experiments presented were performed at TRIUMF's ISAC facility using the TIGRESS gamma-ray spectrometer in conjunction with the SHARC charge particle detector. Highly charged beams of 94,95,96Sr, produced in the ISAC UCx target and charge-bred by an ECR source were accelerated to 5.5 MeV/A in the superconducting ISAC-II linac before delivery to the experimental station. Other than their clear scientific value, these measurements were landmark being the first high mass (A > 30) post-accelerated radioactive beam experiments performed at TRIUMF. Recent advances within the facility making the measurements possible as well as initial results discussed in the context of the evolution of single-particle structure will be presented.

One of the most important questions in the field of Nuclear Astrophysics is the origin of the elements heavier than iron. It is well known that there are three main processes responsible for the nucleosynthesis of the heavy elements: two neutron-induced processes (s- and r-process) that create the majority of these nuclei, and a third process (p-process), which is called upon to produce the small number of neutron-deficient isotopes (p-nuclei) that are not reached by the other two processes. This latter process is the main focus of my talk. I will present the development of a new detection system (the SuN detector) that was designed, characterized and used in experiments related to the astrophysical p process. I will discuss the results of these first experiments and present the plans for future measurements at the ReA3 facility at the NSCL.

The discovery of neutrino oscillations gives us proof that neutrinos have mass, the first direct contradiction of the minimal standard model. But how much mass? That is something oscillations cannot give, other than to tell us that the average of the three masses must be at least 0.02 eV. Laboratory measurements of the beta spectrum of tritium have steadily advanced: the masses are now known to be less than 2 eV. A very large and ambitious experiment called KATRIN that offers an order of magnitude gain in sensitivity is taking shape in Germany. And a novel, very different idea has just this summer passed its proof-of-concept test.

The source of about half of the heaviest elements in the Universe has been a mystery for a long time. Finding out whether they can be made in cataclysmic events requires extensive astronomical observation and sophisticated computer modeling.

I will introduce the concept of spallation neutron sources and discuss the main differences between pulsed and continuous sources. The principle of a short pulse spallation neutron source will be demonstrated on the example of the Lujan Center’s Target-Moderator-Reflector-Shield (TMRS) system. The current TMRS assembly is the 4th generation spallation neutron target in service at LANSCE. Our new design makes a number of new improvements over the previous iterations and is the first production implementation of a cold beryllium reflector-filter at the core of the spallation neutron source. Also presented are a detailed neutronic analysis of the predicted performance and influence of various external conditions on cold-neutron performance.

Recently, spectroscopy of neutron-rich nuclei has made considerable progress on the study of the change of single particle levels, so-called shell evolution. On the studies, the method using breakup reactions with fast radioactive ion beams has been a powerful spectroscopic tool. The nuclear breakup reactions including nucleon knockout reactions on light targets have been used to determine the spin parities of the ground and excited states of neutron-rich nuclei. On the other hand, the Coulomb breakup reaction on a heavy target has investigated the single particle levels of weakly-bound neutrons such as the valence neutrons in halo nuclei. In this talk, I will briefly review the spectroscopic studies using breakup reactions, and then I will focus on our recent results. Our present work addresses the spectroscopy of neutron-rich nuclei around the island of inversion, specifically, the halo, shell and deformation properties of 31Ne [1,2] and 37Mg [3]. For this purpose, the nuclear- and Coulomb-dominated reaction probes were used at energies around 240 MeV/nucleon. The present analysis exploits the different sensitivities of these reaction mechanisms to obtain the ground state separation energies, spin parities and the spectroscopic factors of 31Ne and 37Mg. The observables obtained were the nuclear and Coulomb breakup 1n-removal cross sections on C and Pb targets, respectively, and the parallel momentum distributions of the residues from the C target. We report also the recent analysis for the 20C momentum distribution in two-neutron removal reactions from 22C [4]. [1] T. Nakmaura, N. Kobayashi et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 262501 (2009). [2] T. Nakmaura, N. Kobayashi et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 142501 (2014). [3] N. Kobayashi et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 242501 (2014). [4] N. Kobayashi et al., Phys. Rev. C 86, 054604 (2012).

Radiative capture reactions on protons and alpha particles play a crucial role in the nucleosynthesis of elements in stellar environments. One of the most effective ways of directly observing such reactions is by utilizing H and He gas targets in inverse kinematics. The results of two important experiments using this method, conducted at the DRAGON facility, are discussed. The first is the (p,g) capture on a 18F nuclei, which is relevant to the study of novae. Using a recoil mass separator just two 19Ne events were successfully discerned, significantly constraining the contribution from an important resonance in this reaction's rate. The second experiment was observing the (a,g) capture on 76Se, the experimental data of which can aid the study into the production of p-nuclei, whose method of production remains tentative. The first experimental data on this reaction channel at astrophysical energies was successfully observed.

High precision, low energy probes of the standard model provide a number of the strongest constraints on physics beyond the standard model (BSM). In this seminar I provide a brief overview of the role measurements with slow neutrons play in these constraints and then focus on two examples of interest to our group: high precision beta decay measurements of neutrons and nuclei and neutron-antineutron oscillations. Beta decay gives us our most precise characterization of the charged weak current, and through the CKM unitarity test, the most stringent constraints on charged current BSM physics with vector or axial vector (V,A) structure. Measurements specifically of neutron decay produce the definitive value for the axial coupling constant, gA,and also provide high precision inputs for astrophysical processes such as the Big Bang Nucleosynthesis abundance of $^{4}$He and solar fusion rates. We describe our measurements of neutron decay using ultracold neutrons (UCN) at the Los Alamos Neutron Science Center (LANSCE), including measurements of angular correlations (UCNA and UCNB) and the neutron lifetime (UCNtau).These measurements utilize the remarkable properties of UCN to produce very highly polarized neutron samples and suppress neutron-generated backgrounds in our angular correlations measurements, and to store UCN in a gravito-magnetic trap for a measurement of the lifetime. We also describe how these measurements can sharpen our understanding of charged current interactions and push BSM constraints for scalar and tensor (S,T) couplings to post-LHC energy scales. The second example concerns neutron-antineutron oscillations. Experimental probes of this phenomenon place the most stringent limits on processes which violate Baryon number by 2. In many model scenarios, this process is allowed even when proton decay, which violates Baryon number by 1 unit, is forbidden. Recent work has demonstrated that this phenomenon can result, at levels measurable in a next generation experiment, in scenarios which solve the baryon-asymmetry problem. We presentour work evaluating next generation experiments using free neutrons which can exceed the sensitivity of all existing or planned underground experiments. Such an experiment is being evaluated at present for the science program at the European Spallation Source in Sweden.

Collective motions in atomic nuclei at low excitation energies have often been described in terms of rotation and vibration with respect to the ground-state shape. This picture can be altered in exotic nuclei with unusual proton-to-neutron ratios, where shape and shell effects can induce a delicate interplay between different structures. In self-conjugate nuclei at N=Z, proton and neutron shape (deformed shell) effects can be amplified, leading to shape coexistence phenomena pronounced in the A=70-80 region. On the neutron-rich side with large isospin asymmetry (N>>Z), the shell structure is significantly modified, which results in a competition between the normal and intruder configurations at the magic numbers and induces the halo structure in weakly-bound nuclei. As a way to observe unique forms and dynamics of exotic isotopes which are often produced in very low amounts, the advanced gamma-ray tracking array GRETINA (Gamma-Ray Energy Tracking In-beam Nuclear Array) has recently been commissioned at LBNL and employed in physics campaign programs with fast rare isotope beams at NSCL. This talk will provide an overview of the lifetime measurement program at NSCL and present the implementation of gamma-ray Doppler-shift techniques with GRETINA. Recent physics highlights as well as future perspectives will also be discussed.

Classical novae and type I x-ray bursts are explosive events that occur in close binary systems where hydrogen-rich material is accreted. This accreted material is heated and compressed until this compression unchains an explosion. During this explosion heavier nuclei are produced via proton captures and beta decays. In many proton capture reactions, resonant capture dominates the reaction rate. Sometimes the measurement of these resonances cannot be done directly with radioactive ion beams. However, they can be determined indirectly by studying the same states via beta-delayed proton emission of proton-rich nuclei. The main challenges in the detection of these emitted protons are that the kinetic energies and the branching ratios of the protons are very low for standard solid state detectors. In order to overcome this difficulty, a novel detection system has been developed. It consists of a gas volume where radioactive ions are implanted. Gas reduces the sensitivity to the beta-particles emitted minimizing their contribution to the background. The use of Micro Pattern Gas Detectors like MICROMEGAS assures a good resolution, efficiency and gain. A detection system based on this technique is being designed in NSCL for measuring these resonances. GEANT4 simulations are being performed to optimize efficiency and performance.

The atomic nucleus is composed of two different kinds of fermions, protons and neutrons. If the protons and neutrons did not interact, the Pauli exclusion principle would force the majority fermions, usually neutrons, to higher average momentum. In this talk I will present results from high-energy electron scattering experiments, which show that short-range interactions between the fermions form correlated, high-momentum, neutron-proton pairs. Thus, in neutron-rich nuclei the probability of finding a high-momentum (k>kFermi) proton (a minority Fermion) is greater than that of a neutron (a majority Fermion). This has wide ranging implications for atomic, nuclear and astro physics, including neutrino-nucleus scattering, the EMC effect, the NuTeV anomaly, the nuclear symmetry energy and more. This feature is universal for imbalanced interacting Fermi systems and can also be observed experimentally in two-spin states ultra-cold atomic gas systems.

Presolar grains recovered from primitive meteorites preserve the isotopic record of nucleosynthesis in individual stars. Our group has used laser resonant ionization mass spectrometry (RIMS) to measure the isotopic compositions of Cr, Fe, Ni, Sr, Zr, Mo, Ru, Ba, and Nd in presolar SiC and graphite to constrain models of nucleosynthesis in AGB stars and core-collapse supernovae. I will discuss recent and planned future isotopic studies of presolar grains and their implications for stellar nucleosynthesis.

Since ancient times, humans have inquired about what makes up the world around them. Today, we know that protons and neutrons, collectively named nucleons, constitute the building blocks of normal matter but despite long investigation we still remain far from understanding the intricacies and mysteries of their inner structure. Jefferson Laboratory's primary mission is to expand our knowledge of the universe by studying the emergence of nucleons and their interactions from the properties and dynamics of quarks and gluons of Quantum Chromo Dynamics. In this seminar some of the main questions addressed by the scientific program of the upgraded facility will be presented.

The Equation of State (EOS) of nuclear matter is an important question for both nuclear physics and astrophysics. The symmetry energy term has been constrained at densities below saturation density, but remains poorly constrained above saturation density, a region that is important for the understanding of heavy-ion collisions and neutron stars. An experiment has been proposed to constrain the density dependence at about twice saturation density by studying pion production ratios. This experiment will use the newly constructed SPiRIT time projection chamber in the new SAMURAI spectrometer at the RIKEN facility. A motivation for this experiment will be presented, along with a description of equipment and the proposed experiment.

As an electron and a positron bind to form positronium, a conduction-band electron and valence-band hole in a crystal bind to form an exciton. As a pair of electrons and a pair of positrons bind to form a positronium molecule, a pair of electrons and a pair of holes can bind to form a biexciton. Exciton-exciton interactions are of fundamental importance in understanding many-body effects in non-metallic systems, but they are also important for potential applications ranging from optical gain to solar energy conversion. In nanoscale systems, the binding of biexcitons can be enhanced through confinement and reduced screening. At the same time, relaxation of momentum conservation and confinement of carriers allow for rapid, non-radiative recombination of biexcitons in nanoscale quantum dots. After an overview of the range of research being conducted in my lab, I will discuss our work to understand and engineer exciton-exciton interactions in colloidal quantum dots. I will focus on our recent work in graphene quantum dots in which the two-dimensional lattice of light atoms leads to weak screening of the Coulomb interaction and consequently yields strong interactions between excitons.

The shape of the atomic nucleus is a fundamental nuclear property. Changes in shape as a function of proton or neutron number are sensitive to the underlying nuclear structure and can vary rapidly, even between neighboring isotopes. Within a single nucleus, multiple shapes can also coexist as a function of excitation energy. The manifestation of shape coexistence results from the balance between the energy necessary to redistribute nucleons across the closed shells into particle-hole configurations and the residual interaction between the protons and neutrons. Along the closed Z = 28 proton shell, 68Ni has been identified as a candidate for coexistence between spherical, prolate, and oblate shapes at low excitation energies. The experimental signatures include the presence of low-energy excited 0+ states in even-even nuclei and intruder states in odd-mass nuclei. This talk will provide an overview of the region around 68Ni and present recent results from the NSCL beta-decay spectroscopy program along with future perspectives.

Spallation reactions at high excitation energy are a promising tool in order to investigate nuclear dissipation effects on fission and the subsequent emission of light particles and intermediate mass fragments. We have studied transient and dissipative effects in proton-induced fission of 181Ta at different relativistic energies [1], and in proton- and deuteron-induced fission of 208Pb at 500A MeV [2]. With a dedicated setup optimized for inverse kinematics measurements [3], we detected both fission fragments in coincidence with efficiency and determined the atomic number with high resolution. The evolution of the fissioning system from ground to saddle is characterized with different observables: total fission cross sections, and partial fission cross sections and the width of the fission fragment charge distribution, both as a function of the charge of the fissioning nuclei. Modern reaction codes were used to reveal the influence of transient and dissipative effects in the fission process at high excitation energy [4, 5]. The advent of new facilities dedicated to produce radioactive exotic beams using fragmented or post-accelerated secondary beams in inverse kinematics, will open new attractive opportunities to further explore the fission process in nuclei far from stability and perform the spectroscopy of the neutron-rich fission fragments, of great importance for the r-process. In order to counterbalance the low production rates of the most exotic species more advanced and highly efficient detection setups are required. In particular, active targets and time projection chambers are well suited for such scenarios where high luminosity without degradation of resolution is needed. The active target MAIKo, developed by the RCNP (Research Center for Nuclear Physics, Osaka, Japan) and Kyoto University (Japan), is a novel active target for reactions in inverse kinematics based on μ-PIC (micro pixel chamber) technology. In this talk, the capabilities of MAIKo will be discussed, as well as the present status of the detector. [1] Y. Ayyad et al., Phys. Rev. C 89, 054610 (2014) [2] Y. Ayyad et al., In preparation. [3] K. H. Schmidt et al., Nucl. Phys. A 665, 221 (2000) [4] A. Boudard, J. Cugnon, J.-C. David, S. Leray and D. Mancusi, Phys. Rev. C 66, 014606 (2013) [5] A. Kelic, M. V. Ricciardi and K.-H. Schmidt, Proceeding of Joint ICTP-IAEA Advanced Workshop on Model Codes for Spallation Reactions, ICTP Trieste, Italy, 4-8 February (2008)

We study the dynamics of ultracold Bosons in weakly linked potential wells. We consider an unbalanced initial state and investigate the dynamics of the population imbalance between the two wells. The population imbalance undergoes damped oscillations followed by revivals to almost the initial value. Since classical equations of motion like the Gross-Pitaevskii equation cannot describe this behaviour without additional assumptions we apply semi-classical methods to the problem and find good agreement with the numerical exact dynamics.