Events
August
| Event Location: Hennings 309 | Speaker: PhD student:Robin Newhouse
The Standard Model of particle physics is a powerful theory of nature, yet it does not account for all physical observations. Notably, the nonzero masses of the three neutrino flavours and their transformations into one another suggest the need for an extension of the Standard Model. One such extension postulates the existence of Heavy Neutral Leptons (HNLs, N ) — right-handed neutrino states that do not interact with other particles except through mixing with Standard Model neutrinos. HNLs may generate light neutrino masses through the so-called “seesaw mechanism.”
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August
| Event Location: HENN 318 |
Hello everyone!
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July
| Event Location: https://ubc.zoom.us/j/61385552566?pwd=WDg4UDhxZy8rQWphb3FxOFdyWFBGZz09 Passcode: 791344 | Speaker: PhD student, Oliver Yam
We study the effects of the Peierls electron-phonon coupling in different multi-band systems. In contrast to the more commonly employed Holstein coupling, which is used in single-band models and is momentumindependent, the momentum-dependent Peierls coupling can explicitly treat coupling to multiple bands. Our results demonstrate the importance of using the Peierls coupling in modelling complex systems
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July
| Event Location: https://ubc.zoom.us/j/67592194700?pwd=NHdUb1pqQ08wZUNwQ3dsQjB5blZ6UT09 Passcode: 695934 | Speaker: PhD Student, Colby Delisle
The electromagnetic and gravitational fields transfer information between physical systems. This work is an attempt to better understand how matter systems communicate quantum information with one another using these fields, and also how quantum information about matter is broadcast into the fields themselves. We study the former process in Part I and the latter in Part II, by answering two distinct but related questions.
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June
| Event Location: BRIM 311 | Speaker: Graham Baker(PhD student)
Electrical conduction becomes non-local when an inhomogeneous electronic distribution is induced with spatial variation shorter than the mean free path (MFP) between momentum-relaxing electronic scattering processes. Two important methods of inducing such a distribution are via the size and skin effects. In the size effect, one or more dimensions of a medium are reduced below the MFP.
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June
| Event Location: room 203 of the graduate student centre | Speaker: Javiera Fernanda Parada Torres
This thesis introduces two new extragalactic distance determination
methods; the first uses the median magnitude of carbon-rich asymptotic
giant branch stars (CS), while the second uses the combined luminosity
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May
| Event Location: Henn 318 & https://cern.zoom.us/j/63497174616?pwd=UDNRN1JLSUNVemd0SnJhalVuYlcvQT09 | Speaker: PhD student: Robin Hays
The Standard Model (SM) is the governing theory of particle physics. Although its predictions are in excellent agreement with experimental observations, it does not provide a full picture of the physical universe. The Higgs boson is the SM's most recently-discovered particle and a crucial ingredient of the theory. Measuring any deviation between its observed and expected properties could pave the way toward a more complete theory.
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May
| Event Location: Zoom: https://ubc.zoom.us/j/61164285940?pwd=QWFiV0JZT3VwTXVacnc4SEh5UVErdz09. Password: 053582. | Speaker: PhD student: David Wakeham
Black holes are regions of spacetime from which nothing can escape. This is already strange, but more puzzling is the fact that, over time, quantum mechanics causes black holes to leak energy and disappear. What happens to the objects that fell inside? The unitarity of quantum mechanics suggests one answer, and computations in semiclassical gravity another. To determine which is correct, we need to understand how quantum and gravitational effects interact.
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May
| Event Location: University of Winnipeg or Watch live! (See webinar registration link below) | Speaker: PHAS PhD student and UBC 3MT winner (2022) Emilie Carpentier is moving to the next round to compete at this year's Western Regional Three-Minute Thesis competition in Winnipeg, Manitoba with her topic, "Liver Cancer? No need to hold your breath for a cure!". Researching in the field of medical physics, Emilie's work focuses on improving radiation treatments and dosages for liver and pancreatic cancers. See more on Emilie's research and graduate student experience here: https://www.grad.ubc.ca/campus-community/meet-our-students/carpentier-emilie.
2022 Western Regional Three-Minute Thesis Competition is being hosted by the University of Winnipeg on May 6, 2022 from 2:00-4:30 pm (CST)
Seventeen graduate schools across western Canada are sending their local Three-Minute Thesis Competition winners to compete in the 2022 Western Regional Competition!
Originally developed by the University of Queensland, the Three-Minute Thesis is an annual research communication competition challenging graduate students to communicate their scholarly research and its significance in three minutes or less.
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April
| Event Location: Hennings 201 (and via zoom) | Speaker: Equity and Inclusion Committee
-- This event is cancelled for Thursday, April 28th --
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April
| Event Location: zoom : https://ubc.zoom.us/j/63707269353?pwd=YnZKMzd4K0NKWGtESUJSS2JXNGU5Zz09 Passcode: 486279 | Speaker: MengXing Na, PhD student
Quantum materials manifest exciting macroscopic electronic properties that emerge from microscopic electron interactions -- such as those between the electron and the lattice. Extensive research effort has been dedicated to understanding the physics of these materials; among these, angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) has the unique capability of taking ``photos" of the electronic band structure.
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April
| Event Location: Room 318 - Hennings Building | Speaker: Julio Parra-Martinez, Caltech
In this talk I will describe constraints from causality and unitarity on 2→2 graviton scattering in four-dimensional weakly-coupled effective field theories. Together, causality and unitarity imply dispersion relations that connect low-energy observables to high-energy data.
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April
| Event Location: Hennings 318 or https://ubc.zoom.us/j/64946668591?pwd=a2xCZEI5Uk5vTVQzR2g0cHlZMlU2QT09 | Speaker: Chris Gubbels, PhD student
The Standard Model of Particle Physics is the prevailing theory for describing the interactions of all observed fundamental particles and three of the four known fundamental interactions. However, despite its profound success, the Standard Model fails to explain some observations, such as dark matter and matter-antimatter asymmetry. Additionally, incorporating Einstein’s theory of general relativity has proven difficult.
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April
| Event Location: https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68698080843?pwd=cEJ3S283RENpSWROR0I3a0lzbkY2dz09 | Speaker: PhD Student :Xunyu Liang
Over two decades of development since its establishment, the axion quark nugget (AQN) is one of the best-studied macroscopic dark matter candidate with characteristic mass and size of order grams and 0.1 μm respectively. It naturally explains the observed similarity between the dark and visible density in the Universe, i.e.
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April
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Elham Kashefi (BC Quantum Algorithm Institute)
Abstract: Quantum computers promise to efficiently solve not only
problems believed to be intractable for classical computers, but also
problems for which verifying the solution is also considered
intractable. This raises the question of how one can check whether
quantum computers are indeed producing correct results. This task,
known as quantum verification, has been highlighted as a significant
challenge on the road to scalable quantum computing technology. We
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April
| Event Location: Zoom link in description | Speaker: Dr. Valentino R. Cooper
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68470173961?pwd=RTZEak9Pd01WajVOZHN5SW5YZHcyQT09
Meeting ID: 684 7017 3961
Passcode: 113399
Speaker: Dr. Valentino R. Cooper
Title: Exploring the Chemical Landscape of High Entropy Oxides
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April
| Event Location: https://ubc.zoom.us/j/67782233773?pwd=aU5JNkV0K2g3Y3EvcTV1c09JcmQvUT | Speaker: Daniel Bruns
Atomistic modeling of phonon-mediated heat transport in single-walled carbon nanotubes (CNTs) dates to the year 2000, when Berber, Kwon and Tománek, by means of molecular dynamics (MD) simulations, predicted a thermal conductivity of up to 6600 W/mK, suggesting extremely efficient heat transfer in these one-dimensional carbon materials.
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April
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Daniel Fabrycky (U Chicago)
In the field of exoplanets, the most extreme systems often capture our attention, and they teach us interesting lessons. However, statistical modeling of survey data is important too, as it identifies what are the more common processes involved in planet formation.
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March
| Event Location: Hennings 201 (or via zoom) | Speaker: Chris Waltham (UBC)
In the mid-90s I found myself, as a member of the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO) collaboration, a recipient and custodian of 1000 tonnes of “spare” heavy water, book value $300M. How such a rare asset came to exist in Canada is a complex story of nuclear physics, geopolitics, world war, flight and exile. For a while the tale runs along the fringe of the Manhattan Project saga, but it largely concerns reactors rather than bombs. The story crosses continents (Norway-France-Canada) in circumstances anyone familiar with the news at this moment can readily imagine.
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March
| Event Location: Zoom link in description | Speaker: Kwabena Bediako
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68470173961?pwd=RTZEak9Pd01WajVOZHN5SW5YZHcyQT09
Meeting ID: 684 7017 3961
Passcode: 113399
Speaker: Kwabena Bediako, Assistant Professor at UC Berkeley, Dept. of Chemistry
Title: New twists on chemistry and physics in moiré superlattices
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March
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Calvin Leung (MIT)
The Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) has discovered thousands of fast radio bursts (FRBs). The extremely high all-sky rate of FRBs implies that they have the potential to become powerful cosmological probes. Unlocking this potential requires localizing a large sample of FRBs to their host galaxies. Until now, precise localization within the host galaxy has only been accomplished in follow-up observations of repeating sources. Here, we demonstrate the localization of FRB 20210603A using very long baseline interferometry (VLBI) at its time of first detection.
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March
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Felice C. Frankel (MIT)
Abstract
Images and figures — visual representations of scientific data and concepts — are critical components of science and engineering research. They communicate in ways that words cannot. They can clarify or strengthen an argument and spur interest into the research process.
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March
| Event Location: Zoom link in description | Speaker: Marlou Slot; National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) - Gaithersburg, Maryland, United States
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68470173961?pwd=RTZEak9Pd01WajVOZHN5SW5YZHcyQT09
Meeting ID: 684 7017 3961
Passcode: 113399
Speaker: Marlou Slot; National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) - Gaithersburg, Maryland, United States
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March
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Simon Blouin (UVic)
White dwarfs are stellar embers that simply cool down for the rest of time, eventually freezing into a solid state. This predictable evolution makes them precise cosmic clocks; they have been used for decades to measure the ages of stellar populations. But data from the Gaia space observatory is now challenging our understanding of white dwarf evolution and calling into question the accuracy of this age dating technique. The cooling process appears to be much more delayed by the onset of crystallization than predicted by current models.
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March
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Alexandra Navrotsky (Arizona State)
Calorimetry measures heat effects, so why should one care? Enthalpies of formation and phase transformation sing about making and breaking chemical bonds. Heat capacities and entropies dance about how atoms and electrons jostle each other, move, and disorder. Combining thermodynamic and structural studies provides illuminates what materials form in nature, in the lab, and in technology. I illustrate the insights gained from calorimetry by three examples from our work. (1) Zinc sulfide (ZnS) is important as a semiconductor and an ore mineral.
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March
| Event Location: Zoom link in description | Speaker: Alexandra Navrotsky
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68470173961?pwd=RTZEak9Pd01WajVOZHN5SW5YZHcyQT09
Meeting ID: 684 7017 3961
Passcode: 113399
Speaker: Alexandra Navrotsky - Center for Materials of the Universe (MotU) , Arizona State University
Title: Recent developments in high temperature calorimetry
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March
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Laura Parker (McMaster)
As the universe evolves star-forming galaxies transform into
passively-evolving red galaxies. These transformations are due to a
combination of internal processes, like feedback from an active
galactic nucleus, as well as environmental processes. I will review
the ways in which host environment can affect the properties of
galaxies and then present some of our recent work on group and cluster
galaxies in the local universe. Previous work has found that the star
formation rates of satellite galaxies depend on the mass of their host
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March
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Daniel Goldman (Georgia Tech)
Abstract: Robots will soon move from the factory floor and into our lives (e.g. autonomous cars, package delivery drones, and search-and-rescue devices). However, compared to living systems, robot capabilities in complex environments are limited. I believe the mindset and tools of physics can help facilitate the creation of robust self-propelled autonomous systems.
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March
| Event Location: https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68470173961?pwd=RTZEak9Pd01WajVOZHN5SW5YZHcyQT09 | Speaker: Inna Vishik - Associate Professor in Physics and Astronomy at UC Davis
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68470173961?pwd=RTZEak9Pd01WajVOZHN5SW5YZHcyQT09
Meeting ID: 684 7017 3961
Passcode: 113399
Speaker: Inna Vishik - Associate Professor in Physics and Astronomy at UC Davis
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March
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Barbara Ryden (Ohio State)
The internal structure of galaxies is strongly affected by the gravitational influence of surrounding matter, on scales up to several megaparsecs. For example, galaxies are tidally torqued by surrounding galaxies and clusters. Conversely, a single massive elliptical galaxy can have a significant gravitational influence on surrounding satellite galaxies.
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March
| Event Location: Henn 201 | Speaker: PHAS graduate students
3 Minute Thesis Competition, Physics and Astronomy Heat
Thursday March 3, 2022 4-5:15pm in Colloquium, live in HENN 201
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March
| Event Location: Zoom link in description | Speaker: Ke Zou: University of British Columbia - Department of Physics and Astronomy
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68470173961?pwd=RTZEak9Pd01WajVOZHN5SW5YZHcyQT09
Meeting ID: 684 7017 3961
Passcode: 113399
Speaker: Ke Zou
Abstract:
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March
| Event Location: Zoom | Speaker: Julio Parra Martinez
Hello, please join us over Zoom for a special seminar talk on Wed, March 2nd hosted by Assistant Professor candidate Julio Parra Martinez
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February
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Howard Hui (Caltech)
Cosmic inflation was postulated to solve the horizon, flatness and monopole problems that arise from the standard LCDM model. Inflation generically predicts the existence of primordial gravitational waves which would leave a unique degree-scale B-mode polarization pattern in the cosmic microwave background (CMB). If detected, this could serve as a probe to the early Universe and high energy physics inaccessible with existing particle accelerators. The BICEP/Keck experiments are a series of telescopes at the South Pole designed to search for this degree-scale B-mode signature in the CMB.
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February
| Event Location: Zoom | Speaker: Brian Shuve
Hidden Sectors: From the Early Universe to Today
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February
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Daniel Korchinski (UBC)
The UBC Ars Scientia collaboration brings together artists and scientists to identify fruitful areas for interdisciplinary work. I'll describe how it plunged this theoretical physicist into a messy (and fun!) glassblowing studio, why it saw me capturing explosions at 100,000 frames per second at the hospital, and how some serendipitous physics observations have taken me into the lab. Come learn a bit about the physics of glass and other avalanching systems, as well as how to make the most of an art and science collaboration!
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February
| Event Location: Zoom link in description | Speaker: Fazel Tafti
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68470173961?pwd=RTZEak9Pd01WajVOZHN5SW5YZHcyQT09
Meeting ID: 684 7017 3961
Passcode: 113399
Speaker: Fazel Tafti, Boston College
Abstract
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February
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Michael Kramer (MPIfR, Bonn)
We are experiencing a golden era in testing and exploring relativistic gravity.
Whether it is results from gravitational wave detectors, satellite or lab
experiments, radio astronomy plays an important complementary role.
Here one can mention the cosmic microwave background, black hole
imaging and, obviously, binary pulsars. This talk will provide an overview of
how these methods relate to each other, and will in particular focus on new
results from the study of binary pulsars, where we can test the behaviour
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February
| Event Location: Zoom | Speaker: Brian Lenardo
The discovery that neutrinos have nonzero, but inexplicably small, masses hints that these particles may hold the key to unlocking physics beyond the Standard Model (BSM). In this talk, I will discuss the search for neutrinoless double beta decay (0νββ), a proposed form of radioactive decay that, if observed, would immediately demonstrate BSM physics.
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February
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Latham Boyle (Perimeter Institute)
After reviewing some key hints and puzzles from the early universe, I will introduce recent work with Neil Turok suggesting a rigid and predictive new approach to addressing them.
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February
| Event Location: Zoom link in description | Speaker: Christian Schneider, Institute of Physics, University of Oldenburg
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68470173961?pwd=RTZEak9Pd01WajVOZHN5SW5YZHcyQT09
Meeting ID: 684 7017 3961
Passcode: 113399
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February
| Event Location: Zoom | Speaker: Emmanuel Schaan
Upcoming large-scale structure (LSS) and cosmic microwave background (CMB) experiments offer a unique opportunity to turn the Universe into a particle physics laboratory and determine the nature of dark matter, dark energy, and the masses of the neutrinos. I will present innovative methods to jointly analyze these datasets and unleash their full constraining power.
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February
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Wynn Jacobson-Galan (UC Berkeley)
We present multi-wavelength observations of supernova (SN) 2020tlf, the first normal type II-P/L SN with confirmed precursor emission, as detected by the Young Supernova Experiment (YSE) transient survey. Soon after discovery, "flash" spectroscopy of SN 2020tlf with Keck LRIS revealed prominent narrow emission lines from shock-ionized circumstellar material (CSM) shedded in progenitor mass-loss episodes in the final months before explosion. Following classification, SN 2020tlf was observed in a thorough multi-wavelength follow-up campaign (x-ray to radio) out to 300 days after explosion.
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February
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Andrew Pelling (U Ottawa)
Abstract: The Pelling Lab for Augmented Biology is a highly interdisciplinary research group in which there is a seamless flow between fundamental biophysics, custom instrumentation, material science, bioengineering, tissue engineering, in vivo animal trials and commercialization. In this talk, I will speak broadly about our efforts in developing an understanding of the intimate relationship between Physics and Biology.
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January
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Adrian Liu (McGill)
The eras of Cosmic Dawn (when first-generation stars were formed) and reionization (when first-generation galaxies systematically ionized our Universe) are rather mysterious epochs in our cosmic timeline. New radio interferometers promise to change this by mapping out spatial fluctuations of neutral hydrogen at high redshifts via the 21cm line. In this talk, I will discuss recent upper limits on the high-redshift 21cm signal set by the Hydrogen Epoch of Reionization Array (HERA).
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January
| Event Location: https://ubc.zoom.us/j/4072923844?pwd=UCt2K0pOM2JUVllKckZMZXpjckpQZz09 | Speaker: Nicolas Savard(PHAS PhD student)
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January
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Don Morton (Researcher Emeritus, Herzberg Astronomy and Astrophysics)
Donald Morton is former Director-General of the Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics
This presentation will provide a broad overview of some of the central issues relating to global climate change and the related uncertainties, including greenhouse gases, temperature anomaly, climate models, future projections, solar irradiance, sunspot cycle, cosmic rays, historic warm and cold intervals, sea level rise and extreme meteorological events.
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January
| Event Location: Zoom | Speaker: Jennifer Cano, Assistant Professor at Stony Brook University
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68470173961?pwd=RTZEak9Pd01WajVOZHN5SW5YZHcyQT09
Meeting ID: 684 7017 3961
Passcode: 113399
Speaker: Jennifer Cano, Assistant Professor at Stony Brook University
Title: Higher magic angles in twisted bilayer graphene and topological twistronics
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January
| Event Location: Connect via zoom | Speaker: Ilsa Cooke (UBC Chemistry)
Less than a hundred years ago astronomers believed that molecules could not survive in the harsh environments found in interstellar space. However, advancements in radio astronomy in the last 50 years have enabled a boom in the detection of new molecules. Today, our picture of the molecular universe has expanded and around 250 molecules have been identified in the interstellar medium, including exotic and unstable species as well as many molecules that are also found on Earth.
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January
| Event Location: https://ubc.zoom.us/j/68660391182?pwd=bXp3NXd4L0tWL0dHSmF4V0lBZW1NZz09 | Speaker: Ryley Hill, PhD student
The Λ cold dark matter (ΛCDM) model accurately reproduces many notable observations of our Universe, such as the existence of galaxy clusters embedded in a cosmic web. However, there remain many open questions about the physics governing baryons on galaxy cluster scales that the ΛCDM model cannot address, such as how star-formation is triggered and quenched, and how feedback processes regulate structure growth.
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