Welcome to the Department of Physics and Astronomy Summer 2010 newsletter.

It is my extraordinary privilege, beginning July 1, 2010, to serve as Chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy.  It is indeed an honor to do so, as this Department possesses an extraordinarily collegial and collaborative atmosphere.  It is a place I have felt professionally at home now nearly 20 years.  The Department is, despite great difficulties within the State and the University, in excellent shape, due to the dedication and enthusiasm of the faculty, staff, the student body, and – not in a small part – to the long and distinguished service of the previous Chair, Ferd Coroniti.  I would like to wish Ferd well in his new position as Associate Dean of Physical Sciences in the UCLA College of Letters and Science.

The present is a time of great change in the university, due to changing budgetary support from the State, but it also is a time of great opportunity.  The research university finds itself in a central position in the nation's economic recovery, and in its economic future, as the federal government has placed unprecedented emphasis on scientific research funding.  As such, our Department was uniquely placed to grow in its research reach in the past two years.  With our first-rate faculty, the response to this opportunity was an overwhelming success.  I note with pride that our Department now has the largest external support of research funding in the UCLA College of Letters and Science.

The story of the Department's progress goes well beyond numbers.  It is found in the remarkable diversity of subjects investigated by the faculty, covering disciplines ranging from traditional areas – e.g. the quest for the Higgs boson at the LHC – to emerging new programs such as the physics of neuroscience.  Our ambitious research agenda is an integral part of the educational mission here and energizes the faculty and students.  I invite you to learn more from this newsletter, and from the departmental website, which provides continual updates on new developments here at UCLA.

The Department of Physics & Astronomy Website

JOHN MIAO: Three-dimensional structure determination from a single view
UCLA researchers, Kevin Raines, Sara Salha, Huaidong Jiang, Jose Rodríguez and John Miao have played an important role in developing this method. This work is also in collaboration with Richard Sandberg and Henry Kapteyn of University of Colorado, Boulder and Jincheng Du of University of North Texas.

The ability to determine the structure of matter in three dimensions has profoundly advanced our understanding of nature. Traditionally, the most widely used schemes for 3D structure determination of an object are implemented by acquiring multiple measurements over various sample orientations, as in the case of crystallography and tomography, or by scanning a series of thin sections through the sample, as in confocal microscopy. Now, the Miao group, in collaboration with Richard Sandberg and Henry Kapteyn of University of Colorado, Boulder and Jincheng Du of University of North Texas, has developed a novel 3D imaging modality, termed ankylography (derived from the Greek words ankylos meaning 'curved' and graphein meaning 'writing'), which under certain circumstances enables complete 3D structure determination from a single exposure using a monochromatic incident beam. With further development, this approach of obtaining complete 3D structure information from a single view could find broad applications in the physical and life sciences. For more details, please refer to the paper, which is published in Nature. Nature

GILL TRAVISH: Creating a Portable X-Ray Machine and Radius Health Joins Tech Incubator at CNSI to Conduct Proof-of-concept Research
Gil Travish and collaborators have developed a Microemitter Array X-rays (MAX) technology that has the potential to address the widespread demand for both performance improvements and cost reductions in the traditional vacuum tube-based technology of the X-ray-imaging market.

Electric point: This point, carved into a pyroelectric crystal, emits electrons when the material is heated. A flat-panel x-ray source uses an array of such points to make a more uniform field for medical imaging. Credit: Gil Travish

Read more: Creating a Portable X-Ray Machine and Radius Health Joins Tech Incubator at CNSI to Conduct Proof-of-concept Research

ERIC HUDSON: First there were atomic clocks that beat at microwave frequencies. Then along came optical clocks that provide higher frequency standards. Now, physicists in the US have unveiled plans to build the first "nuclear clock" that runs at still higher frequencies.Read article in physicsworld.com
Plan for 'nuclear clock' unveiled

Thorium doped crystal under illumination by the Advanced Light Source beam at Berkeley Lab in California. (Courtesy: Eric Hudson).

EDWARD L. (NED) WRIGHT: NASA's WISE launched on Monday, December 14, 2009. An unmanned NASA satellite that will survey the entire sky to discover millions of uncharted stars and galaxies, asteroids, and planetary "construction zones," providing valuable new information on our solar system, the Milky Way and the universe. NASA'S Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE), launched from California's Vandenberg Air Force Base on Dec.14, 2009, will map the sky at four infrared wavelengths – invisible to the unaided human eye – with a sensitivity hundreds of times greater than its predecessors. WISE will catalogue hundreds of millions of objects.

An infrared image of Edward L. (Ned) Wright, WISE's principal investigator and a UCLA professor of physics and astronomy. In the image, warm objects appear brighter than cool ones. His eye sockets are the hottest and brightest, while his clothes are cooler and look dark. NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, will measure infrared light from asteroids, stars, galaxies and more. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech Read More: NASA'S WISE infrared satellite to reveal new galaxies, stars, asteroids

July 16 - WISE Eyes the Whole Sky – WISE will complete its first survey of the entire sky on July 17, 2010. Visit WISE website

2010/WISE_telescope-developed by L3 Communications-SSG Credit- NASA_JPL-Caltech_L-3 SSG-Tinsley

ERIC BECKLIN: an emeritus astrophysicist at UCLA and SOFIA's project's chief science adviser : NASA's Flying Telescope Sees Early Success. NASA has begun operating a flying telescope powerful enough to record the birth of distant stars and planets. In late May it made its first scientific flight, capturing images of Jupiter and a nearby galaxy.
The telescope, which weighs 17 tons, is built into a 747 that serves as an airborne observatory. It's called the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, or SOFIA, and it's a marvel of astronomy and aeronautics. NPR interview July 2, 2010

Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images

NASA filled SOFIA's interior with workstations for airborne scientists.

February 2010 UCLA 'dark matter' conference highlights new research on mysterious cosmic substance

UCLA 'dark matter' conference highlights new research on mysterious cosmic substance. UCLA scientists discuss XENON100, the newest dark matter detector Dark matter, for more than 70 years is as mysterious and unknowable a subject to science as the legendary island of Atlantis has been to history. The ninth Symposium on Sources and Detection of Dark Matter and Dark Energy in the Universe was held at the Marriott Hotel in Marina del Rey February 24 - 26, 2010. UCLA professor of physics Katsushi Arisaka and Hanguo Wang, a UCLA physics researcher, described the newest dark matter detector, XENON100, which UCLA has been operating beneath Italy's Gran Sasso mountain, some 70 miles west of Rome, in partnership principally with Columbia University and Rice University, along with seven other institutions in Switzerland, Portugal, Italy, Germany, France, Japan and China. Read more about dark matter and the symposium at UCLA Newsroom Visit the Symposium Website

XENON100 Detector

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