Research School of Physical Sciences and Engineering
Encyclopedia
The Research School of Physics and Engineering (RSPE) was established with the creation of the Australian National University
(ANU) in 1947. Located at the ANU's main campus in Canberra
, the school is one of the four founding research schools in the ANU's Institute of Advanced Studies.
As part of the Institute of Advanced Studies it is primarily a research school with limited interaction with the ANU's undergraduate students. With a total of around 200 employees the school has approximately 60 PhD students and 70 academic staff. The school is divided into separate research departments although PhD students can often be based in more than one department.
Pelletron
accelerator
and associated modular superconducting linac run by the Department of Nuclear Physics, the H-1NF
flexible Stellarator
Heliac run by the Plasma Research Laboratory plus an extensive range of smaller experimental and computational equipment. Research ranges from the fundamental to the applied, including both experimental and theoretical work. The school's primary research areas are: materials science and engineering; lasers, nonlinear optics and photonics; nanotechnology and mesoscopic physics; physics of atoms, molecules and the nucleus; plasma physics and surface science; physics and the environment.
The nuclear physics 14UD is one of a handful of large Van de Graaff
accelerators in the world. It was the largest machine of its type when installed in 1974. After many upgrades the 14UD is capable of running terminal voltage of up 16.7 MV. Charging is via three inductive charging chains. In 1996 a superconducting RF linac was installed that is used as an energy booster for the 14UD enabling higher energies to be reached.
Sir Mark Oliphant
was the founder of the School and its first Director from 1950 to 1963. The school was originally called the "Research School of Physical Sciences" with "Engineering" being added to its title in 1990 to highlight the large amount of engineering work that is undertaken in the school. The name was again changed in 2008 to the "Research School of Physics and Engineering" to coincide with the merger with ANU's undergraduate physics teaching department.
For much of the early years the focus of a large part of the school was designing, re-designing and building a cyclo-synchrotron that in its final intended form was to produce a beam of 10.6 GeV
protons for nuclear physics research. Designed to be a world class research machine it was referred to within the school as "The Big Machine". Due to shifting goalposts and huge costs the cyclo-syncrotron was never completed. The small 7.7 MeV
cyclotron
designed to function as the proton injector was completed in 1955, and the large homopolar generator
intended to power the system was first operated in 1962, but by this time work on "The Big Machine" itself had been abandoned.
The homopolar generator, the largest ever built, was capable of supplying currents of over 2 megaamperes. Even though it was never used for its intended purpose it ended up being used for numerous research projects requiring an extremely high current source until its disassembly in 1986. One of these projects was the invention and development of the railgun
by John Barber and Richard Marshall. The school also benefited in an indirect way from the construction of the massive generator, the accumulated engineering experience and techniques where later used to build other research equipment around the school including the Plasma Physics H1NF Heliac. Some parts of the homopolar generator are now on permanent display on the lawn outside the research school.
The school has been home to many different particle accelerators over the years. The first accelerator installed was a 1.25 MV Cockcroft-Walton known as HT1, this was in use from 1952 until 1967 when it was sold to the University of New South Wales
. A second smaller 600 kV Cockcroft-Walton machine (HT2) was assembled in house using many spare parts acquired for HT1. In 1955 the UK government supplied a 33 MeV electron synchrotron as a gift. It was moved to the University of Western Australia
in 1961. During 1960–1980 a HVEC EN tandem accelerator was used by nuclear physics for light ion research. 1975 saw the school's 14UD accelerator come online, which has since been augmented with a superconducting linear accelerator.
On 5 July 1960 a fire during the night destroyed much of the eastern end of the Cockcroft Building. The damage included the drawing office, many student's and staff's results and files and the control room for the 600 kV Cockcroft-Walton accelerator. The 600 kV accelerator though only water damaged had to be scrapped. Refurbishment of the burnt out area was completed in September 1961.
Early departments that have now been spun off into research schools of their own include the departments of Astronomy and Geophysics and Geochemistry. Geophysics and Geochemistry separated into the Research School of Earth Sciences in 1973. Mount Stromlo Observatory
became part of the Department of Astronomy in 1957. While part of the school, the Department of Astronomy developed Siding Spring Observatory
and installed many new telescope
s at Mount Stromlo Observatory
. It separated into the Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics in 1986.
Australian National University
The Australian National University is a teaching and research university located in the Australian capital, Canberra.As of 2009, the ANU employs 3,945 administrative staff who teach approximately 10,000 undergraduates, and 7,500 postgraduate students...
(ANU) in 1947. Located at the ANU's main campus in Canberra
Canberra
Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
, the school is one of the four founding research schools in the ANU's Institute of Advanced Studies.
As part of the Institute of Advanced Studies it is primarily a research school with limited interaction with the ANU's undergraduate students. With a total of around 200 employees the school has approximately 60 PhD students and 70 academic staff. The school is divided into separate research departments although PhD students can often be based in more than one department.
Research
RSPE is one of the leading physics research institutions in Australia. Major research facilities at the school include the 14UD NECNEC
, a Japanese multinational IT company, has its headquarters in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. NEC, part of the Sumitomo Group, provides information technology and network solutions to business enterprises, communications services providers and government....
Pelletron
Pelletron
A pelletron is a type of electrostatic particle accelerator similar to a Van de Graaff generator. Pelletrons have been built in many sizes, from small units producing voltages up to 500 kilovolts and beam energies up to 1 megaelectronvolt of kinetic energy, to the largest system, which has...
accelerator
Particle accelerator
A particle accelerator is a device that uses electromagnetic fields to propel charged particles to high speeds and to contain them in well-defined beams. An ordinary CRT television set is a simple form of accelerator. There are two basic types: electrostatic and oscillating field accelerators.In...
and associated modular superconducting linac run by the Department of Nuclear Physics, the H-1NF
H-1NF
The H-1 flexible Heliac is a three field-period helical axis stellarator located in the Research School of Physics and Engineering at the Australian National University...
flexible Stellarator
Stellarator
A stellarator is a device used to confine a hot plasma with magnetic fields in order to sustain a controlled nuclear fusion reaction. It is one of the earliest controlled fusion devices, first invented by Lyman Spitzer in 1950 and built the next year at what later became the Princeton Plasma...
Heliac run by the Plasma Research Laboratory plus an extensive range of smaller experimental and computational equipment. Research ranges from the fundamental to the applied, including both experimental and theoretical work. The school's primary research areas are: materials science and engineering; lasers, nonlinear optics and photonics; nanotechnology and mesoscopic physics; physics of atoms, molecules and the nucleus; plasma physics and surface science; physics and the environment.
The nuclear physics 14UD is one of a handful of large Van de Graaff
Van de Graaff
Van de Graaff can refer to the physicist Robert J. Van de Graaff or machines named in honor of the physicist. The devices include:* Van de Graaff generator* The linear particle accelerator design that bears his name....
accelerators in the world. It was the largest machine of its type when installed in 1974. After many upgrades the 14UD is capable of running terminal voltage of up 16.7 MV. Charging is via three inductive charging chains. In 1996 a superconducting RF linac was installed that is used as an energy booster for the 14UD enabling higher energies to be reached.
History
Mark Oliphant
Sir Marcus 'Mark' Laurence Elwin Oliphant, AC, KBE, FRS was an Australian physicist and humanitarian who played a fundamental role in the first experimental demonstration of nuclear fusion and also the development of the atomic bomb.During his retirement, Oliphant was appointed as the Governor of...
was the founder of the School and its first Director from 1950 to 1963. The school was originally called the "Research School of Physical Sciences" with "Engineering" being added to its title in 1990 to highlight the large amount of engineering work that is undertaken in the school. The name was again changed in 2008 to the "Research School of Physics and Engineering" to coincide with the merger with ANU's undergraduate physics teaching department.
For much of the early years the focus of a large part of the school was designing, re-designing and building a cyclo-synchrotron that in its final intended form was to produce a beam of 10.6 GeV
GEV
GEV or GeV may stand for:*GeV or gigaelectronvolt, a unit of energy equal to billion electron volts*GEV or Grid Enabled Vehicle that is fully or partially powered by the electric grid, see plug-in electric vehicle...
protons for nuclear physics research. Designed to be a world class research machine it was referred to within the school as "The Big Machine". Due to shifting goalposts and huge costs the cyclo-syncrotron was never completed. The small 7.7 MeV
MEV
MeV and meV are multiples and submultiples of the electron volt unit referring to 1,000,000 eV and 0.001 eV, respectively.Mev or MEV may refer to:In entertainment:* Musica Elettronica Viva, an Italian musical group...
cyclotron
Cyclotron
In technology, a cyclotron is a type of particle accelerator. In physics, the cyclotron frequency or gyrofrequency is the frequency of a charged particle moving perpendicularly to the direction of a uniform magnetic field, i.e. a magnetic field of constant magnitude and direction...
designed to function as the proton injector was completed in 1955, and the large homopolar generator
Homopolar generator
A homopolar generator is a DC electrical generator comprising an electrically conductive disc rotating in a plane perpendicular to a uniform static magnetic field. A potential difference is created between the center of the disc and the rim, the electrical polarity depending on the direction of...
intended to power the system was first operated in 1962, but by this time work on "The Big Machine" itself had been abandoned.
The homopolar generator, the largest ever built, was capable of supplying currents of over 2 megaamperes. Even though it was never used for its intended purpose it ended up being used for numerous research projects requiring an extremely high current source until its disassembly in 1986. One of these projects was the invention and development of the railgun
Railgun
A railgun is an entirely electrical gun that accelerates a conductive projectile along a pair of metal rails using the same principles as the homopolar motor. Railguns use two sliding or rolling contacts that permit a large electric current to pass through the projectile. This current interacts...
by John Barber and Richard Marshall. The school also benefited in an indirect way from the construction of the massive generator, the accumulated engineering experience and techniques where later used to build other research equipment around the school including the Plasma Physics H1NF Heliac. Some parts of the homopolar generator are now on permanent display on the lawn outside the research school.
The school has been home to many different particle accelerators over the years. The first accelerator installed was a 1.25 MV Cockcroft-Walton known as HT1, this was in use from 1952 until 1967 when it was sold to the University of New South Wales
University of New South Wales
The University of New South Wales , is a research-focused university based in Kensington, a suburb in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia...
. A second smaller 600 kV Cockcroft-Walton machine (HT2) was assembled in house using many spare parts acquired for HT1. In 1955 the UK government supplied a 33 MeV electron synchrotron as a gift. It was moved to the University of Western Australia
University of Western Australia
The University of Western Australia was established by an Act of the Western Australian Parliament in February 1911, and began teaching students for the first time in 1913. It is the oldest university in the state of Western Australia and the only university in the state to be a member of the...
in 1961. During 1960–1980 a HVEC EN tandem accelerator was used by nuclear physics for light ion research. 1975 saw the school's 14UD accelerator come online, which has since been augmented with a superconducting linear accelerator.
On 5 July 1960 a fire during the night destroyed much of the eastern end of the Cockcroft Building. The damage included the drawing office, many student's and staff's results and files and the control room for the 600 kV Cockcroft-Walton accelerator. The 600 kV accelerator though only water damaged had to be scrapped. Refurbishment of the burnt out area was completed in September 1961.
Early departments that have now been spun off into research schools of their own include the departments of Astronomy and Geophysics and Geochemistry. Geophysics and Geochemistry separated into the Research School of Earth Sciences in 1973. Mount Stromlo Observatory
Mount Stromlo Observatory
Mount Stromlo Observatory located just outside of Canberra, Australia, is part of the Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the Australian National University .-History:...
became part of the Department of Astronomy in 1957. While part of the school, the Department of Astronomy developed Siding Spring Observatory
Siding Spring Observatory
Siding Spring Observatory near Coonabarabran, New South Wales, Australia, part of the Research School of Astronomy & Astrophysics at the Australian National University , incorporates the Anglo-Australian Telescope along with a collection of other telescopes owned by the Australian National...
and installed many new telescope
Telescope
A telescope is an instrument that aids in the observation of remote objects by collecting electromagnetic radiation . The first known practical telescopes were invented in the Netherlands at the beginning of the 1600s , using glass lenses...
s at Mount Stromlo Observatory
Mount Stromlo Observatory
Mount Stromlo Observatory located just outside of Canberra, Australia, is part of the Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the Australian National University .-History:...
. It separated into the Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics in 1986.
Departments
- Applied Mathematics
- Atomic and Molecular Physics Laboratories
- Electronic Materials Engineering
- Laser Physics Centre
- Nuclear Physics
- Plasma Physics
- Nonlinear Physics Centre
- Optical Sciences Group
- Theoretical Physics
- Quantum Science
Centres and Networks
- The Australian Photonics Cooperative Research Centre
- The Centre for Complex Systems
- CRC for Functional Communications Surfaces
- The Centre for the Mind
- ARC Centre of Excellence for Quantum-Atom Optics
- Australian Research Network for Advanced Materials
- ARC Complex Open Systems Research Network
- Australian Research Council Nanotechnology Network
- The Centre for Antimatter-Matter Studies
Deans and Directors
- Sir Mark OliphantMark OliphantSir Marcus 'Mark' Laurence Elwin Oliphant, AC, KBE, FRS was an Australian physicist and humanitarian who played a fundamental role in the first experimental demonstration of nuclear fusion and also the development of the atomic bomb.During his retirement, Oliphant was appointed as the Governor of...
1950–1963 - John Jaeger 1964–1965
- Sir Ernest Titterton 1966–1973
- Robert Street 1974–1978
- John Carver 1978–1992
- Erich Weigold 1992–2002
- Jim Williams 2002-present