In February our latest work experience student, Mackenzie, from William Farr near Lincoln joined us for a week of work experience. It was a pleasure to host Mackenzie for a few days. Here’s what he had to say about his week:

“After having arrived at Lincoln Uni, I was greeted by Matthew Booth, with whom I had organised my work experience. He then showed me to the physics department and helped organise my schedule for the rest of the week based off my interests, giving me as many options/opportunities as possible. We then toured the INB which helped massively in getting my bearings, after which he introduced me to some of his colleagues who seemed more than happy to accommodate me in any applicable activities. Throughout my time at the Uni, I had the opportunity to attend several lectures, including an astrophysics lecture by Phil Sutton; a condensed matter physics lecture by Matthew Booth; and a thermodynamics lecture by Manuela Mura, all of which were immensely interesting and informative. I was also tasked with analysing some of the data from the Uni’s radio telescope, which I was more than happy to do despite the fact I had forgotten nearly everything I’d learned about excel in IT lessons at school. I also had the opportunity to attend a 2^nd year lab, in which I helped check how easily the new scripts could be followed by 1^st years. As a part of this, I was able to set up and perform the experiments myself just as I would have if I’d been a 1^st year myself. During my work experience, I was also invited to attend a meeting of a group of students and professors where they discussed General Relativity and other physicists around the subject which was of great interest to me. Finally, I had the opportunity to sit in on a session where they were using an electron microscope to image different objects and discussed how they work, and I must say the images were rather impressive. Overall, I can’t think of many ways in which this experience could have been made better considering the excellent staff and opportunities they had allowed me to partake in.”

In January, a work experience student, Elliott, from Sir Robert Pattinson Academy joined us for a week of work experience. Elliott experienced what it would be like to be a student studying Physics by attending some lectures, and helped our technician prepare the laboratory for the undergraduate lab sessions. Elliott also helped us to test some of our new first year experiment scripts and gave some very useful feedback!

Here’s what he had to say about his week:

As a Y12 Sixth Form student wanting to eventually go to university, I decided some form of work experience at a university would be best for me; it would allow me to experience university life, traversing the campus and visit the certain labs that I would see taking some form of Physics.

This turned out to be a fantastic decision. Although the campus scope and the level of independence the university atmosphere emitted was immensely daunting, my supervisor helped me traverse parts of the campus I didn’t know and I soon became accustomed to travelling around the Isaac Newton Building – which I spent most of work experience at.
Since I chose to work in the physics department, I was able to see and use some of the incredible equipment and apparatus that you wouldn’t see at A-level, or GSCE studies- my position as a technician let me operate a lot of this equipment- an electron microscope being a highlight. I spent my time with this equipment practising 1st year practical experiments and giving feedback to my supervisor on the clarity of the scripts in order to help these students. Some of the experiments I tested, I got to see applied by the students when I assisted in setting up multiple apparatus in the physics labs: one example being an experiment involving a variable ‘g’ pendulum which would show gravity’s effects on the pendulum at different angles between the Y and X axis and another being the refraction of a laser through different material densities, like air, or acrylic. Between practical work, I also got to experience some of my supervisor’s lectures on physics, which (despite not having all the knowledge to follow along without fear of shattering my skull) felt much more like an A-level classroom environment and was a pleasant time overall.

The working environment was incredibly relaxed with my lunch hour being able to be taken at any point in the day (with many cafes across the campus, by the way) along with my supervisor’s fantastic support provided there was little worry each day and the only worry came from remembering where the toilets and exits were.

To those considering going to university and/or looking for a casual and insightful work experience, I would heavily recommend contacting the head of one of these fantastic departments at Lincoln Uni for whatever subject you may be interested in- I was very tempted to help in the LPAD (Lincoln Performing Arts Department)- and see how you can spend your time to help them and experience the University environment.

In the summer of 2022 our Physics BSc student Adam Kinsella undertook a research project funded by the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Scheme (UROS) here at the University of Lincoln. Their project focused on the substitution of Fe in the semiconductor CuAlS₂. Using density functional theory (DFT) they investigated the role of Fe content on the electronic structure of the material. This research is a step towards understanding this complicated material, and its potential for application in photovoltaics, photothermal energy conversion, or spintronics.

Below is an excerpt from Adam’s blog post about their project.

Over the course of the project, I’ve definitely learned a lot, and I was surprised by how many different areas I ended up learning about – I’ve gained knowledge in computing/programming, in DFT simulation, in the physical concepts behind semiconductors and in collaborative research. I’ve enjoyed the process of working alongside my supervisors and being directly involved in the decisions made on this project and believe my experience will aide me in a wide variety of areas in the future.

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Adam Kinsella – third year Physics BSc

This week, a research article based on Adam’s project has been published in the journal ‘Crystals’. This is a fantastic achievement for not only Adam, but also for our PhD student Chris Dickens, who co-supervised the UROS project and is the first author on the article. Congratulations!

On Friday 30th September the School of Mathematics and Physics at the University of Lincoln hosted our first ever PGR symposium event. We invited alumni who are currently PGR students at other institutions to give a short (10-15 minute) presentation about their research projects alongside some of our own PhD students. 

The final speaker was Alek Radic, who is studying for a PhD in the Optoelectronics group at the University of Cambridge. Alek’s research is on the development of 4D operando optical scattering microscopy to track ion dynamics and phase transitions in battery electrodes.

In his talk, Alek started by introducing a technique called transient absorption spectroscopy, for determining the excited state dynamics of electrons in materials. He then spoke in more detail about ‘wide-field’ transient absorption microscopy, which is
an interferometrically enhanced optical technique used to track changes in the morphology, dynamics and structure of advanced materials.

On Friday 30th September the School of Mathematics and Physics at the University of Lincoln hosted our first ever PGR symposium event. We invited alumni who are currently PGR students at other institutions to give a short (10-15 minute) presentation about their research projects alongside some of our own PhD students. 

The seventh speaker was George Bell, who is studying for a PhD at the University of Lincoln with our very own Phil Sutton. George’s research is on the gravitational braking of captured moons around ringed planets.

In his talk, George started by discussing the properties of planetary rings and how they may be formed. He then proceeded to talk about how the interactions between rings and captured bodies can vertically displace ring material. George then summarised the main aim of his PhD project: what can we can learn about past unobserved impacts by observing ring structures?

Saturn isn’t the only ringed planet in our solar system!

On Friday 30th September the School of Mathematics and Physics at the University of Lincoln hosted our first ever PGR symposium event. We invited alumni who are currently PGR students at other institutions to give a short (10-15 minute) presentation about their research projects alongside some of our own PhD students. 

The sixth speaker was Reece Jones, who has just finished his first year studying for a PhD at the University of Strathclyde (joint appointment with NPL). His research is on the development of quantum devices based on silicon carbide (SiC).

In his talk, Reece started by introducing the abstract concept of a quantum bit – a qubit – and discussing the various possible realisations. He then proceeded to discuss the particular case of silicon vacancies in SiC, and how they can be identified using photoluminescence spectroscopy.

On Friday 30th September the School of Mathematics and Physics at the University of Lincoln hosted our first ever PGR symposium event. We invited alumni who are currently PGR students at other institutions to give a short (10-15 minute) presentation about their research projects alongside some of our own PhD students. 

The fifth speaker was Nick von Jeinsen, who is currently in his first year studying for a PhD in the Surfaces, Microstructure and Fracture Group at the University of Cambridge. His research is on the development of state-of-the-art scanning helium microscopy (SheM).

In his talk, Nick started by outlining the general motivations for SHeM in comparison to electron microscopy. He then proceeded to discuss the angular and spatial resolution and reported on his efforts to improve the resolution of the instrument.