News and Events

Michael Churchill
Friday, October 18, 12:00 PM (C215 ESC, and online)
Can Fusion Energy Become Reality? Where Physics and Engineering Converge

The quest to realize fusion energy as a clean power source is accelerating, with recent breakthroughs in inertial confinement fusion reaching scientific breakeven—producing more energy than consumed—and magnetic confinement fusion nearing similar milestones. However, significant challenges remain in turning these achievements into a practical fusion power plant. These challenges include designing materials capable of withstanding the intense heat and particle fluxes from fusion plasmas, creating plasma control systems to mitigate effects from loss of plasma confinement, developing blanket systems to capture energy from fusion neutrons and close the fuel cycle, and the list goes on. Realizing a fusion power plant requires a multidisciplinary, systems-level approach, balancing the competing demands of physics and engineering to create an efficient and economically viable power source. In this talk, I will explore how advanced modeling and simulation techniques—from large-scale parallel computing to reduced AI models—are not only guiding the design of fusion systems but also deepening our understanding of the complex, multi-physics, multi-scale dynamics of fusion plasmas.

Thumbnail of Northern Lights, West Virginia
A gravel country lane gently winds through this colorful rural night skyscape. Captured from Monroe County in southern West Virginia on the evening of October 10, the starry sky above is a familiar sight. Shimmering curtains of aurora borealis or northern lights definitely do not make regular appearances here, though. Surprisingly vivid auroral displays were present on that night at very low latitudes around the globe, far from their usual northern and southern high latitude realms. The extensive auroral activity was evidence of a severe geomagnetic storm triggered by the impact of a coronal mass ejection (CME), an immense magnetized cloud of energetic plasma. The CME was launched toward Earth from the active Sun following a powerful X-class solar flare. Growing Gallery: Global aurora during October 10/11, 2024
Mount Timpanogos with sky above
Temperature:76.2 F
Rel. Humidity: 21%
Pressure:30.11 Inches Hg
Image for BYU Women Represent at CUWiP 2024
21 women student attend conference at Montana State University, where students engaged in keynote speeches, panels, and research presentations.
Image for Nathan Powers, Updated labs and AAPT lab committee work
Dr. Powers initiated the effort to update BYU’s physics undergraduate lab curriculum in 2015. The revamped curriculum, aimed at teaching students how to construct knowledge from experiments.
Image for Dr. Stephens’ Sabbatical to University of Arizona
Dr. Stephens participated in a research project at the University of Arizona focused on studying brown dwarfs using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST).

Selected Publications

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By Christiana Z. Suggs, Eric G. Hintz, and Denise C. Stephens
Abstract:

As part of our variable star follow-up program, we have examined a number of stars from the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) survey. Using a combination of our own data, ATLAS data, and other archival data, we confirmed the published periods and established a baseline ephemeris for each star. This initial sample of six stars are from the PUL or mono-periodic set from the ATLAS survey. Our determined periods agreed well with the published values. Five targets were found to be high amplitude δ Scuti variables (HADS), and one a low-amplitude δ Scuti (LADS). Beyond the primary period we examined the frequency content, Q value, position in the PL relation, and position within the instability strip of each object. We found ATO J070.9950+37.4038 to be the most complex target. The frequency content is likely a set of nonradial pulsations. ATO J328.8034+58.0406 is a multiperiodic HADS variable that is pulsating in the first and second overtones. ATO 345.4240+42.0479 was found to be a simple HADS monoperiodic fundamental pulsator. In the case of ATO J086.0780+30.3287, we found a strong fundamental pulsation with many harmonics and a weaker first overtone pulsation. We classify ATO J086.0780+30.3287 as a HADS. ATO J077.6090+36.5619 was found to be an interesting case of a monoperiodic star that appears to be pulsating in the third overtone. The lower amplitude for this target would put it in the LADS group. ATO J045.8159+46.0090 was found to be a multiperiodic HADS pulsating in the first and second overtones.

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By Levi Hancock and Richard Sandberg (et al.)
Abstract:

The performance of metal and polymer foams used in inertial confinement fusion (ICF), inertial fusion energy (IFE), and high-energy-density (HED) experiments is currently limited by our understanding of their nanostructure and its variation in bulk material. We utilized an X-ray-free electron laser (XFEL) together with lensless X-ray imaging techniques to probe the 3D morphology of copper foams at nanoscale resolution (28 nm). The observed morphology of the thin shells is more varied than expected from previous characterizations, with a large number of them distorted, merged, or open, and a targeted mass density 14% less than calculated. This nanoscale information can be used to directly inform and improve foam modeling and fabrication methods to create a tailored material response for HED experiments.

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By Mark C. Anderson, Kent L. Gee, and J. Taggart Durrant (et al.)
Abstract:

As part of its Quesst mission, NASA will fly the supersonic X-59 aircraft over communities to assess human annoyance to quieter sonic booms. As preparation for this flight test campaign continues, there are still many unanswered questions regarding best practices for sonic boom measurements inside and outside communities. This paper features sonic boom measurement and signal processing information including time-domain windowing, zero padding, digital pole-shift filtering, ground-based vs. elevated microphones, atmospheric turbulence, and contaminating noise mitigation. This work both summarizes previous recommendations and provides new recommendations for sonic boom measurement and signal processing. Thus, this paper serves as an overview of the research and recommendations.

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By Kyle R Adams and Aleksandr V Mosenkov (et al.)
Abstract:

We examine deep optical images of edge-on galaxies selected from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) Stripe 82. The entire sample consists of over 800 genuine edge-on galaxies with spectroscopic redshifts out to z similar to 0.2. To discern the faintest details around the galaxies, we use three different data sources with a photometric depth of down to 30 mag arcsec(-2) in the r band: SDSS Stripe 82, Hyper Suprime-Cam Strategic Program, and DESI Legacy Imaging Surveys. Our analysis of the deep images reveals a variety of low surface brightness features. 49 galaxies exhibit prominent tidal structures, including tidal tails, stellar streams, bridges, and diffuse shells. Additionally, 56 galaxies demonstrate peculiar structural features such as lopsided discs, faint warps, and dim polar rings. Overall, we detect low surface brightness structures in 94 galaxies out of 838, accounting for 11 per cent of the sample. Notably, the fraction of tidal structures is only 5.8 per cent, which is significantly lower than that obtained in modern cosmological simulations and observations. Previous studies have shown that strongly interacting galaxies have stellar discs about 1.5-2 times thicker than those without apparent interactions. In an analysis where tidal features are carefully masked for precise disc axis ratio measurements, we show that discs of galaxies with tidal features are 1.33 times thicker, on average, than control galaxies that do not have visible tidal features. Furthermore, we find that edge-on galaxies with tidal structures tend to have a higher fraction of oval and boxy discs than galaxies without tidal features.

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Abstract:

Chiral multiferroics offer remarkable capabilities for controlling quantum devices at multiple levels. However, these materials are rare due to the competing requirements of long-range orders and strict symmetry constraints. In this study, we present experimental evidence that the coexistence of ferroelectric, magnetic orders, and crystallographic chirality is achievable in hybrid organic-inorganic perovskites [(R/S)-β-methylphenethylamine]2CuCl4. By employing Landau symmetry mode analysis, we investigate the interplay between chirality and ferroic orders and propose a novel mechanism for chirality transfer in hybrid systems. This mechanism involves the coupling of non-chiral distortions, characterized by defining a pseudo-scalar quantity, 

 (

 represents the ferroelectric displacement vector and 

 denotes the ferro-rotational vector), which distinguishes between (R)- and (S)-chirality based on its sign. Moreover, the reversal of this descriptor’s sign can be associated with coordinated transitions in ferroelectric distortions, Jahn-Teller antiferro-distortions, and Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya vectors, indicating the mediating role of crystallographic chirality in magnetoelectric correlations.