What's New?

New content and hot topics in the JRM Lab.

Hot Topics

Professor Tom Gray, a long-time faculty member who retired from our department about 15 years ago, passed away last May, but due to global circumstances, his funeral had been postponed. There will be a service for Tom on Monday May 3rd at 2:00pm at Sunrise Cemetery here in Manhattan.
Similarly, Professor John Spngler also passed during the pandemic. His family has scheduled the memorial service for Friday, June 18 starting at 10:30 am at the First United Methodist Church on Pontz Ave in Manhattan.
Congratulations to newly-minted Drs. Travis Severt and Seyyed Javad Robatjazi. Both successfully (and virtually) defended their dissertations in early April 2021. They were joined by Huynh Lam in mid-May. Best wishes to all!
Daniel Rolles has achieved tenure and been promoted to associate professor!
The latest edition of the Division of Laser Science newsletter is available.

Local Research in the News

Thanks to a DOE Graduate Student Research Program, our Kurtis Borne will study at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in California. Borne will use the LCLS-II Free Electron Laser facility there.
K-State physicists have taken extremely fast snapshots of light-induced molecular ring-opening reactions - similar to those that help a human body produce vitamin D from sunlight. The research is published in Nature Chemistry and more popularly explained in a K-State press release.
The APS online magazine Physics featured an article co-authored by our student Xiang Li. Their story is titled "Jumpstarting Electron Motion in Molecules.
Laser metrology research begun by former JRM researcher Brian Washburn and continued by Brett DePaola is featured in the APS Physics online magazine. The story explains how frequency combs can be used for remote spectroscopy and is titled "Combing a Herd for Methane Emissions". The story has since been retold in many publications, notably, Optics & Photonic News.
The Department of Energy's Office of Science featured the work of Artem Rudenko and Daniel Rolles this December in "Science Up-Close: Blasting Molecules with Extreme X-Rays".
JRM Professor Daniel Rolles and his group have published a video article in JoVE, the Journal of Visualized Experiments. They describe the key steps for performing and analyzing pump-probe experiments combining a femtosecond optical laser with a free-electron laser in order to study ultrafast photochemical reactions in gas-phase molecules. This work utilizes the CAMP instrument at FLASH, a soft x-ray free electron laser that is part of the German DESY laboratory. Daniel has also been newly awarded a National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development (NSF CAREER) grant.
See older press releases concerning ultrafast physics at JRM.

Web Site Updates

See our preparations for the new FLAME laser, the Femtosecond LAser for Multicolor Experiments, in a new photo gallery.
James R. Macdonald Laboratory theoretical physicist Uwe Thumm has been named a University Distinguished Professor. We have featured Uwe and his work as a feature story on the lab's home page. Uwe joins a long line of Physics professors who have been so honored. Current Distinguished Professors in the Physics department include Itzik Ben-Itzhak, Brett Esry, CD Lin, Bharat Ratra and Chris Sorenson. Retired or otherwise past professors include Lew Cocke, Pat Richard, Dean Zollman, Talat Rahman and Bill Reay. Clearly, we're doing something right!
See all the latest news from the KSU Physics Department, including the latest edition of the departmental newsletter.