Our Science and Scientists in the News
Pawel Danielewicz co-authored a paper titled "Deblurring for Nuclei: 3D Characteristics of Heavy-Ion Collisions” that has been published in Physical Review C. The authors propose to use deblurring techniques to arrive at sharp 3D images of nuclear collisions. The deblurring techniques may also be effective under other situations in nuclear and high energy physics when assessed signals are degraded by instrument performance or by methodology.
August 2021
New research by the University of Surrey's Nuclear Physics Group has shown that it's possible to mimic excited quantum states with exotic nuclei, opening up a host of opportunities for next generation radioactive beam facilities, such as the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams.
Alex Brown co-authored the Nature Communication paper on proton emission from an isomeric state in 54Ni. The paper concludes that show that these decays carry an unusually high angular momentum, l=5 and l=7.
June 2021
DOE highlighted experimental work on Glancing into a Nuclear Mirror: the Fate of Aluminum-26 in Stars
May 2021
Witek Nazarewicz served as a review-panel member for the Nuclear Physics European Collaboration Committee (NuPECC) Review report. The report is an independent review of the activities of NuPECC over the period 2014-2020 and is published by the European Science Foundation-Science Connect.
Filomena Nunes explains why theorists are excited about exotic nuclei.
April 2021
Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis reported the first observations of a new form of fluorine, the isotope 13F, from measurements at NSCL. Read more in Sci-News here.
Witek Nazarewicz comments on the recent PREX-II neutron skin result and the discovery of uranium-214.
January 2021
Witek Nazarewicz co-authored the Nature Physics paper on Charge radii of exotic potassium isotopes challenge nuclear theory and the magic character of N = 32. The paper concludes that the measured charge radii and binding energies of the potassium isotopes show no signature of a magic shell gap at N = 32. The comparison of the experimental results with theoretical calculations highlights our limited understanding of the size of neutron-rich nuclei.
December 2020
Rahul Jain discusses his research on the formation of exotic elements on the podcast 'The Sci-Files'.
August 2020
Alex Brown's famous "Island of Inversion" Warburton, Becker and Brown paper from 1990 was selected as a Physical Review C Milestone paper in celebration of 50 years of Physical Review C. The milestone was also highlighted in MSU Today.
June 2020
Witek Nazarewicz co-authored the Communications Physics paper on "Structural trends in atomic nuclei from laser spectroscopy of tin," which was highlighted on the journal's homepage.
May 2020
An experiment performed by an international collaboration at NSCL with an optical time projection chamber was selected as one of the 50-year Physical Review C highlights
April 2020
Witek Nazarewicz co-authored the Nature Physics paper on ‘Measurement and microscopic description of odd–even staggering of charge radii of exotic copper isotopes’
March 2020
Alexandra Gade was asked to write the News&Views article for Nature: High-energy-electron scattering probes the strong nuclear interaction at close range
January 2020
MSU leads in world-class nuclear science research, graduate education
December 2019
The Phys. Rev. Lett. paper on "Discovery of an Exceptionally Strong β-Decay Transition of F20 and Implications for the Fate of Intermediate-Mass Stars" involving nuclear theorists from FRIB/NSCL was highlighted as Editors' Suggestion. It was also featured in Physics as a Viewpoint.
November 2019
Luke Robert’s paper Equation of state effects in the core collapse of a 20−M⊙ star was highlighted as Editor's suggestion
A feature on the Na-39 discovery that involved researchers from NSCL
October 2019
What lies at the end of the periodic table? NSCL's Witek Nazarewicz helps to explain.
September 2019
Superheavy: Making and Breaking the Periodic Table, interviews Witek Nazarewicz.
July 2019
Professor Witold Nazarewicz, a John A. Hannah Distinguished Professor of Physics and a Chief Scientist at the Lab received an honorary degree from The University of York.
June 2019
A team of researchers, led by Benoit Cote at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Astrophysics - Center for the Evolution of the Elements at Michigan State University in the United States and the Konkoly Observatory in Hungary, are looking into the cosmic origin of the heaviest elements in the periodic table.
May 2019
The Phys. Rev. Lett. paper on "Laser Spectroscopy of Neutron-Rich Tin Isotopes: A Discontinuity in Charge Radii across the N=82Shell Closure" involving nuclear theorists from FRIB/NSCL was highlighted as Editors' Suggestion. It was also featured in Physics as a Synopsis.
April 2019
NSCL Graduate students Rebecca Lewis and Zachary Matheson have been selected as fellows in the NNSA Graduate Fellowship Program (NGFP)
March 2019
Nuclear Physics in Reviews of Modern Physics was featured in Physics Today by G. Bertsch, W. Nazarewicz, and A. Richter
February 2019
Artemis Spyrou was interviewed by APS Physics: Q&A: Studying the Stars—No Telescope Required https://physics.aps.org/articles/v12/22
Extreme elements push the boundaries of the periodic table
January 2019
The results of a Tin-132(proton, neutron) charge-exchange experiment at RIBF, Japan, aimed at elucidating the role of pion condensation in dense environments, such as neutron stars, were published. The press release can be found at: http://www.riken.jp/en/pr/press/2018/20181221_1/. Remco Zegers was co-spokesperson of the experiment, which was carried in a collaboration between RIKEN, Kyushu University, and Michigan State University. The papers are available in Japanese here:
https://www.nikkei.com/article/DGXLRSP493599_Z11C18A0000000/
http://www.optronics-media.com/news/20181023/53543/
December 2018
Artemis Spyrou published an article in the The Conversation: Hunting for rare isotopes: The mysterious radioactive atomic nuclei that will be in tomorrow’s technology
September 2018
The paper "Bayesian approach to model-based extrapolation of nuclear observables" by a new collaboration between nuclear theorists and statisticians was highlighted as an Editors' Suggestion in Physical Review C.
The Phys. Rev. Lett. paper on "From Calcium to Cadmium: Testing the Pairing Functional through Charge Radii Measurements of 100−130Cd" involving nuclear theorists from FRIB/NSCL was highlighted by Technische Universität Darmstadt.
July 2018
The paper led by the FRIB/NSCL theory group on "Eigenvector Continuation with Subspace Learning" was highlighted by Physics as a Synopsis "Making Quantum Computations Behave".
June 2018
The Nature Physics Perspective on The limits of nuclear mass and charge by Witek Nazarewicz was highlighted by MSUToday and many international news outlets.
The paper on "Probing Sizes and Shapes of Nobelium Isotopes by Laser Spectroscopy" involving nuclear theorists from FRIB/NSCL was highlighted as an Editors' Suggestion in Phys. Rev. Lett. and also featured as Physics Focus. It was also featured in Science News.
May 2018
The article on heavy ion fusion published by Bastian Schuetrumpf and Witek Nazarewicz was featured by GSI
Artemis Spyrou and Hendrik Schatz published an article in the The Conversation: Elements from the stars: The unexpected discovery that upended astrophysics 66 years ago
March 2018
The paper "New result for the neutron β-asymmetry parameter A0 from UCNA" co-authored by Chris Wrede was highlighted as an Editors' Suggestion in Physical Review C.
MSU Professor Morten Hjorth-Jensen was awarded the Norwegian prize for Excellence in Teaching.
January 2018
The paper by Massey/MSU theorists on "Electron and Nucleon Localization Functions of Oganesson: Approaching the Thomas-Fermi Limit" was featured as "Physics Viewpoint: Heaviest Element Has Unusual Shell Structure". It was also featured on the cover of Phys. Rev. Lett. 120(5) issue, Physics Today, Nature, MSUToday, Physics World, Science News, and Gizmodo
December 2017
The paper by Bastian Schuetrumpf et al. on "Cluster formation in precompound nuclei in the time-dependent framework" was featured as Physics Focus "Nuclear Fusion in Hi-Def"
November 2017
Artemis Spyrou and Wolfgang Mittig published an article in the The Conversation: Atomic age began 75 years ago with the first controlled nuclear chain reaction
Daniel Bazin was chosen to write the APS Physics Viewpoint: Doubly Magic Nickel
October 2017
MSU Professor Remco Zegers named 2017 APS Fellow
MSU Professor Steve Lund chosen to head US Particle Accelerator School
Two MSU graduate students receive prestigious DOE fellowship.
October 2017
Immense oganesson projected to have no electron shells.
Scott Pratt's paper on the "Consistent implementation of non-zero-range terms into hydrodynamics" was highlighted as Editors' Suggestion in Physical Review C
August 2017
MSU Hannah Professor and FRIB Chief Scientist Witek Nazarewicz was awarded the Flerov Prize in recognition of his contributions to the theoretical understanding of the properties of the heaviest elements.
MSU Assistant Professor Heiko Hergert has been selected by the DOE Office of Science as a recipient for an FY2017 Early Career Research Program award. Dr. Hergert, this year’s sole recipient from MSU, joined the FRIB faculty in 2015 and holds a joint appointment in the Department of Physics and Astronomy.
July 2017
Tetraneutron calculations by Kevin Fossez et al. published in Physical Review Letters were highlighted by Physics World: http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/2017/jul/24/can-four-neutrons-form-a-stable-nucleus
Morten Hjorth-Jensen was chosen to write a Synopsis piece for a recent PRL: https://physics.aps.org/articles/v10/72
June 2017
The work described in this highlight by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science was done at NSCL, led by an outside user from the University of Connecticut.
https://science.energy.gov/np/highlights/2017/np-2017-05-a/
May 2017
Witek Nazarewicz' paper “Challenges in nuclear structure theory” has
been selected as a 2016 Journal of Physics G Highlight
Artemis Spyrou's article in the Journal of Physics G "Emerging Leaders"
volume was highlighted by the publisher
February 2017
Filomena Nunes, managing director for the FRIB Theory Alliance and professor of physics, received MSU’s 2017 Inspirational Woman of the Year Award in the Professional Achievement category.
