On the 4th January 2017 a third gravitational wave signal (GW170104) was detected by both of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) detectors further establishing the era of gravitational wave astronomy .
Annual Gathering
The highlight of the year is the SUPA Annual Gathering, a showcase and celebration of physics in Scotland.
The 2025 Annual Gathering took place in Dundee University on 28 May 2025.
The 2024 Annual Gathering took place in the ARC building, University of Glasgow on 22 May 2024.
In 2023, The SUPA Annual Gathering 2023 took place at the TIC building on George Street at the University of Strathclyde. It was held on Tuesday, 16 May 2023.
In 2022, the Annual Gathering was held in person, at the John McIntyre Conference Centre, with the talks streamed online and recorded.
This week, the LHCb experiment at CERN's Large Hadron Collider announced the discovery of five new resonances (very short-lived particles), known as excited Ωc (Omega_c) baryons. Baryons are composed of three fundamental particles called quarks. Well-known examples of baryons are the protons and neutrons that are found in atomic nuclei. A proton is made of two “up” quarks and one “down” quark, bound together via the strong nuclear force. The Ωc baryons are similar, but they are made from two “strange” quarks and one “charm” quark. These are like heavier (i.e., more massive) versions of the up and down quarks. The Ωc baryons do not exist inside atomic nuclei and can only be produced on earth in certain particle physics experiments such as the CERN Large Hadron Collider.
The “SUPAscopes” are three identical 1m robotic telescopes located at top observatory sites spread around the southern hemisphere: Siding Spring Observatory (Australia), South African Astronomical Observatory, and Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (Chile). Our capital investment has been turned into a share of the larger world-spanning LCO (Las Cumbres Observatory) network of 0.4m, 1m, and 2m telescopes, with a partnership agreement enabling collaborative projects with LCO and further network partners.
By providing round-the-clock access to the night sky, the LCO/SUPAscope network enables quasi-uninterrupted time series observations with both multi-filter imagers and spectrographs, and is the leading facility of its kind in the world. The automated scheduling of the telescopes allows for fast response via software interfaces.
Outstanding Academics, Celebrated Professionals and Royalty Join Scotland’s National Academy
The Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) is delighted to announce that HRH The Duke of Cambridge has been elected to become an RSE Royal Honorary Fellow. We much look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with HRH, as we have with our Patron, Her Majesty The Queen, and our other Royal Fellows.¹
Gregor Steele, Education Support (Physics), and Radiation Protection Adviser, gives some background on SSERC for SUPA; The school physics curriculum has changed quite radically in the last few years, with topics such as astrophysics, particle physics and quantum physics now much more to the fore. Some teachers will have last studied these subjects a decade or more ago, or perhaps not at all, depending on their route into teaching. RCUK courses bring teachers and researchers together with the aim of bringing cutting edge science into the classroom. These courses have been very well received in Scotland because the presenters have been able to talk about their research in an accessible manner that supports teachers’ understanding of curriculum content.
The SUPA Careers Event 2016 took place at Our Dynamic Earth in Edinburgh on 6th December. In keeping with the format used successfully in the past, we had a range of speakers from various industries who gave a brief introduction and then took part in round table sessions where delegates had the opportunity to chat with the speakers, ask questions, and get an insight into a variety of career options.
The SUPA careers event is designed to demonstrate the wide range of careers open to people with a physics PhD. The 80 student attendees heard from nine speakers who have careers in everything from satellites to software start-ups, including academia, finance, patent law and medical physics. Following brief introductions, the speakers spent 10 minutes with small groups of students to discuss their careers in detail before moving on to speak to other groups.
CV clinics were provided by Vishanti Fox of the Institute of Physics (IoP), and careers advisors Keith Kilgore (HW), Helen Stringer (UoE) and Katrina Garder (UoG).
An exhibition of Scottish Physics employers included representatives from M2 Lasers, Textesor, Leonardo, Coherent and the IoP.
In 2012 the Materials and Condensed Matter Physics Group opened the MagTEM facility at the University of Glasgow. MagTEM is a JEOL ARM (Atomic Resolution Microscope) 200cF which is a scanning transmission electron microscope (STEM) with aberration correction provided by CEOS. Aberration correction allows world leading performance of this instrument, and the capability of the instrument is summarised below:
University of Glasgow's LISA Pathfinder team has been awarded The Arthur C. Clarke Foundation and the British Interplanetary Society's 2016 Sir Arthur Clarke Award for "Space Achievement in Academic Research or Study".
The Welcome Event for new SUPA students was held on 28th October at Our Dynamic Earth in Edinburgh. First year students from across SUPA came to learn about the excellent research in SUPA, to meet colleagues in other universities and to receive advice from their peers.