The Stoner Colloquium 2024

The School of Physics and Astronomy are delighted to host Professor Stephen Blundell at the Stoner Colloquium 2024 on 5 December.

About the colloquium 

Secret agent: how an implanted particle can report back intelligence on magnets and superconductors

What is going on inside magnets and superconductors at the atomic level?  To find out, you can’t just put a magnet or a superconductor inside a measurement apparatus. Instead, you need to find a way of shrinking down your measurement apparatus down to the atomic scale and placing it inside your magnet or superconductor. How on earth can you do that? It turns out that muons provide the answer. These unstable, radioactive particles aren't scattered from samples, but implanted inside them. After interacting for a short period of time, they decay, reporting back on information that they have obtained.  

To make the most use of this information, you have to know where they have hidden, and this information has only been readily available rather recently. This has opened up a new window on the `universe’ of quantum materials, compounds in which the fascinating and weird nature of quantum mechanics becomes manifest. Professor Stephen Blundell will describe how this technique works and some of the recent results that have been obtained. 

Book your place

The lecture will take place in the Michael Sadler Building at the University of Leeds, with the colloquium commencing at 5.30 pm in the Rupert Beckett Lecture Theatre (LG.X04). 

Booking is required to attend this event – you can do so at our dedicated ticket portal.

If you have any questions please contact Physics.Research@leeds.ac.uk.