Time, Einstein and the Coolest Stuff in the Universe

PHYSICS the word, which elevates my mind to the plane of eternal bliss. 

When I was studying in my 9th Standard, I used to thoroughly hate the Physics and always showed no interest towards it. When I joined my college for 1st PU (Pre University), we had a lecturer by name Kempegowda, who used to take physics and he taught physics so well that, I instantly fell in love with it. During my 2nd year, while traveling from my house to college in bus, I developed habit of reading books. At that time, my father used to bring collection of Physics books, Vignettes in Physics by G.Venkataraman. I read them like novels and I was unable to understand the mathematics part of it but I came to know the fascinating part of physics. Result is that I fell in love with my first lover, PHYSICS, to which I am committed and will be committed through out my life. I was fascinated by the life stories of Nobel laureates, physicists  their achievements and struggles to achieve it. I even dreamt of having one (I know it is just a dream!).

I read in one of the G.Venkataraman’s books, THE HOT STORY, about the attempt to reach the absolute zero (in chapter Marching Towards Zero). There I came across various experiments to reach zero kelvin. As I read it during my Pre University level, I could not follow much of the technical stuff. Time passed by, I completed my engineering and by god’s grace got into ISRO.

On 24^th of January, 2010, I logged on to the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA) , website, to see if the ‘Integrated PhD’ offered by IIA-IGNOU (Indira Gandhi National Open University), is part-time of full time. On the home page I noticed that there would be a lecture “Einstein, Time and Coolest stuff in the Universe ”  by Nobel Laureate  Dr.William.D.Phillips ( to know about him click here http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes /physics/laureates /1997 /phillips-autobio.html) on 25th of January 2010, at IIA itself. The lecture would begin at 5:30 PM. I surfed through net, to know the information about him and later came to know that, he got the Nobel Prize on his work related to Laser Cooling.

I briefly went through the laser cooling technique (you can check these links to know about Laser cooling http://www.colorado.edu/ physics/ 2000/bec/ lascool1.html).I decided to attend it at any cost. I along with few people from other division of my office, left our office and reached IIA at 5 PM. I enjoyed the high tea, and finishing it, took our seats in the lecture hall. 

Lecture hall was filled in no time. Dr.William.D.Phillips was introduced by Prof.S.S.Hasan, Director, IIA. After finishing the welcoming speech he handed over the dais to Dr.Phillips.

  He began his lecture by showing Einstein’s photo on TIME magazine. He briefed about the three famous papers of Einstein; on Brownian Motion, Theory of Relativity and Photoelectric effect. He spoke about how cool the stuff by demonstrating few things, using liquid nitrogen. He poured the liquid nitrogen on to the floor and demonstrated how quickly it evaporates. He took few balloons, filled them with the air, and dipped them into flask (mostly vacuum flask) containing liquid nitrogen. If they were put into the same flask then hardly three to four would fit in it. As liquid nitrogen liquefies the air in the balloons, more than ten could be dipped into it. He beautifully showed the liquification of air. He also demonstrated that, when air is liquefied in the container, the liquid air sticks to the container walls.

He moved on to the various ways of cooling, like starting from domestic refrigeration where, coolant cools the refrigerated space to low temperatures (but more than that of the coolant temperature) to Doppler cooling.

He beautifully explained the Doppler cooling (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Doppler_cooling), by explaining the Doppler’s effect, and taking an example of water waves (I read many books where they take an example of train approaching an observer or going away from him).He explained the principle of atomic clocks (http://en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Atomic_clock).

The velocity of the Cesium atom moving in the clock is very crucial in maintaining the accuracy. The slower it is moving, better will be the velocity (because as the velocity increases, due to Special Theory of relativity, it mass also increases which induces error and decreases accuracy).

 Figure 1. Schematic drawing of the vacuum chamber, intersecting laser beams and atomic beam used for the Doppler cooling experiment. The laser beams enter the UHV windows vertically and horizontally. (courtesy http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1997/back.html)

Then he described the method of Doppler cooling and explained how he and his fellow researchers at NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology, USA), defied the cooling limit laid out by Doppler Cooling (which is 240µK for) and reached 40 µK.

Later he moved on to the trapping of atoms, which are cooled to the µK. He then described that, cooling to such low temperatures and trapping in containers is very difficult because, they stick on to the container walls. He demonstrated the use of magnetism in trapping the cooled atoms, by demonstrating the levitating spinning top. 

Fig 2.You can have a glimpse of it in this badly taken photo.

I tell you, this was really one of the spell bounding moments of my life. The levitated spinning top was in air literally for more than minute and half. He moved his hand beneath it and also transparent coffee cup through it. He then said that, as atoms are spinning and they have magnetic moment, they can also be held/trapped in similar manner. There was a round of loud applause for this demonstration.

Later, he spoke about various ways, in which the cooled atoms can be held in Magnetic Optical Trap (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magneto-optical_trap) by pumping them up like a fountain and through various other methods (which I couldn’t follow much).

He ended his talk, with the coolest temperature achieved on earth, which is 100pK (100 pico kelvin i.e 100 × 10 ^-12 K- too cold!!). He showed in comparison to the coldest temperatures in universe known which is 3K (Cosmic Microwave background radiation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Cosmic_ microwave background radiation), the one achieved on earth is still coldest!

After, finishing his lecture, he answered the questions posed by the audience. Finishing, the questionnaire, he again demonstrated the Levitron (levitating spinning top) experiment for the kids who were there. He began giving the autographs to everyone

Fig3. Dr.Phillips giving autographs.

Atlast, I found him free and approached him for the autograph, which he gave it to me. I had the autograph of a Nobel Laureate which, remained as a dream to me. It was my happiest moment.

Fig4. Autograph of Nobel Laureate Dr.William.D.Phillips. The camera of my phone is of bad quality.

I came out of the hall in the elevated mind.  I met Dr.C.V.Vishveshvara outside IIA, whose book Einstein's Enigma or Black Holes in My Bubble Bath, I had read. I enjoyed the book like anything. I said the same and he felt very happy. He gave his email id. I said that I will be in touch with him and took leave from him.

After, coming out of the highly intensified physics atmosphere of IIA, I dwelt in my own physics atmosphere. My mind became the coolest stuff of the universe when my thoughts strolled to Einstein’s theory, defying the time,

                                                                                                               By

                                                                                       Karumanchi Viswanatha Sarma

                                                                                                      30th Jan, 2010   

(Note:- Kindly forgive me if there are any technical mistakes in this article as I hardly know  physics)

External Links:

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1997/press.html

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1997/back.html