Date: Saturday 23-Sep-2017
Time: 10:00-12:00 pm
Location: Physics Lecture Hall 1410, Physics Building
Speaker: William D. Phillips (UMD Physics)
Title: Time, Einstein and the coolest stuff in the universe
At the beginning of the 20th century Einstein changed the way we think about Time.
Now, at the beginning of the 21st century, the measurement of Time is being revolutionized by the ability to cool a gas of atoms to temperatures billions of times lower than anything else in the universe. Atomic clocks, the best timekeepers ever made, are one of the scientific and technological wonders of modern life. Such super-accurate clocks are essential to industry, commerce, and science; they are the heart of the Global Positioning System (GPS), which guides cars, airplanes, and hikers to their destinations.
Today, the best primary atomic clocks use ultracold atoms, achieve accuracies better than a second in 300 million years, and are getting better all the time. Super-cold atoms, with temperatures that can be below a billionth of a degree above absolute zero, use, and allow tests of, some of Einstein's strangest predictions.
This will be a lively, multimedia presentation, including experimental demonstrations and down-to-earth explanations about some of today's most exciting science.
