Blog

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Read all about it

My latest article has just been published! It’s called Emittance growth due to energy spread in a laser-driven proton beamline, and has been published in Results in Physics. It’s all about what happens to protons in an accelerator when they have a large energy spread, such as when accelerated by a powerful laser. I did lots of simulations and developed some mathematical relations between this energy spread and the growth in emittance of the proton beam, which we need to minimise in order to control the beam properly.

You can read the paper online for free!

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World Environment Day

World Environment Day website snapshot
Visit the World Environment Day website

Tomorrow is World Environment Day! A great opportunity to think about how we can play our part in overcoming the climate crisis.

Things you could do:

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Countdown to a better future

Today is the launch of the Countdown campaign to fight together against the climate emergency.

If you have the time today, please tune in to some or all of the launch event and find out how you can play your part in saving the planet from the crisis and fighting the injustice brought by climate change.

Continue reading “Countdown to a better future”
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Auto-dark mode in WordPress

screenshot

I’ve spent most of today moving my website to a new host, and while I was doing it I wanted to add a dark mode.

It took quite a lot of fiddling around, but now I’ve got the site to automatically switch between light and dark mode based on the OS mode. I use macOS, and it automatically switches to dark mode at night-time. Now my website switches along with it!

Continue reading “Auto-dark mode in WordPress”

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A simple message of love…

Sometimes it’s just the little things that say, “We love you!”

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Morn shall tearless be

O love, that wilt not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in Thee;
I give Thee back the life I owe,
That in Thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.

O Light, that followest all my way,
I yield my flickering torch to Thee;
My heart restores its borrowed ray,
That in Thy sunshine’s blaze its day
May brighter, fairer be.

O Joy, that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to Thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain
That morn shall tearless be.

O Cross, that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from Thee;
I lay in dust life’s glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be.


Lyrics: George Matheson (1842-1906)
Music: Albert Lister Peace (1844-1912)

哦，那不肯放我之爱，
我將疲魂安息於你；
我把所欠余生归来，
好使牠在你这深海，
得更丰满洋溢。

哦，那照耀我路之光，
我將残灯带来交你；
我心因得你光復亮，
牠的日子藉你太阳，
得更光明美丽。

哦，那苦中寻我之乐，
我心不能向你关闭；
我在雨中彩虹寻得，
知你应许不会空说，
天亮便无泪涕。

哦，那使我抬头十架，
我不敢求与你稍离；
今生虚荣死葬土下，
那土长出生命红花，
永远开放不已。

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Unspoken

This is a poem I wrote for Mum in 2003, when I was at university. People say, “You never know what you’ve got till it’s gone,” and I wanted Mum to know that I really appreciated all she was and all she did for us all, even though I couldn’t find the right words.

Mum talked to Dad before she died about what she wanted at her funeral, and she wanted me to read this poem. It will always be very special to me as an expression of our love for each other.

So much unspoken
So much to say
So many words
So much love
So much
Unspoken

Love that never changes
Care that never ends
Life given unconditionally
Unselfishly in love
So much love
So much
Unspoken

A lifetime is not enough to speak the words unspoken
Love knows no language but the heart
To say, ‘Thank you’ is too little
To leave it unsaid is not enough

I hope you know
I hope you understand
I hope you believe:

I love you

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My second research article

I’m very excited to announce that my second main research article from my post-doctoral research at Peking University has just been published in the Journal of Instrumentation!

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-0221/14/02/T02003/meta

This article is about simulating some of the complex interactions that go on between particles inside a high-intensity accelerator. Lots of simulations focus either on the accelerator physics of how the beam moves in the accelerator, or on the interactions between different particles in certain materials, but it’s hard to model both these parts together. The article describes the changes I made to a simulation code called Impact-T in order to try and understand what’s going on in these high-intensity beams.

Unfortunately, this journal is not open-access, so you’ll need a university subscription to read the full article. If you don’t have access and you want to know more, you can find some of the information in my latest conference paper.

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I published a new article!

I’m very excited to announce that my first article with me as “first author” has been published in Physical Review Accelerators and Beams!

https://journals.aps.org/prab/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevAccelBeams.21.122401

The article is about magnets to be used to control high-intensity beams inside some linear particle accelerators. We want to make these magnets as small as possible while still being as strong as possible, and on top of that the strength needs to be adjustable for different beams. This is quite a challenge!

We tested out two different methods for solving this problem: firstly, using smaller, fixed magnets inside the accelerator and using larger, external magnets to compensate; and secondly, coming up with some interesting new designs for compact adjustable permanent magnets.

The article is open access, so anyone can read it!