SLAC scientists win $2.5 million awards from U.S. Department of Energy
BY STEPHANIE LIOU
Two scientists at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have received $2.5 million awards given to the most promising researchers in the early stages of their careers.
Markus Guehr, a senior staff scientist and leader of the Ultrafast Electron Dynamics group in the PULSE Institute, and Faya Wang, an associate staff scientist at SLAC's Accelerator Design Department, were given the awards by the U.S. Department of Energy.
This is the second year that the DOE has given Early Career Research Awards, which will be disbursed over the next five years.
In total, 69 winners were chosen from a nationwide pool of more than 1,150 untenured professors and DOE national laboratory scientists who received their doctoral degrees within the last 10 years.
Guehr's research will focus on valence electron distribution and electron interactions with nuclei using extreme ultraviolet (UV) and soft X‐ray time-resolved spectroscopy.
He will set up his own laboratory to use high harmonic generation, which provides short-wavelength pulses of light, to map electron movement during chemical reactions. Guehr is also using soft X-rays at the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) to investigate a phenomenon known as photoprotection of DNA.
"Nucleotide bases [of DNA] absorb UV light very strongly," said Guehr. "But DNA doesn't get destroyed, and we want to find out why."
Wang's proposal aims to improve linear accelerator design by identifying the individual roles of different factors that cause radio frequency (RF) breakdown at high acceleration gradients. To do so, Wang is constructing a special RF cavity that allows for precise control of the three factors: electric fields, magnetic fields and pulsed heating.
"Better understanding of the associated physics and generation of breakdown can lead to significant cost saving for future high gradient accelerator applications," he said. This could have far-reaching implications for scientific, medical and industrial research.
Stephanie Liou is an intern at the Stanford News Service.
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