Charles Hard Townes, a professor emeritus of physics at the University of California, Berkeley, who shared the 1964 Nobel Prize in Physics for invention of the laser and subsequently pioneered the use of lasers in astronomy, died at the age of 99 on January 27, 2015. This video was produced on the occasion of his 99th birthday on July 28, 2014. Series: "UC Berkeley News" [Science] [Show ID: 29299]

Celebrating Nobel Prize Laser Inventor Charles Townes

Guest speakers, researchers and University of California faculty explore physics to better understand  and predict the world around us.

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Nobel Laureate and physicist Barry Barish, professor at UC Riverside, reflects on his life in science, being curious, experiencing imposter syndrome, and working in the field of physics with Brian Keating, host of the "Into the Impossible" podcast and professor of physics at UC San Diego.   [Humanities] [Science] [Show ID: 38727]

What It Means To Be Curious With Nobel Laureate Barry Barish

Carver Mead is a pioneer of modern microelectronics. He proposed a new methodology, very large-scale integration (VLSI), that would make it possible for creating millions or billions of transistors on a single integrated circuit (microchip). His research investigated techniques for VLSI, designing and creating high-complexity microchips. This design process has advanced electronic technologies and transformed the lives of most of the people inhabiting our planet. Mead also paved the way to VLSI design automation and facilitating the revolutionary development of today's VLSI-based electronics and industry. For his work and contributions, Mead was awarded the 2022 Kyoto Prize in Advanced Technology. In his talk entitled, "Engineering Concepts Clarify Physical Law" Mead will discuss a simplified theory that might serve as an entry point for further development by generations of young people who feel disenfranchised by the existing establishment. Series: "Computer Science Channel" [Science] [Show ID: 38572]

Carver Mead - 2022 Kyoto Prize Laureate in Advanced Technology: Engineering Concepts Clarify Physical Law

The American Physical Society has designated UC San Diego’s Mayer Hall as a historic site in recognition of research conducted by physicists Walter Kohn and Lu Jeu Sham on density functional theory. Their development of the "Kohn-Sham equation" inside Mayer Hall became the foundation for the computation of the material properties of electrons and nuclei. Understanding the electronic properties of complex systems is essential to the design and engineering of new materials and drugs. Kohn and Pierre Hohenberg on sabbatical in Paris developed a theorem for the electron ground state energy to depend on the electron density distribution instead of the usual potential energy due to the nuclei. In Building C (later named Mayer Hall), from 1964-66, Kohn and Sham laid the foundation of a computation method, based on a single-particle equation composed of its quantum kinetic energy and the potential energy including the interaction effects. [Science] [Show ID: 38313]

Honoring the Historic Contributions of Mayer Hall to the Field of Physics

The International System of Units (the SI), the modern metric system, has recently undergone its most revolutionary change since its origins during the French Revolution. The nature of this revolution is that all of the base units of the SI are now defined by fixing values of natural constants. Our measurement system is now, both philosophically and practically, strongly quantum.  Nobel Prize recipient William Phillips, Ph.D., a Distinguished University and College Park Professor of Physics at the University of Maryland, talks about why this reform was needed and how it is done. Series: "UC Berkeley Graduate Lectures" [Science] [Show ID: 37728]

A New Measure: The Revolutionary Quantum Reform of the Modern Metric System

At the beginning of the 20th century, Einstein changed the way we think about time.  Now, early in the 21st century, the measurement of time is being revolutionized by the ability to cool a gas of atoms to temperatures millions of times lower than any naturally occurring temperature in the universe.  Nobel Prize recipient William Phillips, Ph.D., a Distinguished University and College Park Professor of Physics at the University of Maryland, talks about laser cooling and ultracold atoms and how they relate to time.

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.   Series: "UC Berkeley Graduate Lectures" [Science] [Show ID: 37727]

Celebrating Nobel Prize Laser Inventor Charles Townes

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