The University of Southampton is marking the 2015 International Year of Light by taking part in a new project to help people and businesses throughout Europe understand the importance of photonics, the science of light.

Photonics plays a crucial role in many global industries such as lighting, telecommunications, medicine and manufacturing. We rely on lightbulbs and LEDs in our homes, while lasers enable us to talk on the phone and use the Internet. In industry, lasers cut and mark the most delicate and strongest of materials with precision and power, and lasers and optics are widely used in surgeries and medical imaging applications.

The two-year Photonics4All outreach project, funded by the European Commission, will involve 10 partners from nine European countries, including Physics and Astronomy and the Optoelectronics Research Centre (ORC) at the University of Southampton. It aims to raise awareness of the importance of photonics and make it accessible to the general public, students, young people, business and industry through a variety of activities and events including business innovation workshops, start-up challenges and a ‘Photonics Science Slam’. For young people and students, there will be a photonics quiz, a photonics app, business boot camps and a Schools Photonics Day aimed at promoting the study of Physics and Optics.

Pearl John, Public Engagement Leader for Physics and Astronomy at the University of Southampton, says: “It’s very exciting to be working on this innovative project and to be able to learn from partners throughout Europe. I am particularly interested in promoting women in photonics and it’s great to play such an important role in getting the message out across the EU to ensure that we really are promoting Photonics4All.

“In Southampton, the University will be collaborating with the South East Photonics Network (SEPNET) which aims to address the skills shortage in the photonics industry in the region. We will be offering schools and colleges opportunities to take part in hands-on photonics activities to teach pupils about the crucial role photonics plays in everyday life and inspire them to study it further We will also encourage our University students to consider ways in which they can use photonics in business.â€?

Pearl adds: “We aim to increase awareness of the local photonics industries, help leverage our collective knowledge and uncover more photonics applications making it easier for organisations to develop new products and access this key enabling technology.â€?

Scientists from Physical Sciences and Engineering (FPSE) at the University of Southampton are heading out to the local pubs to present their latest pioneering research as part of the Pint of Science Festival.

Researchers from Physics and Astronomy and the Optoelectronics Research Centre (ORC) will be hoping to interest local people in their fascinating discoveries when they give talks in their local watering holes later this month (May).

The annual Pint of Science Festival was launched three years ago and takes place in pubs around the globe. This year's festival runs from May 18-20 and brings some of the most brilliant scientists to venues across the UK to discuss their research and findings with members of the public in an accessible format - in the pub.

Southampton scientists will be hoping to intrigue people with a wide range of talks from Could We Really Survive a Mission to Mars, Adventures in the Outer Solar System, and Mum, Why's the Internet So Slow?

Michael Butler FPSE Associate Dean for Enterprise and Impact said: "We are delighted to support Pint of Science as it comes to Southampton for the first time. As researchers we feel it is vital to communicate with the public about the innovative work we are doing and how this can impact on our society and our world. What better and more accessible place to do that than in the pub.

“We hope that many people will come to the events, find out more about the research we are doing here at Southampton, and gain an interest in the world of physics and astronomy and optoelectronics."

Physics PhD student and event coordinator Nathan Shammah added: “By taking science to the pub, we hope to break down barriers and remove some of the mystery surrounding scientific research. Pint of Science is not a series of dull lectures but a chance to meet the real face of science, ask questions and have lots of fun!â€?

The following Atoms to Galaxies talks are due to take place at The Avondale House pub, Carlton Crescent, Southampton:

Monday May 18 The Coolest Stuff in the Universe – Dr Matt Himsworth When Light Meets Matter: A New Quantum Particle Unveiled – Dr Simone de Liberato The Sound of Quantum Music – Martin Fogel

Tuesday May 19 Nonlinear Light: From Missile Defence to Quantum Computers – Professor Peter Smith Mum, Why's the Internet So Slow? – Dr Francesca Parmigiani

Wednesday May 20 Adventures in the Outer Solar System – Dr Caitriona Jackman Could We Really Survive a Mission to Mars? – Dr Angelo N Grubisic

There are a wide range of other science talks happening across Southampton as part of Pint of Science, including The Beautiful Mind, Our Body and Planet Earth.

An award-winning Physics and Astronomy field trip is celebrating its silver anniversary this year.

The innovative Tenerife Field Trip was first launched in 1990 and 25 years later more than 300 students have benefited from its pioneering challenges.

The idea for the collaboration between the University of Southampton and the University of La Laguna (ULL), in Tenerife, started out as a casual conversation over a cup of coffee at an astronomy conference in 1988. But just two years later students from Southampton embarked on the first of many field trips to the island.

The hands-on astrophysics trip makes use of the world-class observing facilities at the Observatario del Teide, and sees students from Southampton and Tenerife working together in international teams to solve project goals.

Professor Malcom Coe, Astronomy Programme Coordinator, said: “We are delighted to be celebrating this milestone in the history of the Tenerife Field Trip. Over the years hundreds of students have benefited from the experiences this trip brings. Together with students from Tenerife they work to severe time constraints to solve a variety of challenges under some of the clearest night skies in Europe.

“Despite spending the week at altitude, working 12-hour nights, and often enduring freezing conditions, our students constantly rate this as the most rewarding experience of their undergraduate degree.â€?

The trip was originally funded under the European Union Erasmus programme and is the most successful course run by Physics and Astronomy in the last three decades. In 1994 it was recognised by the Partnership Trust and was awarded the Nuclear Electric Prize for Innovation in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education.

Physics and Astronomy at the University of Southampton has been recognised for its work in tackling the problem of gender inequality in science with an Athena SWAN Bronze Award.

The Athena SWAN Charter was set up in 2005 to acknowledge the commitment of the higher education sector in addressing gender inequalities, tackling the unequal representation of women in science and improving career progression for female academics.

Physics and Astronomy joins other departments across the University, including Electronics and Computer Science, to have received the award. The University has received the Athena SWAN Bronze Award since 2006.

The national achievement recognises the work Physics and Astronomy has done to address the gender imbalance in science subjects and ensures women are encouraged into an area that historically has been dominated by males.

The department is committed to advancing women in science, technology, engineering, maths and medicine and will continue to encourage more women to continue in higher education particularly in the fields of physics and astronomy.

The Athena SWAN Award was presented at a special ceremony at the University of Greenwich, in London, in June.

An international team of scientists, including University of Southampton Astronomer Dr Poshak Gandhi, have found evidence for a large population of hidden supermassive black holes in the Universe.

Using NASA’s Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) satellite observatory, the team detected the high-energy x-rays from five supermassive black holes previously clouded from direct view by dust and gas.

The research supports the theory that potentially millions more supermassive black holes exist in the Universe, but are hidden from view. The findings were presented today at the Royal Astronomical Society’s National Astronomy Meeting, at Venue Cymru, in Llandudno, Wales (Monday 6 July).

The scientists pointed NuSTAR at nine candidate hidden supermassive black holes, chosen by Dr Gandhi and the NuSTAR team, that were thought to be extremely active at the centre of galaxies, but where the full extent of this activity was potentially obscured from view.

High-energy x-rays found for five of the black holes confirmed that they had been hidden by dust and gas. The five were much brighter and more active than previously thought as they rapidly feasted on surrounding material and emitted large amounts of radiation.

Such observations were not possible before NuSTAR, which launched in 2012 and is able to detect much higher energy x-rays than previous satellite observatories. Dr Gandhi assisted the lead author George Lansbury, a postgraduate student at Durham University, with the data analysis.

Dr Gandhi said: “These results are important for understanding how galaxies themselves grow and evolve, because we know that black holes feed on galaxies and can profoundly stunt the development of stars. The black holes that we looked at are cocooned within nests of interstellar gas and dust. The nests are their food, but also hide them from our sight. However, just like we can peer inside our chests with an X-ray machine, here we were able to look into the hearts of these supermassive black holes with the X-ray telescope NuSTAR, which is enabling us to peer deeper than ever before.â€?

The research was funded by the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) and has been accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal.

A team of radio astronomers, including Sam Connolly from the University of Southampton, are watching a previously dormant black hole wake up in a dramatic display as material falls on to it for the first time for perhaps millions of years.

Almost every galaxy, including our own, appears to have a black hole at its core. Most of the time these are quiet, with just their invisible gravitational pull shaping their surroundings. But in about 10 per cent of galaxies the central black hole is much more active, swallowing material and spitting out giant jets.

The new study, which is being presented at the National Astronomy Meeting in Llandudno, Wales, shows, for the first time, convincing evidence of the onset, the ‘switching on’ of this active phase, in a black hole at the centre of the galaxy NGC 660 - 42 million light years away in the constellation of Pisces.

In 2012, astronomers noticed that NGC 660 had suddenly become hundreds of times brighter over just a few months. Normal galaxies do not change their brightness very quickly as they are very large systems made of many (relatively) small individual components in the form of stars, gas and dust.

Over the last three years, a team of scientists led by Dr Megan Argo of the Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics, has been trawling through archived results from ground- and space-based telescopes. They then used data from three radio observatories: the UK’s e-MERLIN telescope operated from Jodrell Bank, the Westerbork array in the Netherlands and the European VLBI network (EVN), which also includes telescopes in Russia, China and South Africa, that was combined to simulate a much larger instrument – a technique known as interferometry.

Sam’s contribution was to use x-ray astronomy to check the brightness of the source before and after the radio brightening, which helped to rule out potential reasons for the brightening and come to the conclusion that it is most likely to be a newly-awoken supermassive black hole.

Sam says: “As supermassive black holes are so huge, they evolve very slowly, remaining dormant for thousands of years at a time, so to catch one waking up is really incredible.â€?

The new images reveal a new, very bright radio source in the very centre of NGC 660, right where the researchers expect to find the central supermassive black hole.

Inactive black holes do not emit large amounts of radiation, so they can only be detected by their gravitational effect on the orbits of stars around them. However, the black hole in NGC 660 is now very obvious, and is many hundreds of times brighter than anything seen in the centre of NGC 660 in the archive of radio images before 2010.

The parallel results from e-MERLIN show that the object is slowly fading, and is similar to other galaxies with more mature systems, and the highest resolution images from the EVN show evidence of a high-speed jet of material leaving the vicinity of the black hole.

Material (gas, dust and stars) near a black hole can sit in stable orbits around the central massive object for a long time, but eventually it loses energy, spirals in, and falls onto the black hole. At the same time, some material is ejected and this seems to have created the outburst and jet now seen in NGC 660.

Studying the jet will give astronomers a clue about the initial eruption of the jet, and how much material fell onto the black hole to cause the outburst in the first place.

Physics and Astronomy at the University of Southampton is playing a leading role in organising a new conference that will tackle the many challenges faced by scientists when studying astrophysical phenomenon simultaneously with multiple observatories.

The Paving the Way to Simultaneous Multi-wavelength Astronomy conference will explore this new concept that is becoming increasingly important in the field of astronomy.

Organiser Dr Poshak Gandhi, Science and Technology Facilities Council Ernest Rutherford Fellow at the University, said: “Astronomers have realised that many phenomena such as black hole accretion and outflows, supernovae, and gamma ray bursts require us to study the entire electromagnetic spectrum at the same time in order to understand the underlying physics. However, there are numerous challenges in carrying out observations simultaneously across multiple facilities globally and in space. So far there has been little coordinated effort to tackle the logistical difficulties involved and this conference is a first step in the right direction.â€?

The conference is being held at the Lorentz Centre, in Leiden, Netherlands, from July 13 to 17, and already top-level directors and high-ranking staff from many observatories have signed up.

Poshak added: “The aim of the conference is to obtain a complete understanding of the processes driving multi-wavelength emissions from rapidly varying objects. This demands new approaches and the ability to observe across wavebands simultaneously.

“We hope to develop strategies that can answer such demands and will lay the groundwork for major advances in our understanding of transient and rapidly varying phenomena. This meeting is about uniting the global multi-wavelength astronomy community, based upon the realisation that what we can achieve through coordinated actions is much greater than the sum of our individual efforts.â€?

The meeting’s other core organisers are Dr Matthew Middleton (Cambridge) and Dr Piergiorgio Casella (INAF-Rome).

Physics and Astronomy students celebrated their achievements at a special Graduation Ceremony at the University of Southampton.

127 students graduated in the physics ceremony at the Nuffield Theatre, which recognised their hard work and effort in passing their degree programmes.

Families and friends gathered to watch them be presented with their awards before attending a reception in Garden Court.

Admissions Tutor, Professor Jonathan Flynn, said: “Graduation is a time for us to celebrate our students' achievements and recognise a significant transition in their lives. We wish all of our students well as they embark on their future careers or further studies.â€?

Four students were singled out for special recognition during their time at Southampton and received a certificate and £50 prize money from Professor Tim Morris, Third Year Director of Studies. The winners were:

• Peter Boorman – Most outstanding performance on the Master of Physics Degree • Joel Collins – Best Master of Physics project • Ali Farzaneh Far – Best project by a year abroad/final year research finalist • Imogen Scott – Best performance on the BSc Hons Degree and Best BSc Physics project

Joel said: “I didn’t expect this at all. It is amazing and really nice to have recognition for my work.â€?

Peter added: “I can’t believe I’ve won the award, but it’s a great way to finish my degree.â€?

Peter Boorman’s family were particularly proud as both his parents and his older brother have all graduated from Southampton with Master of Physics degrees and PhDs.

Peter’s father, Chris Boorman enthused: “This is a culmination of all the hard work Peter has put in over the four years. Winning the award for the most outstanding performance is such a great achievement, we are so proud.â€?

The University of Southampton has joined with Elks-Smith Landscape & Garden Design to create a spectacular ‘Garden of Light’ for the RHS Tatton Flower Show in Cheshire (22-26 July) in celebration of the United Nations International Year of Light.

News update - The garden has won a gold award in the Year of Light Garden category in recognition of the high-standard of the garden brief, design and build.

The Optoelectronics Research Centre (ORC) and Physics and Astronomy at the University have collaborated with BALI Design Excellence award-winning garden designer Helen Elks-Smith to design a garden that takes visitors on a journey into the world of light-based technology, known as photonics and its foremost communications channel, fibre optics.

Drawing parallels with nature, the garden shows how fibre optics, which transmit light over huge distances, are bundled together to form fibre optic cables capable of transferring vast qualities of data. These cables, which circle the globe in the ground and under the sea, form the backbone of the Internet and provide the high-speed telecommunications we take for granted today. Fibre optics are also used in cutting edge manufacturing research and when used with lasers focus light powerfully and with great precision.

The garden’s pavilion roof reflects a ‘holey fibre’ structure, a new type of optical fibre which allows light to travel faster over longer distances. Set into the pavilion floor are fibre optic glass ‘drops’, created as part of the fibre fabrication process. These and the wave-form in the path through the garden are a metaphor for how light reflects along the fibres.

The perspex rods within the landform represent the fibre ‘preforms’ which may be considered in this context as the ‘seeds’ of the optical fibre. During fibre fabrication, the preforms are ‘grown’ as they are heated and drawn out into the lengths of optical fibre - often thinner than a human hair. The finished fibres transmit data in the form of digital light pulses.

The garden highlights the advances in optical fibre research pioneered by the ORC. The incredible growth in Internet usage has been made possible by the ORC’s revolutionary developments in fibre optics technology. Scientists at the ORC invented the key optical fibre technology which forms the Internet as well as the erbium doped fibre amplifier (EDFA). It is this device in particular, the world’s first practical optical amplifier, which enables light to travel further and faster in fibre optic cables.

Deanna Standen, from the ORC, said: “Significantly the optical fibres that form the infrastructure of the Internet and the fibre amplifiers that power it, may be likened to the incredible symbiotic relationship of roots and fungi that our world would be barren without. Many of the fibres fabricated at the ORC have uncommonly similar structure to many plant stems, seeds and other organic matter that nourish our planet.â€?

Garden designer Helen Elks-Smith said: “I am delighted to be working with the University of Southampton’s ORC and for the support of the EPSRC Centre for Innovative Manufacturing in Photonics to help raise public awareness of its ground breaking photonics research at RHS Tatton; it’s such a good opportunity for public engagement.â€?

Scientists from the University’s public engagement and outreach programmes will be demonstrating in the garden on Wednesday 22 and Thursday 23 July during the show. Visit the garden and learn first-hand about this fascinating technology in a beautiful setting.

Southampton Physics and Astronomy students joined other PhD students from across the region in a challenging three-day GRADnet Summer School at IBM, Hursley.

Six Southampton students attended the residential which saw them exploring the skills required to become the research leaders of the future.

During the course, which was organised by the South East Physics Network (SEPnet), the 35 delegates were introduced to the concept of leadership from a variety of viewpoints and had to work together as a team on a series of challenges.

They also got the opportunity to explore the technological, societal, economic and political impact of physics and physicists, and discussed examples of how physics has made an impact on the world.

The students said they had enjoyed the Summer School and found the tasks challenging and valuable, while the staff leading some of the projects said they were impressed with the students and what they were able to achieve in the time available.

Southampton PhD student Paul Gow said: “I enjoyed the course. I found the exercise in managing data extremely useful as it gave me great ideas for presenting results in clear and fun ways, perfect for public engagement. Building a trebouchet was also a great chance to use my physics skills to launch an egg!â€?