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On Thursday 2nd February, as part of the 'Science Outside the Classroom' series of talks organised by Ms Dove, Professor Justin Wark from the Physics Department of Oxford University spoke to a packed upper library (about 80 students, mainly drawn from Yr 10 and 11) on the world's strongest lasers and what you can do with them.

 

Justin grew up in the Wycombe area, went to Worcester College, Oxford in 1979 gaining his BA in 1982 and then a PhD from Imperial College, London in 1985.  After great success in his postdoctoral research in the United States, he returned to the UK, and was appointed a University Lecturer in Physics by Oxford in 1995.  He is a fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, and in that position has taught a number of ex-RGS undergraduate physicists - the most recent being Matthew Watson who graduated with First Class Honours this year.  Justin was awarded his professorship in recognition of the world class standard of his research in 2000.  We were particularly lucky to have him with us, as he had only just had a paper published in Nature detailing particularly interesting results from an X-ray laser experiment at Stanford, US.

This was a ticketed event (tickets were free) and the 80 tickets available were in very heavy demand.  The presentation was informative and dynamic, the questions intelligent, and a good time was had by all.  Eight students were able to have a buffet lunch with Justin before the talk and enjoyed a discussion on a wide range of subjects from GCSEs to Special Relativity.