Postgraduate Opportunities

Postgraduates students are welcome to join our on-going research project:

• Turbulence in superfluid ⁴He in the T=0 limit

For formal applications, check http://www.physics.manchester.ac.uk/postgraduate/index.html

For informal inquiries, write to Andrei Golov at [email protected]

Keywords

• condensed matter physics
• liquid helium
• low temperature
• quantized vortex
• quantum fluid
• quantum solid
• quantum turbulence
• superfluid helium
• topological defect

Qualifications

MSc (1983) Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, Department of General and Applied Physics 

PhD (1989)  Institute of Solid State Physics, Russian Academy of Sciences, Chernogolovka, Moscow

Research Groups

• Condensed Matter Physics

Education:

· Kolmogorov Special Boarding School for Physics and Mathematics at Moscow State University, Sept. 1975 - June 1977.

· Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, Department of General and Applied Physics (Master Degree in Solid State Physics), Sept. 1977 - June 1983.

Previous employment and appointments held:

· Research Associate, Institute of Solid State Physics, Russian Acad. Sci., 1989 – 1996;

· Alexander von Humboldt Fellow, Bayreuth University, Germany, 1992 – 1994;

· Visiting Professor/Research Fellow, ISSP, University of Tokyo, Japan, 1995 – 1996.

· Research Associate, LASSP, Cornell University, USA, 1996 – 1998;

· Lecturer in Low Temperature Physics, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Manchester, 1998 – 2004.

· Senior Lecturer in Low Temperature Physics, School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Manchester, 2004 - 2005.

· Reader in Low Temperature Physics, School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Manchester, 2005 - 2009.

Present appointment:

  Professor of Condensed Matter Physics, School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Manchester, 1/08/2009 - present.

Visiting appointments/secondments during employment with the University of Manchester:

· Visiting Fellow (sabbatical leave), Helsinki University of Technology, Finland, 2006 - 2007. 

· Invited Professor, Joseph Fourier University, Grenoble, France, 2009.

My main interests are in superfluid ³He and ⁴He, which include: quantized vortices and other topological defects, quantum turbulence.

I study quantum fluids, i.e. liquids at sufficiently low temperatures so that quantum properties of particles forming the liquid prevail (for example, the behaviour of fermions is markedly different from that of bosons at these temperatures). Liquid helium is a pure and simple liquid, yet at low temperatures it can show a great variety of new properties and orders. Some of these properties are similar to those of another available quantum fluid - electrons in metals.

There are two isotopes of helium: ⁴He (boson) and ³He (fermion). Owing to quantum effects they remain liquid to absolute zero. Both liquids show the phenomemon of superfluidity (fluid flow without viscosity) at sufficiently low temperatures (2 K and 2 mK respectively) but often in very different ways. They are excellent systems for testing our understanding of the quantum behaviour of condensed matter from first principles. Liquid ³He is the purest substance available for study and whilst being the simplest Fermi superfluid known it exhibits a wide array of interesting phenomena which result directly from the various symmetries which are spontaneously broken when its different superfluid states form.

Currently, our main interest is in the properties of turbulent superfluid ⁴He ("quantum turbulence") in the limit of zero temperature (i.e. when thermal excitations, "normal component", become irrelevant). The dynamics of tangles of vortex lines, especially their wavy behaviour and reconnections, is at the heart of this.

Very recently, we also investigated properties of mobile dislocations in solid helium at temperatures below 100mK.

I am the head of the Low Temperature Physics Group. To learn more about our research, check http://www.condmat.physics.manchester.ac.uk/researchthemes/quantumfluids/ and links from there.