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Function through form in soft matter: The influence of bounded geometries in heated gels and fluctuating proteins
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2017-07-31)
The ability to control the behavior of a material through the prescription of spatial inhomogeneity is of increasing interest in condensed matter physics. Examples of materials such as auxetic metamaterials, which widen ...
Fish robotics: understanding the diversity of fish locomotion using mechanical devices
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2012-02-21)
There are over 28,000 species of fishes, and a key feature of this remarkable evolutionary diversity is a great variety of propulsive systems used by fishes for maneuvering in the aquatic environment. Fishes have numerous ...
Dark matter, and how we would not be alive without it
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2012-08-30)
Most of the mass in the Universe is of some unknown form of matter. While we have some guesses what it might be we are not sure. In this talk for a non-specialist audience, Professor Abel will explain how observations using ...
Celebration of 2018 Physics Nobel Prize: Lighting the way with microscopic tractor beams and sculpted laser pulse
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2018-10-23)
The 2018 Nobel Prize in Physics recognizes two breakthrough inventions in laser physics. The first, optical tweezers, allows scientist and engineers to use lasers like the tractor beams of Star Trek to manipulate everything ...
The Origin of the Universe and the Arrow of Time
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2016-04-11)
One of the most obvious facts about the universe is that the past is different from the future. We can remember yesterday, but not tomorrow; we can turn an egg into an omelet, but can't turn an omelet into an egg. That's ...
Statistical mechanics of the phase transition to turbulence: zonal flows, ecological collapse and extreme value statistics
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2016-04-21)
How do fluids become turbulent as their flow velocity is increased? In recent years, careful experiments in pipes and Taylor-Couette systems have revealed that the lifetime of transient turbulent regions in a fluid appears ...
The Science Behind Animal-Inspired Robotics
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2014-11-10)
The 21st Century has seen an explosion of bio-inspired technology and devices. Perhaps no where has this approach been more transformative than in the field of mobile robotics. Geckos, snakes, and even cockroaches have ...
Will Evolution and Information Theory Provide The Fundamentals Of Physics?
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2018-02-26)
This presentation will describe an arc in the mathematical/theoretical physics research of the presenter that has traversed concept spaces from equations, to graphical imagery, to coding theory error-correction, and pointing ...
Aeons Before the Big Bang?
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2009-03-24)
There is much impressive observational evidence, mainly from the cosmic microwave background (CMB), for an enormously hot and dense early stage of the universe referred to as the Big Bang. Observations of the CMB are now ...
Emergent collective phenomena in V. Cholerae biofilms, mixed human-autonomous fleets, and nascently multicellular bodies
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2019-11-07)
Here I focus on the physics of the evolution of multicellularity and division of labor, the cyberphysical risks of hacked internet connected vehicles, and diffusive motion that arises from cell reproduction and lysis (cell ...