“What makes a good astronaut?” asks director Hannah Berryman in the opening scene of Spacewoman. It’s a question few can answer better than Eileen Collins. As the first woman to pilot and command a NASA Space Shuttle, her career was marked by historic milestones, extraordinary challenges and personal sacrifices. Collins looks down the lens of the camera and, as she pauses for thought, we cut to footage of her being suited up in astronaut gear for the third time. “I would say…a person who is not prone to panicking.”
In Spacewoman, Berryman crafts a thoughtful, emotionally resonant documentary that traces Collins’s life from a determined young girl in Elmira, New York, to a spaceflight pioneer.
The film’s strength lies in its compelling balance of personal narrative and technical achievement. Through intimate interviews with Collins, her family and former colleagues, alongside a wealth of archival footage, Spacewoman paints a vivid portrait of a woman whose journey was anything but straightforward. From growing up in a working-class family affected by her parents’ divorce and Hurricane Agnes’s destruction, to excelling in the male-dominated world of aviation and space exploration, Collins’s resilience shines through.
Berryman wisely centres the film on the four key missions that defined Collins’s time at NASA. While this approach necessitates a brisk overview of her early military career, it allows for an in-depth exploration of the stakes, risks and triumphs of spaceflight. Collins’s pioneering 1995 mission, STS-63, saw her pilot the Space Shuttle Discovery in the first rendezvous with the Russian space station Mir, a mission fraught with political and technical challenges. The archival footage from this and subsequent missions provides gripping, edge-of-your-seat moments that demonstrate both the precision and unpredictability of space travel.
Perhaps Spacewoman’s most affecting thread is its examination of how Collins’s career intersected with her family life. Her daughter, Bridget, born shortly after her first mission, offers a poignant perspective on growing up with a mother whose job carried life-threatening risks. In one of the film’s most emotionally charged scenes, Collins recounts explaining the Challenger disaster to a young Bridget. Despite her mother’s assurances that NASA had learned from the tragedy, the subsequent Columbia disaster two weeks later underscores the constant shadow of danger inherent in space exploration.
These deeply personal reflections elevate Spacewoman beyond a straightforward biographical documentary. Collins’s son Luke, though younger and less directly affected by his mother’s missions, also shares touching memories, offering a fuller picture of a family shaped by space exploration’s highs and lows. Berryman’s thoughtful editing intertwines these recollections with historic footage, making the stakes feel immediate and profoundly human.
The film’s tension peaks during Collins’s final mission, STS-114, the first “return to flight” after Columbia. As the mission teeters on the brink of disaster due to familiar technical issues, Berryman builds a heart-pounding narrative, even for viewers unfamiliar with the complexities of spaceflight. Without getting bogged down in technical jargon, she captures the intense pressure of a mission fraught with tension – for those on Earth, at least.
Berryman’s previous films include Miss World 1970: Beauty Queens and Bedlam and Banned, the Mary Whitehouse Story. In a recent episode of the Physics World Stories podcast, she told me that she was inspired to make the film after reading Collins’s autobiography Through the Glass Ceiling to the Stars. “It was so personal,” she said, “it took me into space and I thought maybe we could do that with the viewer.” Collins herself joined us for that podcast episode and I found her to be that same calm, centred, thoughtful person we see in the film and who NASA clearly very carefully chose to command such an important mission.
Spacewoman isn’t just about near-misses and peril. It also celebrates moments of wonder: Collins describing her first sunrise from space or recalling the chocolate shuttles she brought as gifts for the Mir cosmonauts. These light-hearted anecdotes reveal her deep appreciation for the unique experience of being an astronaut. On the podcast, I asked Collins what one lesson she would bring from space to life on Earth. After her customary moment’s pause for thought, she replied “Reading books about science fiction is very important.” She was a fan of science fiction in her younger years , which enabled her to dream of the future that she realized at NASA and in space. But, she told me, these days she also reads about real science of the future (she was deep into a book on artificial intelligence when we spoke) and history too. Looking back at Collins’s history in space certainly holds lessons for us all.
Berryman’s directorial focus ultimately circles back to a profound question: how much risk is acceptable in the pursuit of human progress? Spacewoman suggests that those committed to something greater than themselves are willing to risk everything. Collins’s career embodies this ethos, defined by an unshakeable resolve, even in the face of overwhelming odds.
In the film’s closing moments, we see Collins speaking to a wide-eyed girl at a book signing. The voiceover from interviews talks of the women slated to be instrumental in humanity’s return to the Moon and future missions to Mars. If there’s one thing I would change about the film, it’s that the final word is given to someone other than Collins. The message is a fitting summation of her life and legacy, but I would like to have seen it delivered with her understated confidence of someone who has lived it. It’s a quibble though in a compelling film that I would recommend to anyone with an interest in space travel or the human experience here on Earth.
When someone as accomplished as Collins says that you need to work hard and practise, practise, practise it has a gravitas few others can muster. After all, she spent 10 years practising to fly the Space Shuttle – and got to do it for real twice. We see Collins speak directly to the wide-eyed girl in a flight suit as she signs her book and, as she does so, you can feel the words really hit home precisely because of who says them: “Reach for the stars. Don’t give up. Keep trying because you can do it.”
Spacewoman is more than a tribute to a trailblazer; it’s a testament to human perseverance, curiosity and courage. In Collins’s story, Berryman finds a gripping, deeply personal narrative that will resonate with audiences across the planet.
Spacewoman premiered at DOC NYC in November 2024 and is scheduled for theatrical release in 2025. A Haviland Digital Film in association with Tigerlily Productions.
Watch this short video filmed at the APS March Meeting in 2024, where Mark Elo, chief marketing officer of Tabor Quantum Solutions, introduces the Echo-5Q, which he explains is an industry collaboration between FormFactor and Tabor Quantum Systems, using the QuantWare quantum processing unit (QPU).
Elo points out that it is an out-of-the-box solution, allowing customers to order a full-stack system, including the software, refrigeration, control electronics and the actual QPU. With the Echo-5, it gets delivered and installed, so that the customer can start doing quantum measurements immediately. He explains that the Echo-5Q is designed at a price and feature point that increases the accessibility for on-site quantum computing.
Brandon Boiko, senior applications engineer with FormFactor, describes the how FormFactor developed the dilution refrigeration technology that the qubits get installed into. Boiko explains that the product has been designed to reduce the cost of entry into the quantum field – made accessible through FormFactor’s test-and- measurement programme, which allows people to bring their samples on site to take measurements.
Alessandro Bruno is founder and CEO of QuantWare, which provides the quantum processor for the Echo-5Q, the part that sits at the milli Kelvin stage of the dilution refrigerator, and that hosts five qubits. Bruno hopes that the Echo-5Q will democratize access to quantum devices – for education, academic research and start-ups.
Researchers at the University of Chicago’s Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering have created a groundbreaking hydrogel that doubles as a semiconductor. The material combines the soft, flexible properties of biological tissues with the electronic capabilities of semiconductors, making it ideal for advanced medical devices.
In a study published in Science, the research team, led by Sihong Wang, developed a stretchy, jelly-like material that provides the robust semiconducting properties necessary for use in devices such as pacemakers, biosensors and drug delivery systems.
Rethinking hydrogel design
Hydrogels are ideal for many biomedical applications because they are soft, flexible and water-absorbent – just like human tissues. Material scientists, long recognizing the vast potential of hydrogels, have pushed the boundaries of this class of material. One way is to create hydrogels with semiconducting abilities that can be useful for transmitting information between living tissues and bioelectronic device interfaces – in other words, a hydrogel semiconductor.
Imparting semiconducting properties to hydrogels is no easy task, however. Semiconductors, while known for their remarkable electronic properties, are typically rigid, brittle and water-repellent, making them inherently incompatible with hydrogels. By overcoming this fundamental mismatch, Wang and his team have created a material that could revolutionize the way medical devices interface with the human body.
Traditional hydrogels are made by dissolving hydrogel precursors (monomers or polymers) in water and adding chemicals to crosslink the polymers and form a water-swelled state. Since most polymers are inherently insulating, creating a hydrogel with semiconducting properties requires a special class of semiconducting polymers. The challenges do not stop there, however. These polymers typically only dissolve in organic solvents, not in water.
“The question becomes how to achieve a well-dispersed distribution of these semiconducting materials within a hydrogel matrix,” says first author Yahao Dai, a PhD student in the Wang lab. “This isn’t just about randomly dispersing particles into the matrix. To achieve strong electrical performance, a 3D interconnected network is essential for effective charge transport. So, the fundamental question is: how do you build a hydrophobic, 3D interconnected network within the hydrogel matrix?”
Innovative material Sihong Wang (left), Yahao Dai (right) and colleagues have developed a novel hydrogel with semiconducting properties. (Courtesy: UChicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering/John Zich)
To address this challenge, the researchers first dissolved the polymer in an organic solvent that is miscible with water, forming an organogel – a gel-like material composed of an organic liquid phase in a 3D gel network. They then immersed the organogel in water and allowed the water to gradually replace the organic solvent, transforming it into a hydrogel.
The researchers point out that this versatile solvent exchange process can be adapted to a variety of semiconducting polymers, opening up new possibilities for hydrogel semiconductors with diverse applications.
A two-in-one material
The result is a hydrogel semiconductor material that’s soft enough to match the feel of human tissue. With a Young’s modulus as low as 81 kPa – comparable to that of jelly – and the ability to stretch up to 150% of its original length, this material mimics the flexibility and softness of living tissue. These tissue-like characteristics allow the material to seamlessly interface with the human body, reducing the inflammation and immune responses that are often triggered by rigid medical implants.
The material also has a high charge carrier mobility, a measure of its ability to efficiently transmit electrical signals, of up to 1.4 cm2/V/s. This makes it suitable for biomedical devices that require effective semiconducting performance.
The potential applications extend beyond implanted devices. The material’s high hydration and porosity enable efficient volumetric biosensing and mass transport throughout the entire thickness of the semiconducting layer, which is useful for biosensing, tissue engineering and drug delivery applications. The hydrogel also responds to light effectively, opening up possibilities for light-controlled therapies, such as light-activated wireless pacemakers or wound dressings that use heat to accelerate healing.
A vision for transforming healthcare
The research team’s hydrogel material is now patented and being commercialized through UChicago’s Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. “Our goal is to further develop this material system and enhance its performance and application space,” says Dai. While the immediate focus is on enhancing the electrical and light modulation properties of the hydrogel, the team envisions future work in biochemical sensing.
“An important consideration is how to functionalize various bioreceptors within the hydrogel semiconductor,” explains Dai. “As each biomarker requires a specific bioreceptor, the goal is to target as many biomarkers as possible.”
The team is already exploring new methods to incorporate bioreceptors, such as antibodies and aptamers, within the hydrogels. With these advances, this class of semiconductor hydrogels could act as next-generation interfaces between human tissues and bioelectronic devices, from sensors to tailored drug-delivery systems. This breakthrough material may soon bridge the gap between living systems and electronics in ways once thought impossible.
Journal of Reliability Science and Engineering (Courtesy: IOP Publishing)
As our world becomes ever more dependent on technology, an important question emerges: how much can we truly rely on that technology? To help researchers explore this question, IOP Publishing (which publishes Physics World) is launching a new peer-reviewed, open-access publication called Journal of Reliability Science and Engineering (JRSE). The journal will operate in partnership with the Institute of Systems Engineering (part of the China Academy of Engineering Physics) and will benefit from the editorial and commissioning support of the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Hunan University and the Beijing Institute of Structure and Environment Engineering.
“Today’s society relies much on sophisticated engineering systems to manufacture products and deliver services,” says JRSE’s co-editor-in-chief, Mingjian Zuo, a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Alberta, Canada. “Such systems include power plants, vehicles, transportation and manufacturing. The safe, reliable and economical operation of all these requires the continuing advancement of reliability science and engineering.”
Defining reliability
The reliability of an object is commonly defined as the probability that it will perform its intended function adequately for a specified period of time. “The object in question may be a human being, product, system, or process,” Zuo explains. “Depending on its nature, corresponding sub-disciplines are human-, material-, structural-, equipment-, software- and system reliability.”
Key concepts in reliability science include failure modes, failure rates and reliability function and coherency, as well as measurements such as mean time-to-failure, mean time between failures, availability and maintainability. “Failure modes can be caused by effects like corrosion, cracking, creep, fracture, fatigue, delamination and oxidation,” Zuo explains.
To analyse such effects, researchers may use approaches such as fault tree analysis (FTA); failure modes, effects and criticality analysis (FMECA); and binary decomposition, he adds. These and many other techniques lie within the scope of JRSE, which aims to publish high-quality research on all aspects of reliability. This could, for example, include studies of failure modes and damage propagation as well as techniques for managing them and related risks through optimal design and reliability-centred maintenance.
A focus on extreme environments
To give the journal structure, Zuo and his colleagues identified six major topics: reliability theories and methods; physics of failure and degradation; reliability testing and simulation; prognostics and health management; reliability engineering applications; and emerging topics in reliability-related fields.
JRSE’s co-editor-in-chief, Mingjian Zuo, a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Alberta, Canada. (Courtesy: IOP Publishing)
As well as regular issues published four times a year, JRSE will also produce special issues. A special issue on system reliability and safety in varying and extreme environments, for example, focuses on reliability and safety methods, physical/mathematical and data-driven models, reliability testing, system lifetime prediction and performance evaluation. Intelligent operation and maintenance of complex systems in varying and extreme environments are also covered.
Interest in extreme environments was one of the factors driving the journal’s development, Zuo says, due to the increasing need for modern engineering systems to operate reliably in highly demanding conditions. As examples, he cites wind farms being built further offshore; faster trains; and autonomous systems such as drones, driverless vehicles and social robots that must respond quickly and safely to ever-changing surroundings in close proximity to humans.
“As a society, we are setting ever higher requirements on critical systems such as the power grid and Internet, water distribution and transport networks,” he says. “All of these demand further advances in reliability science and engineering to develop tools for the design, manufacture and operation as well as the maintenance of today’s sophisticated engineering systems.”
The go-to platform for researchers and industrialists alike
Another factor behind the journal’s launch is that previously, there were no international journals focusing on reliability research by Chinese organizations. Since the discipline’s leaders include several such organizations, Zuo says the lack of international visibility has seriously limited scientific exchange and promotion of reliability research between China and the global community. He hopes the new journal will remedy this. “Notable features of the journal include gold open access (thanks to our partnership with IOP Publishing, a learned-society publisher that does not have shareholders) and a fast review process,” he says.
In general, the number of academic journals focusing on reliability science and engineering is limited, he adds. “JRSE will play a significant role in promoting the advances in reliability research by disseminating cutting-edge scientific discoveries and creative reliability assurance applications in a timely way.
“We are aiming that the journal will become the go-to platform for reliability researchers and industrialists alike.”
The first issue of JRSE will be published in March 2025, and its editors welcome submissions of original research reports as well as review papers co-authored by experts. “There will also be space for perspectives, comments, replies, and news insightful to the reliability community,” says Zuo. In the future, the journal plans to sponsor reliability-related academic forums and international conferences.
With over 100 experts from around the world on its editorial board, Zuo describes JRSE as scientist-led, internationally-focused and highly interdisciplinary. “Reliability is a critical measure of performance of all engineering systems used in every corner of our society,” he says. “This journal will therefore be of interest to disciplines such as mechanical-, electrical-, chemical-, mining- and aerospace engineering as well as the mathematical and life sciences.”
Learn about the surge of landslide activity in California's Palos Verdes Peninsula as measured by NASA, showing the effects of climate change and intensifying precipitation.
Hot material The crystal structure of cordierite gives the material its unique thermal properties. (Courtesy: M Dove and L Li/Matter)
The anomalous and ultra-low thermal expansion of cordierite results from the interplay between lattice vibrations and the elastic properties of the material. That is the conclusion of Martin Dove at China’s Sichuan University and Queen Mary University of London in the UK and Li Li at the Civil Aviation Flight University of China. They showed that the material’s unusual behaviour stems from direction-varying elastic forces in its lattice, which act to vary cordierite’s thermal expansion along different directions.
Cordierite is a naturally-occurring mineral that can also be synthesized. Thanks to its remarkable thermal properties, it is used in products ranging from pizza stones to catalytic converters. When heated to high temperatures, it undergoes ultra-low thermal expansion along two directions, and it shrinks a tiny amount along the third direction. This makes it incredibly useful as a material that can be heated and cooled without changing size or suffering damage.
Despite its widespread use, scientists lack a fundamental understanding of how cordierite’s anomalous thermal expansion arises from the properties of its crystal lattice. Normally, thermal expansion (positive or negative) is understood in terms of Grüneisen parameters. These describe how vibrational modes (phonons) in the lattice cause it to expand or contract along each axis as the temperature changes.
Negative Grüneisen parameters describe a lattice that shrinks when heated, and are seen as key to understanding thermal contraction of cordierite. However, the material’s thermal response is not isotropic (it only contracts only along one axis when heated at high temperatures) so understanding cordierite in terms of its Grüneisen parameters alone is difficult.
Advanced molecular dynamics
In their study, Dove and Li used advanced molecular dynamics simulations to accurately model the behaviour of atoms in the cordierite lattice. Their closely matched experimental observations of the material’s thermal expansion, providing them with key insights into why the material has a negative thermal expansion in just one direction.
“Our research demonstrates that the anomalous thermal expansion of cordierite originates from a surprising interplay between atomic vibrations and elasticity,” Dove explains. The elasticity is described in the form of an elastic compliance tensor, which predicts how a material will distort in response to a force applied along a specific direction.
At lower temperatures, lattice vibrations occur at lower frequencies. In this case, the simulations predicted negative thermal expansion in all directions – which is in line with observations of the material.
At higher temperatures, the lattice becomes dominated by high-frequency vibrations. In principle, this should result in positive thermal expansion in all three directions. Crucially, however, Dove and Li discovered that this expansion is cancelled out by the material’s elastic properties, as described by its elastic compliance tensor.
What is more, the unique arrangement of crystal lattice meant that this tensor varied depending on the direction of the applied force, creating an imbalance that amplifies differences between the material’s expansion along each axis.
Cancellation mechanism
“This cancellation mechanism explains why cordierite exhibits small positive expansion in two directions and small negative expansion in the third,” Dove explains. “Initially, I was sceptical of the results. The initial data suggested uniform expansion behaviour at both high and low temperatures, but the final results revealed a delicate balance of forces. It was a moment of scientific serendipity.”
Altogether, Dove and Li’s result clearly shows that cordierite’s anomalous behaviour cannot be understood by focusing solely on the Grüneisen parameters of its three axes. It is crucial to take its elastic compliance tensor into account.
In solving this long-standing mystery, the duo now hope their results could help researchers to better predict how cordierite’s thermal expansion will vary at different temperatures. In turn, they could help to extend the useful applications of the material even further.
“Anisotropic materials like cordierite hold immense potential for developing high-performance materials with unique thermal behaviours,” Dove says. “Our approach can rapidly predict these properties, significantly reducing the reliance on expensive and time-consuming experimental procedures.”
Gravitational waves are distortions of space–time that occur when massive bodies, such as black holes, are accelerated. They were first detected in 2016 by researchers working on the Advanced Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (aLIGO) located in Hanford, Washington and Livingston, Louisiana.
LISA comprises three identical satellites in an equilateral triangle in space, with each side of the triangle being 2.5 million kilometres – more than six times the distance between the Earth and the Moon.
While ground-based instruments detect gravitational waves with a frequency from a few Hz to a KHz, a space-based mission could pick up gravitational waves with frequencies between 10–4–10–1 Hz.
According to Hong-Bo Jin from the National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences, in Beijing, one disadvantage of a triangular array is that when the direction of gravitational-wave propagation as a transverse wave is parallel to the plane of the triangle, it is more difficult to detect the source of the gravitational wave.
A tetrahedral configuration could get around this problem while Jin says that an additional advantage is the extra combinations of optical paths possible with six arms. This means it could be sensitive to six polarization modes of gravitational waves. Einstein’s general theory of relativity predicts that gravitational waves have only two tensor polarization modes, so any detection of so-called vector or scalar polarization modes could signal new physics.
“Detecting gravitational waves based on the TEGO configuration will possibly reveal more polarization modes of gravitational waves, which is conducive to deepening our understanding of general relativity and revealing the essence of gravity and spacetime,” says Jin.
Yet such a design will come with costs. Given that the equipment for TEGO, including the telescopes and optical benches, is twice that of a triangular configuration, estimates for a tetrahedral set-up could also be double.
While TEGO has a separate technical route than TAIJI, Jin says it can “refer” to some of its mature technologies. Given that many technologies still need to be demonstrated and developed, however, TEGO has no specific timeline for when it could be launched.
Italian gravitational-wave physicist Stefano Vitale, a former principal investigator of the LISA Pathfinder mission, told Physics World that “polyhedric” configurations of gravitational-wave detectors are “not new” and are much more difficult to implement than LISA. He adds that even aligning a three-satellite configuration such as LISA is “extremely challenging” and is something the aerospace community has never tried before.
“Going off-plane, like the TEGO colleagues want to do, with telescope add-ons, opens a completely new chapter [and] cannot be considered as incremental relative to LISA,” adds Vitale.
Michelle Lollie is an advanced laser scientist at Quantinuum, supporting the design, development and construction of complex optical systems that will serve as the foundations of world-class quantum computers. Lollie also participates in various diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility initiatives, advocating for those who are marginalized in STEM fields, particularly in physics. Outside of wrangling photons, you can often find her at home practicing the violin.
Your initial bachelor’s degree was in finance, and you went on to work in the field through your 20s before pivoting to physics – what made you take the leap to make this change, and what inspired you to pick physics for your second bachelor’s degree?
I had dreams of working in finance since high school – indeed, at the time I was on my way to being the most dedicated, most fashionable, and most successful investment banker on Wall Street. I would like to think that, in some other quantum universe, there’s still a Michelle Lollie – investment banker extraordinaire.
So my interest in physics wasn’t sparked until much later in life, when I was 28 years old – I was no longer excited by a career in finance, and was looking for a professional pivot. I came across a groundbreaking theory paper about the quantum teleportation of states. I honestly thought that it referred to “Beam me up, Scotty” from Star Trek, and
I was amazed.
But all jokes aside, quantum physics holds many a mystery that we’re still exploring. As a field, it’s quite new – there are approximately 100 years of dedicated quantum study and discovery, compared to millennia of classical physics. Perusing the paper and understanding about 2% of it, I just decided that this is what I would study. I wanted to learn about this “entanglement” business – a key concept of quantum physics. The rest is history.
Can you tell me a bit about your PhD pathway? You were a part of the APS Bridge Program at Indiana University – how did the programme help you?
After deciding to pursue a physics degree, I had to pick an academic institution to get said degree. What was news to me was that, for second baccalaureate degrees, funding at a public university was hard to come by. I was looking for universities with a strong optics programme, having decided that quantum optics was for me.
I learned about the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, in Terre Haute, Indiana by searching for optical engineering programmes. What I didn’t know was that, in terms of producing top engineers, you’d be hard pressed to find a finer institution. The same can be said for their pure science disciplines, although those disciplines aren’t usually ranked. I reached out to inquire about enrolment, was invited to visit and fell in love with the campus. I was funded and my physics journey began.
Prior to graduation, I was struggling with most of my grad-school applications being denied. I wasn’t the most solid student at Rose (it’s a rigorous place), but I wasn’t a poorly performing student, either. Enter the APS Bridge Program, which focuses on students who, for whatever reason, were having challenges applying to grad school. The programme funded two years of education, wherein the student could have more exposure to coursework (which was just what I needed) or have more opportunity for research, after which they could achieve a master’s degree and continue to a PhD.
I was accepted at a bridge programme site at Indiana University Bloomington. The additional two years allowed for a repeat of key undergraduate courses in the first year, with the second year filled with grad courses. I continued on and obtained my master’s degree. I decided to leave IU to collaborate with a professor at Louisiana State University (LSU) who I had always wanted to work with and had done prior research with. So I transferred to LSU and obtained my PhD, focusing on high-dimensional orbital angular momentum states of light for fibre-based quantum cryptography and communication protocols. Without the Bridge Program, it’s likely that you might not be reading this article.
It’s funny, but at the time, no-one was really talking about this. I think, for the individual who has to face various challenges due to race, sexual orientation and preference, gender, immigration status and the like, you just try to take your classes and do your research. But, just by your existence and certain aspects that may come along with that, you are often faced with a decision to advocate for yourself in a space that historically was not curated with you or your value in mind.
Beyond beamlines Alongside her days spent in the lab, Michelle Lollie is a keen violinist. (Courtesy: Samuel Cooper/@photoscoops)
So while no-one was going up and down the halls saying “Hey, look at us, we have five Black students in our department!”, most departments would bend over backwards for those diversity numbers. Note that five Black students in a department of well over 100 is nothing to write home about. It should be an order of magnitude higher, with 20–30 Black students at least. This is the sad state of affairs across physics and other sciences: people get excited about one Black student and think that they’re doing something great. But, once I brought this fact to the attention of those in the front office and my adviser, a bit of talk started. Consequently, and fortuitously, the president of the university happened to visit our lab the fall before my graduation. Someone at that event noticed me, a Black woman in the physics department, and reached out to have me participate in several high-profile opportunities within the LSU community. This sparked more interest in my identity as a Black woman in the field; and it turned out that I was the first Black woman who would be getting a PhD from the department, in 2022. I am happy to report that three more Black women have earned degrees (one master’s in medical physics, and two PhDs in physics) since then.
My family and I were featured on LSU socials for the historic milestone, especially thanks to Mimi LaValle, who is the media relations guru for the LSU Physics and Astronomy department. They even shared my grandmother’s experience as aBlack woman growing up in the US during the 1930s, and the juxtaposition of her opportunities versus mine were highlighted. It was a great moment and I’m glad that LSU not only acknowledged this story, but they emphasized and amplified it. I will always be grateful that I was able to hand my doctoral degree to my grandmother at graduation. She passed away in August 2024, but was always proud of my achievements. I was just as proud of her, for her determination to survive. Different times indeed.
What are some barriers and challenges you have faced through your education and career, if any?
The barriers have mostly been structural, embedded within the culture and fabric of physics. But this has made my dedication to be successful in the field a more unique and customized experience that only those who can relate to my identity will understand. There is a concerted effort to say that science doesn’t see colour, gender, etc., and so these societal aspects shouldn’t affect change within the field. I’d argue that human beings do science, so it is a decidedly “social” science, which is impacted significantly by culture – past and present. In fact, if we had more actual social scientists doing research on effecting change in the field for us physical scientists, the negative aspects of working in the field – as told by those who have lived experience – would be mitigated and true scientific broadening could be achieved.
What were the pitfalls, or stresses, of following this career random walk?
Other than the internal work of recognizing that, on a daily basis, I have to make space for myself in a field that’s not used to me, there hasn’t been anything of the sort. I have definitely had to advocate for myself and my presence within the field. But I love what I do and that I get to explore the mysteries of quantum physics. So, I’m not going anywhere anytime soon. The more space that I create, others can come in and feel just fine.
I want things to be as comfortable as possible for future generations of Black scientists. I am a Black woman, so I will always advocate for Black people within the space. This is unique to the history of the African Diaspora. I often advocate for those with cross-marginalized identities not within my culture, but no-one else has as much incentive to root for Black people but Black people. I urge everyone to do the same in highlighting those in their respective cultures and identities. If not you, then who?
What were the next steps for you after your PhD – how did you decide between staying in academia or pursuing a role in industry?
I always knew I was going to industry. I was actually surprised to learn that many physics graduates plan to go into academia. I started interviewing shortly before graduation, I knew what companies I had on my radar. I applied to them, received several offers, and decided on Quantinuum.
Tools of the trade At Quantinuum, Michelle Lollie works on the lasers and optics of quantum computers. (Courtesy: Quantinuum)
You are now an advanced laser scientist with Quantinuum – what does that involve, and what’s a “day in the life” like for you now?
Nowadays, I can be found either doing CAD models of beamlines, or in the lab building said beamlines. This involves a lot of lasers, alignment, testing and validation. It’s so cool to see an optical system that you’ve designed come to life on an optical table. Its even more satisfying when it is integrated within a full ion-trap system, and it works.I love practical work in the lab – when I have been designing a system for too long, I often say “Okay, I’ve been in front of this screen long enough. Time to go get the goggles and get the hands dirty.”
What do you know today, that you wish you knew when you were starting your career?
Had I known what I would have had to go through, I might not have ever done it. So, the ignorance of my path was actually a plus. I had no idea what this road entailed so, although the journey was a course in who-is-Michelle-going-to-be-101, I would wish for the “ignorance is bliss” state – on any new endeavour, even now. It’s in the unknowing that we learn who we are.
Be direct and succinct, and leave no room for speculation about what you are saying
What’s your advice for today’s students hoping to pursue a career in the quantum sector?
I always highlight what I’ve learned from Garfield Warren, a physics professor at Indiana University, and one of my mentors. He always emphasized learning skills beyond science that you’ll need to be successful. Those who work in physics often lack direct communication skills, and there can be a lot of miscommunication. Be direct and succinct, and leave no room for speculation about what you are saying. This skill is key.
Also, learn the specific tools of your trade. If you’re in optics, for example, learn the ins and outs of how lasers work. If you have opportunities to build laser set-ups, do so. Learn what the knobs do. Determine what it takes for you to be confident that the readout data is what you want. You should understand each and every component that relates to work that you are doing. Learn all that you can for each project that you work on. Employers know that they will need to train you on company-specific tasks, but technical acumen is assumed to a point. Whatever the skills are for your area, the more that you understand the minutiae, the better.
The last radical improvement in our lifespans happened in the 20th Century. Now, researchers are looking into just how much further we can go — and if that’s even possible.
Learn about the Svingerud Stone, a runestone found in a Norwegian grave site that currently stands as the earliest written depiction of the Proto-Norse language.
A new way to measure the temperatures of objects by studying the effect of their black-body radiation on Rydberg atoms has been demonstrated by researchers at the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The system, which provides a direct, calibration-free measure of temperature based on the fact that all atoms of a given species are identical, has a systematic temperature uncertainty of around 1 part in 2000.
The black-body temperature of an object is defined by the spectrum of the photons it emits. In the laboratory and in everyday life, however, temperature is usually measured by comparison to a reference. “Radiation is inherently quantum mechanical,” says NIST’s Noah Schlossberger, “but if you go to the store and buy a temperature sensor that measures the radiation via some sort of photodiode, the rate of photons converted into some value of temperature that you see has to be calibrated. Usually that’s done using some reference surface that’s held at a constant temperature via some sort of contact thermometer, and that contact thermometer has been calibrated to another contact thermometer – which in some indirect way has been tied into some primary standard at NIST or some other facility that offers calibration services.” However, each step introduces potential error.
This latest work offers a much more direct way of determining temperature. It involves measuring the black-body radiation emitted by an object directly, using atoms as a reference standard. Such a sensor does not need calibration because quantum mechanics dictates that every atom of the same type is identical. In Rydberg atoms the electrons are promoted to highly excited states. This makes the atoms much larger, less tightly bound and more sensitive to external perturbations. As part of an ongoing project studying their potential to detect electromagnetic fields, the researchers turned their attention to atom-based thermometry. “These atoms are exquisitely sensitive to black-body radiation,” explains NIST’s Christopher Holloway, who headed the work.
Packet of rubidium atoms
Central to the new apparatus is a magneto-optical trap inside a vacuum chamber containing a pure rubidium vapour. Every 300 ms, the researchers load a new packet of rubidium atoms into the trap, cool them to around 1 mK and excite them from the 5S energy level to the 32S Rydberg state using lasers. They then allow them to absorb black-body radiation from the surroundings for around 100 μs, causing some of the 32S atoms to change state. Finally, they apply a strong, ramped electric field, ionizing the atoms. “The higher energy states get ripped off easier than the lower energy states, so the electrons that were in each state arrive at the detector at a different time. That’s how we get this readout that tells us the population in each of the states,” explains Schlossberger, the work’s first author. The researchers can use this ratio to infer the spectrum of the black-body radiation absorbed by the atoms and, therefore, the temperature of the black body itself.
The researchers calculated the fractional systematic uncertainty of their measurement as 0.006, which corresponds to around 2 K at room temperature. Schlossberger concedes that this sounds relatively unimpressive compared to many commercial thermometers, but he notes that their thermometer measures absolute temperature, not relative temperature. “If I had two skyscrapers next to each other, touching, and they were an inch different in height, you could probably measure that difference to less than a millimetre,” he says, “If I asked you to tell me the total height of the skyscraper, you probably couldn’t.”
One application of their system, the researchers say, could lie in optical clocks, where frequency shifts due to thermal background noise are a key source of uncertainty. At present, researchers have to perform a lot of in situ thermometry to try to infer the black-body radiation experienced by the clock without disturbing the clock itself. Schlossberger says that, in future, one additional laser, could potentially allow the creation of Rydberg states in the clock atoms. “It’s sort of designed so that all the hardware is the same as atomic clocks, so without modifying the clock significantly it would tell you the radiation experienced by the same atoms that are used in the clock in the location they’re used.”
The work is described in a paper in Physical Review Research. Atomic physicist Kevin Weatherill of Durham University in the UK says “it’s an interesting paper and I enjoyed reading it”. “The direction of travel is to look for a quantum measurement for temperature – there are a lot of projects going on at NIST and some here in the UK,”, he says. He notes, however, that this experiment is highly complex and says “I think at the moment just measuring the width of an atomic transition in a vapour cell [which is broadened by the Doppler effect as atoms move faster] gives you a better bound on temperature than what’s been demonstrated in this paper.”
I am one of two co-chairs, along with my colleague Hendrik Ohldag, of the Quantum Materials Research and Discovery Thrust Area at ALS. Among other things, our remit is to advise ALS management on long-term strategy regarding quantum science, We launch and manage beamline development projects to enhance the quantum research capability at ALS and, more broadly, establish collaborations with quantum scientists and engineers in academia and industry.
In terms of specifics, the thrust area addresses problems of condensed-matter physics related to spin and quantum properties – for example, in atomically engineered multilayers, 2D materials and topological insulators with unusual electronic structures. As a beamline scientist, active listening is the key to establishing productive research collaborations with our scientific end-users – helping them to figure out the core questions they’re seeking to answer and, by extension, the appropriate experimental techniques to generate the data they need.
The task, always, is to translate external users’ scientific goals into practical experiments that will run reliably on the ALS beamlines. High-level organizational skills, persistence and exhaustive preparation go a long way: it takes a lot of planning and dialogue to ensure scientific users get high-quality experimental results.
What do you like best and least about your job?
A core part of my remit is to foster the collective conversation between ALS staff scientists and the quantum community, demystifying synchrotron science and the capabilities of the ALS with prospective end-users. The outreach activity is exciting and challenging in equal measure – whether that’s initiating dialogue with quantum experts at scientific conferences or making first contact using Teams or Zoom.
Internally, we also track the latest advances in fundamental quantum science and applied R&D. In-house colloquia are mandatory, with guest speakers from the quantum community engaging directly with ALS staff teams to figure out how our portfolio of synchrotron-based techniques – whether spectroscopy, scattering or imaging – can be put to work by users from research or industry. This learning and development programme, in turn, underpins continuous improvement of the beamline support services we offer to all our quantum end-users.
As for downsides: it’s never ideal when a piece of instrumentation suddenly “breaks” on a Friday afternoon. This sort of troubleshooting is probably the part of the job I like least, though it doesn’t happen often and, in any case, is a hit I’m happy to take given the flexibility inherent to my role.
What do you know today that you wish you knew when you were starting out in your career?
It’s still early days, but I guess the biggest lesson so far is to trust in my own specialist domain knowledge and expertise when it comes to engaging with the diverse research community working on quantum materials. My know-how in photon science – from coherent X-ray scattering and X-ray detector technology to in situ magnetic- and electric-field studies and automated measurement protocols – enables visiting researchers to get the most out of their beamtime at ALS.
In the face of seabeds becoming valuable real estate and corroding bombs polluting the oceans, teams are turning to technology to clean up this dangerous and expensive problem.
Radiation therapy is a targeted cancer treatment that’s typically delivered over several weeks, using a plan that’s optimized on a CT scan taken before treatment begins. But during this time, the geometry of the tumour and the surrounding anatomy can vary, with different patients responding in different ways to the delivered radiation. To optimize treatment quality, such changes must be taken into consideration. And this is where adaptive radiotherapy comes into play.
Adaptive radiotherapy uses patient images taken throughout the course of treatment to update the initial plan and compensate for any anatomical variations. By adjusting the daily plan to match the patient’s daily anatomy, adaptive treatments ensure more precise, personalized and efficient radiotherapy, improving tumour control while reducing toxicity to healthy tissues.
The implementation of adaptive radiotherapy is continuing to expand, as technology developments enable adaptive treatments in additional tumour sites. And as more cancer centres worldwide choose this approach, there’s a need for flexible, innovative software to streamline this increasing clinical uptake.
Designed to meet these needs, RayStation – the treatment planning system from oncology software specialist RaySearch Laboratories – makes adaptive radiotherapy faster and easier to implement in clinical practice. The versatile and holistic RayStation software provides all of the tools required to support adaptive planning, today and into the future.
“We need to be fast, we need to be predictable and we need to be user friendly,” says Anna Lundin, technical product manager at RaySearch Laboratories.
Meeting the need for speed
Typically, adaptive radiotherapy uses the cone-beam CT (CBCT) images acquired for daily patient positioning to perform plan adaptation. For seamless implementation into the clinical workflow to fully reflect the daily anatomical changes, this procedure should be performed “online” with the patient on the treatment table, as opposed to an “offline” approach where plan adaptation occurs after the patient has left the treatment session. Such online adaptation, however, requires the ability to analyse patient scans and perform adaptive re-planning as rapidly as possible.
To fulfil the needs for streamlining all types of adaptive (online or offline) requirements, RayStation incorporates a package of advanced algorithms that perform key tasks, including segmentation, deformable registration, CBCT image enhancement and recontouring, all while the previously delivered dose is taken into consideration. By automating all of these steps, RayStation accelerates the replanning process to the speed needed for online adaptation, with the ability to create an adaptive plan in less than a minute.
Anna Lundin: “Fast and predictable replanning is crucial to allow us to treat more patients with greater specificity using less clinical resources.” (Courtesy: RaySearch Laboratories)
Central to this process is RayStation’s dose tracking, which uses the daily images to calculate the actual dose delivered to the patient in each fraction. This ability to evaluate treatment progress, both on a daily basis and considering the estimated total dose, enables informed decisions as to whether to replan or not. The software’s flexible workflow allows users to perform daily dose tracking, compare plans with daily anatomical information against the original plans and adapt when needed.
“You can document trigger points for when adaptation is needed,” Lundin explains. “So you can evaluate whether the original plan is still good to go or whether you want to update or adapt the treatment plan to changes that have occurred.”
User friendly
Another challenge when implementing online adaptation is that its time constraints necessitate access to intuitive tools that enable quick decision making. “One of the big challenges with adaptive radiotherapy has been that a lot of the decision making and processes have been done on an ad hoc basis,” says Lundin. “We need to utilize the same protocol-based planning for adaptive as we do for standard treatment planning.”
As such, RaySearch Laboratories has focused on developing software that’s easy to use, efficient and accessible to a large proportion of clinical personnel. RayStation enables clinics to define and validate clinical procedures for a specific patient category in advance, eliminating the need to repeat this each time.
“By doing this, we let the clinicians focus on what they do best – taking responsibility for the clinical decisions – while RayStation focuses on providing all the data that they need to make that possible,” Lundin adds.
Versatile design
Lundin emphasizes that this accelerated adaptive replanning solution is built upon RayStation’s pre-existing comprehensive framework. “It’s not a parallel solution, it’s a progression,” she explains. “That means that all the tools that we have for robust optimization and evaluation, tools to assess biological effects, support for multiple treatment modalities – all that is also available when performing adaptive assessments and adaptive planning.”
This flexibility allows RayStation to support both photon- and ion-based treatments, as well as multiple imaging modalities. “We have built a framework that can be configured for each site and each clinical indication,” says Lundin. “We believe in giving users the freedom to select which techniques and which strategies to employ.”
We let the clinicians focus on what they do best – taking responsibility for the clinical decisions – while RayStation focuses on providing all the data that they need to make that possible
In particular, adaptive radiotherapy is gaining interest among the proton therapy community. For such highly conformal treatments, it’s even more important to regularly assess the actual delivered dose and ensure that the plan is updated to deliver the correct dose each day. “We have the first clinics using RayStation to perform adaptive proton treatments in an online fashion,” Lundin says.
It’s likely that we will also soon see the emergence of biologically adapted radiotherapy, in which treatments are adapted not just to the patient’s anatomy, but to the tumour’s biological characteristics and biological response. Here again, RayStation’s flexible and holistic architecture can support the replanning needs of this advanced treatment approach.
Predictable performance
Lundin points out that the progression towards online adaptation has been valuable for radiotherapy as a whole. “A lot of the improvements required to handle the time-critical procedures of online adaptive are of large benefit to all adaptive assessments,” she explains. “Fast and predictable replanning is crucial to allow us to treat more patients with greater specificity using less clinical resources. I see it as strictly necessary for online adaptive, but good for all.”
Artificial intelligence (AI) is not only a key component in enhancing the speed and consistency of treatment planning (with tools such as deep learning segmentation and planning), but also enables the handling of massive data sets, which in turn allows users to improve the treatment “intents” that they prescribe.
Key component AI plays a central role in enabling RayStation to deliver predictable and consistent treatment planning, with deep learning segmentation (shown in the image) being an integral part. (Courtesy: RaySearch Laboratories)
Learning more about how the delivered dose correlates with clinical outcome provides important feedback on the performance and effectiveness of current adaptive processes. This will help optimize and personalize future treatments and, ultimately, make the adaptive treatments more predictable and effective as a whole.
Lundin explains that full automation is the only way to generate the large amount of data in the predictable and consistent manner required for such treatment advancements, noting that it is not possible to achieve this manually.
RayStation’s ability to preconfigure and automate all of the steps needed for daily dose assessment enables these larger-scale dose follow-up clinical studies. The treatment data can be combined with patient outcomes, with AI employed to gain insight into how to best design treatments or predict how a tumour will respond to therapy.
“I look forward to seeing more outcome-related studies of adaptive radiotherapy, so we can learn from each other and have more general recommendations, as has been done in the field of standard radiotherapy planning,” says Lundin. “We need to learn and we need to improve. I think that is what adaptive is all about – to adapt each person’s treatment, but also adapt the processes that we use.”
Future evolution
Looking to the future, adaptive radiotherapy is expected to evolve rapidly, bolstered by ongoing advances in imaging techniques and increasing data processing speeds. RayStation’s machine learning-based segmentation and plan optimization algorithms will continue to play a central role in supporting this evolution, with AI making treatment adaptations more precise, personalized and efficient, enhancing the overall effectiveness of cancer treatment.
“RaySearch, with the foundation that we have in optimization and advancing treatment planning and workflows, is very well equipped to take on the challenges of these future developments,” Lundin adds. “We are looking forward to the improvements to come and determined to meet the expectations with our holistic software.”
This webinar will present the overall experience of a radiotherapy department that utilizes RTsafe QA solutions, including the RTsafe Prime and SBRT anthropomorphic phantoms for intracranial stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) and stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) applications, respectively, as well as the remote dosimetry services offered by RTsafe. The session will explore how these phantoms can be employed for end-to-end QA measurements and dosimetry audits in both conventional linacs and a Unity MR-Linac system. Key features of RTsafe phantoms, such as their compatibility with RTsafe’s remote dosimetry services for point (OSLD, ionization chamber), 2D (films), and 3D (gel) dosimetry, will be discussed. These capabilities enable a comprehensive SRS/SBRT accuracy evaluation across the entire treatment workflow – from imaging and treatment planning to dose delivery.
Christopher W Schneider
Christopher Schneider is the adaptive radiotherapy technical director at Mary Bird Perkins Cancer Center and serves as an adjunct assistant professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. Under his supervision, Mary Bird’s MR-guided adaptive radiotherapy program has provided treatment to more than 150 patients in its first year alone. Schneider’s research group focuses on radiation dosimetry, late effects of radiation, and the development of radiotherapy workflow and quality-assurance enhancements.
Continuing the Artemis program and using its planned lunar space station as a staging post would be a more energy efficient but slower way to reach Mars, and it’s unlikely to be Elon Musk’s preference.
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