Karsten Heeger

grounded

I came to the US as one of the many foreign graduate students this country admits every year. Almost exactly ten years ago I ventured from Europe to the US to follow my dreams of reasearch and scientific work in this country of opportunity. As a graduate student in Seattle I worked on the SNO experiment in Canada, and later on as a postdoc in Berkeley I joined the KamLAND experiment in Japan. Lately, we have worked on a US-China proposal for a  new reactor neutrino experiment near Hong Kong. Throughout my studies and work in the US the international aspect of science has always been an important component of the projects I have been involved in. Throughout the last decade I traveled well ... with my German passport and a US visa.

Last year I married a US citizen. After many years in the US it seemed natural to plan together with my wife for a career and residency in the US. So I applied for residency and a family-based greencard. The process seemed straightforwatd. The legal advise we sought and paid for was mostly useless and my current employer did not support any family-based petitions.

After submitting the application at the beginnng of this year we were invited for a family interview to prove our marriage and  I surrendered my ten fingerprints. All of it went fairly smoothly until the very end: I'm waiting for the "security clearance" before my residency application can be completed. In the meantime my visa has expired. I filed for advance travel parole but this takes months to process.

After ten years in this country, married to a US citizen, and still working for Berkeley Lab National Lab I cannot travel abroad any more until either my security clearance is complete or the my advance travel parole is processed. The letters of support Berkeley Lab and UC Berkeley have written in support of my travel needs for our research projects have disappeared without response in a PO Box in Chicago.

There is no person to contact, and no way to expedite the process. The whole system feels rather Kafkaesque. And in the meantime my research is on hold. I'm grounded in the country of the free. With my German passport I can leave the US but I'm not allowed to return to my wife or travel for my current employer until the security clearance for my greencard has come through.

So, there is nothing I can do but wait and do some local or remote research for a change.

still alive

The past few weeks have been an example of what happens all too often in physics. An overwhelming amount of work and activity. Between job hunting, making a decision on possible long-term career choices, writing a proposal for a new experiment, managing the construction and commissionig activity for a detector upgrade on the current experiment, facing hardware related problems and difficulties, and moving  -- a purely perosnal thing unrelated to physics-- there was little time to breathe yet alone to write a coherent blog. Sometimes I wonder how long I can do this. But then I'm surprised how I cannot avoid juggling so many things at the same time. Somehow it drives me and fuels me until I feel completely overwhelmed and need to step aside to take a break.

Some brief news from the last few weeks: After some long period of indecision, I decided to stay in Berkeley for now to focus on our effort towards a new reactor neutrino oscillation experiment at the Daya Bay nuclear power plant in China and to complete and install the calibration system we built for KamLAND. Both of these projects make heavy use of the resources at Berkeley Lab and I felt that I would be most effective pursuing them here. Eventually, I would still like to move into a faculty position. For them time being though I wanted to focus on these projects .... and on improving my blog. ;)

Over the last month or two we have also stepped up our effort on the proposal for a reactor neutrino experiment at the Daya Bay nuclear power plant in China. A new committee -- the Neutrino Science Assessment Group (NuSAG) -- has formed in the US to look at new proposals and evaluate the future of neutrino science. We made a first presentation to NuSAG on June 1 and are now working on the questions they gave us for the second round. Getting a new experiment funded is tough. Planning an experiment overseas is even more difficult. What are the odds of this being successful?  I don't know. But after spending more than 2 years to initiate the effort this is now the time when the rubber hits the road. We'll keep our fingers crossed.

The new 4pi calibration system we built for KamLAND is almost ready to be installed in KamLAND. In May and June we went through two technical reviews which went pretty well,  I think. We are still waiting for the final report. Once the technical soundness of the projects has been blessed and we have finished the final tests the system is ready. The installation itself will be a challenging undertaking. One of the last problems we are facing is that the cable used in the system has too much background radioactivity. The plan is to immerse the systrem in our very clean neutrino detector. Recent tests showed that the cable in question might have some potassium-40 contamination. Looks like somone might have eaten a banana before handling the cable sample. We are working on resolving this.

Tomorrow, I will escape. Not to a vacation but to a workshop in Seattle. A few days away from the daily routine of getting up early in Berkeley to call vendors on the East Coast and staying up late to communicate with my colleagues in Japan will be a refreshing break.

Ooops, I almost forgot  there is still a talk to prepare for the INT conference in Seattle.....

a balance act

A balance act

In many ways, life and physics research are a balance act. On a daily basis as well as in the long-term you juggle the impossible and try not to drop too many balls along the way. You push yourself to the limit and try the seemingly impossible.

If you succeed and you find time to play, physics can be exhilerating with a spectacular view of the world we live in. It provides a different perspective and understanding of the world and you can see into the distance recognizing the horizon.

As a postdoc or young researcher you get a glimpse of what it might be like to play in the arena of science but hopefully our science is a little more sound and stable than the balance on two legs of a chair. 

In recent weeks I have had the fortune to be presented with the choice of continuing my career as a young faculty. Landing a faculty job is the goal of many young researchers. Our senior colleagues seem much more sober about it.. And quite often you don’t fully realize of what is involved until you actually go through the application process and think about starting a new group yourself. In the end I found myself doubting that I could do this or even wanted to do this. I’m still undecided on whether I want to continue working at a national lab or choose the university environment. It is the question of focusing on research and doing projects versus engaging with students and teaching as part of the academic life. Hopefully, it is not a question of either/or but all just a matter of striking the right balance.

happy easter

the last 3 weeks ...

After travelling around the US for a series of faculty interviews and spending a week in Europe I'm finally back in Berkeley. The last 3 weeks have been rather busy. It was interesting to get an impression of various physics departments around the country and see their differences: their size, their research program, and approach to teaching. It is clear, in the end what matters most to you and the faculty is if you are a good fit to the department. And independent of all qualifications this may be a personal decision.

After hopping from coast to coast amlost every week for the past month or two  I spent the last week in Europe skiing with my wife. After a very intense beginning of the year it was great to get out into the mountains and refresh my mind. Little compares to spending a few days in the scenery of the Alpes, skiing in sunshine, and enjoying good food. And this was not even part of a physics ski conference.

Just some skiing in the midst of the uncomparable glaciers of the European Alpes. I envy my colleagues who will spend their careers at the LHC in Geneva .... :)

http://www.heeger.net/photos/veysonnaz2005/

 

110 years ago ....

110 years after the discovery of X-rays by Roentgen modern x-ray pictures are still amusing. We like to look inside our body and see the structure of bones.

While working at Gran Sasso - a national underground physics lab in Italy - my wife broke her finger. See the difference to Berta Roentgen. Clearly, I need to buy her a bigger ring.  I hope I'm not getting into  trouble for posting this from a US government computer...

Bertha Roentgen, 1895            Reina Maruyama, 2005

Vote for a new neutrino experiment!

Have you ever voted for a new neutrino experiment? Now is your chance!

Go to www.newtimesslo.com and cast your vote on the next neutrino experiment in the US. The unbiased poll is conducted by the highly acclaimed weekly news journal New Times SLO.

For background information see the New Times article on how San Luis Obispo holds the key to the Universe.

And who said that the US public is not interested in science....hmmm.

The key to the Universe

"San Luis Obispo holds the key to the Universe"
or the fame of a non-experiment.

About two years ago we started an inititative to propose the construction of a new neutrino experiment near the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant in California. The idea was to build two underground neutrino detectors near the power plant and study neutrinos that are emitted in the nuclear reactions in the core of the power plant. 

With two detectors at distances of ~1-2km from the plant we planned to study the oscillation of neutrinos and measure one of the yet unknown neutrino mixing parameters.

A proposal to Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) the owners of the plant was made and after some negotiation rejected. I spare you the details, you can read them in this week's article  in New Times SLO .

Over the past year a number of articles on the project appeared in the SLO Tribune, the SF Chronicle, and other newspapers. Just today, Tony Buffat, a colleague from Cal Poly who has helped promote the project in SLO, forwarded me the link to this new article , and to his column . I never believed that a non-experiment that didn't even reach the formal proposal stage could make it to the front page of a (local) news magazine.

After failing to convince PG&E to proceed with the project it is nice to see that some people still care and promote science - or are they just out to get PG&E? I don't know. In this case, I don't care.

With so much excitement and fire in the local community I  believe that the Diablo Canyon neutrino experiment would have been a fantastic project; for San Luis Obispo, for Cal Poly, and for PG&E.

And, we could have figured out the key to the Universe.

job searches and rumor mills

Few things in professional life are as stressful and unpredictable as searching for a job.

Landing an academic position is difficult, and quite often positions are open for a variety of subfields. Once you have made it through the first cut of perhaps 200 applicants you get to go through a campus visit where you meet members of the faculty and present a colloquium and/or seminar. Visiting a department and meeting the faculty can be fun and exciting but it can also be tiring to talk about your academic background and ambitions a dozen times a day. At the end of your campus visit you go home and hope for the best.  I have done this a few times this Spring. 

The whole process can be exciting, tiring, exhilerating, nerve racking, or all of the above. Would you want to enhance and stimulate this experience through web rumors? You can do it...... in physics.

A few years ago when I came to the University of Washington in Seattle as a graduate student I heard about the Particle Physics Jobs Rumors Mill web site. At the time it was hosted at UW but the site has moved since then.

The Rumor Mill allows you to send in comments and rumors about job searches and selections in particle physics. Short lists of faculty candidates are published on the site, along with the offers made by various departments. You can follow how colleagues switch institutions and how physicist couples move to finally land this all-so-precious dual-career position in one place. Candiates declining offers always give rise to good speculation which of the other positions they have been offered they will accept. Great fun and entertainment. And I'm sure that senior and junior people alike follow the physicists' soap on the web.

Interestingly enough, such a site does not exist for experimentalists. Phew! And searching on Google I was unable to find similar sites for other disciplines than physics. Why is it that physicists want such a rumor mill? Does it help, or is it interesting?
I find it strange and surprising but it is certainly not the first cultural or scientific strangeness I have experienced in physics.

The web has clearly changed the dynamics of the academic job search, what we know about it, and perhaps even the selection process. Consciously or unconsciously. The other day I was browsing the Quantum Diaries when I came across an entry by Gordon Watts: First Reading - his account of the selection process from the point of view of a faculty member. Just a few weeks ago I had interviewed at the University of Washington. As a former graduate student from Seattle I could imagine the discussions he described in the faculty meetings and the controversies about candidates. Even before I had heard officially from the department I could gather the status of my application. In the end, a candidate from a different field of research was chosen.

Learning on the blog the news about the outcome of my application struck me as odd. Perhaps less so than seeing my name listed in a rumor mill. 

Heat of POLARBEAR ...

Can you measure the heat of the back of a polarbear at a distance of several kilometers?

Adrian Lee from Berkeley and the POLARBEAR team claim the can do it. With new and nifty bolometers. Yesterday, Adrian gave a very interesting talk in a colloquium series devoted to instrumentation in physics experiments. He described the use of bolometers in CMB experiments and other applications.

Bolometers are nifty devices. They detect the heat deposited in a particle-nucleus interaction. When a particle scatters off a nucleaus it transfers some energy and the material "heats" up by a microscopic amount. This change in temperature can be detected through the change in resistance. It sounds really simple but the technology involved is quite advanced nowadays.

From the late 80's and early 90's when scientists soldered together miniature bolometers to the present age of bolometer production on a chip, the technological advancements in this area seem enormous. When Adrian talked about the use of bolometers in his POLARBEAR experiment it sounded so neat that I almost wanted to start doing CMB research. Not that I am jealous of the technology in his experiment. :)

What a difference to the field of neutrino physics where we still use big tanks of water or liquid scintillator and photomultipliers -- the same technology that was used more than 5 decades ago by Frederick Reines in the experimental discovery of the free antineutrino.

Can you tell the difference between the neutrino detector from 1956 and the one from 1995? I guess the black and white picture gives it away... :)