Durham Astronomy Consolidated Grant 2014-2017

By the nature of the questions it addresses, Astronomy attracts the imagination of the public to an extent that only very few other branches of science can match. It is immediately accessible to every human by simply gazing up into the night sky to look at the stars and the Moon. This has provoked questions about the origins of the Earth, stars and our Solar System, as well as the origins of the Universe since the dawn of civilisation.

The past twenty years have seen the emergence of a standard model in Astronomy for the constituents of our Universe, as well as for the origin and evolution of all structure within it. According to this model, we live in a universe where at least two thirds of all mass-energy is now in the form of a dark energy field which is causing the Universe to expand at an ever increasing rate. About a quarter is in dark matter, most probably a new weakly interacting elementary particle yet to be detected on Earth. Only the remaining 5 percent is ordinary, or baryonic, matter of which at the present-day only about a tenth is in stars and the planets such as the Earth and the rest resides mostly as gas in the space between galaxies.

The structures formed by dark and baryonic matter were seeded by quantum fluctuations imprinted in the density field of the Universe at the earliest instants of the Big Bang. These produced weak sound waves in the near-uniform primordial plasma that left observable imprints on the heat left over from the Big Bang, emitted when the Universe was only 400,000 years old. These tiny ripples grew into the full richness of structures we see around us in the Universe today: galaxies, groups, clusters and larger-scale structures. It is this transformation from a near-uniform primordial soup to a cosmic web of structure that is the focus of our proposal.

Our programme knits together cutting-edge theoretical research into the earliest phases of the Universe with theoretical and observational projects to determine the formation and evolution of structure in the Universe and to confront the predictions of our models with our latest observational results, while exploiting instrumentation developments being pursued in Durham. We will focus on the evolution of galaxies back to the earliest times in the Universe and the influence which their environment has had on their properties. We will investigate the formation and evolution of black holes and their role in determining the structure and properties of galaxies and larger scale structures, using the latest instruments on ground-based observatories and Earth-orbiting satellites and theoretical models.

We are proud of our track record at Durham of public communication. The outreach initiative we started a decade ago has developed into a University-wide activity, which has, in turn, spawned an annual science festival in Durham (the most recent attended by 6,000 people). Our current programme uses a range of activities and techniques to engage with three key groups: a) the general public; b) school children and c) national and international audiences. These activities include science festivals, public lectures, summer schools, master classes and school visits, which together reach 10-15,000 people a year across the region and nationally.

To enhance the impact of our outreach we are developing demonstrations based on the science funded in our programme. These include a "Table Top" demonstrator of the principles of adaptive optics and its application to both astronomy and microscopy. We are also continuing to develop our "Cosmic Universe" application for iPad and iPhone. This free app, which has been downloaded 3,000 times from iTunes, allows the public to interact with the simulations of the Universe undertaken at Durham, providing a striking and effective way to visualise the size and structure of our Universe.

On the international stage we are partners in three ongoing programmes to engage with the wider European population using the science from next-generation projects such as the Cherenkov Telescope Array and the James Webb Space Telescope.

We see several Knowledge Exchange opportunities deriving from our programme. In particular, our development of integral field spectrographs has a range of potential applications for remote sensing and has secured funding from the UKSA for a laboratory demonstrator of a compact hyperspectral imager, which was presented at the STFC Environmental Futures Workshop. Following discussions with the Home Office on exploitation of this technology for home security, we have also obtained CLASP funding for an initial study of potential applications.

We are increasingly transfering our expertise in adaptive optics from Astronomy to life sciences include techniques for selective-plane-illumination spectroscopy of live specimens. We are also investigating the use of adaptive lenses in 3D Displays which has so far led to two patents and a collaboration with Disney Research. Similarly our experience in real-time systems underpins our work on fusion energy, including a Doctoral Training Network and potential future spin-offs for communications and high-speed, non-astronomical adaptive optics.

As well as technological transfer, some of the methodology used in our theoretical and observational work has KE potential. For example, we are developing new approaches for quantifying uncertainties in complex computer models, appropriate for models of climate change or oil extraction. These provide a computationally efficient technique for mapping the behaviour of such models and our work in this field has had significant impact in the statistical community, as well as attracting interest from the Bank of England as it may have application to the modelling of financial markets by regulators.

Finally, our broader research programme supports the research development of a cohort of postgraduate students at Durham, providing them with training in specific and transferable skills. More specifically, our students are given top level training in high performance computing, including parallel programming, handling huge datasets and developing advanced visualization tools. Using these skills our former students have taken jobs in a range of industries and in finance. Similarly, physics undergraduates at Durham benefit through their participation in our research work as part of their 4th year MSci projects. Our technical training of these postgraduates and undergraduate students provides a pool of talented, highly skilled candidates for jobs in the wider UK economy.