| EPSRC Reference: |
GR/N38527/01 |
| Title: |
A COSMOLOGICAL EXPERIMENT IN LIQUID HELIUM-4 |
| Principal Investigator: |
McClintock, Professor P |
| Other Investigators: |
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| Department: |
Physics |
| Organisation: |
Lancaster University |
| Scheme: |
Standard Research (Pre-FEC) |
| Starts: |
20 March 2001 |
Ends: |
19 March 2002 |
Value (£): |
59,614
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| No relevance to Underpinning Sectors |
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Summary on Grant Application Form |
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When a system passes sufficiently fast through a continuous phase transition, production of topological defects is to be anticipated via the Kibble mechanism-because small regions of new phase are being created locally out of casual connection with each other. Some cosmologists believe that cosmic strings created in the GUT symmetry-breaking transition of the early universe may have provided the primordial density inhomogeneities that were later responsible for galaxy formation. The GUT transition is inaccessible to direct experimental investigation, but Zurich suggested in 1985 that the Quibble mechanism might nonetheless be investigated in the laboratory through studies of the (mathematically analogous) lambda transition in liquid 4He, at which the creation quantified vortices (analogues of cosmic strings) is to be expected. The proposed research aims to resolve a disturbing discrepancy between an earlier 4He experiment (no observable defect creation) and comparable experiments in 3He and liquid crystals (defect creation at approximately the predicted density).
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Key Findings |
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This information can now be found on Gateway to Research (GtR) http://gtr.rcuk.ac.uk
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Potential use in non-academic contexts |
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This information can now be found on Gateway to Research (GtR) http://gtr.rcuk.ac.uk
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Impacts |
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| Description |
This information can now be found on Gateway to Research (GtR) http://gtr.rcuk.ac.uk |
| Summary |
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| Date Materialised |
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Sectors submitted by the Researcher |
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This information can now be found on Gateway to Research (GtR) http://gtr.rcuk.ac.uk
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| Project URL: |
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| Further Information: |
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| Organisation Website: |
http://www.lancs.ac.uk |