JILA, formerly known as the Joint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics, is a

physical science Physical science is a branch of natural science that studies non-living systems, in contrast to life science. It in turn has many branches, each referred to as a "physical science", together called the "physical sciences". Definition Phys ...

research institute in the United States. JILA is located on the

University of Colorado Boulder The University of Colorado Boulder (CU Boulder, CU, or Colorado) is a public research university in Boulder, Colorado. Founded in 1876, five months before Colorado became a state, it is the flagship university of the University of Colorado sy ...

campus. JILA was founded in 1962 as a joint institute of The University of Colorado Boulder and the National Institute of Standards & Technology.

Research

JILA is one of the nation’s leading research institutes in the physical sciences. The world's first Bose-Einstein Condensate was created at JILA by Eric Cornell and

Carl Wieman Carl Edwin Wieman (born March 26, 1951) is an American physicist and educationist at Stanford University, and currently the A.D White Professor at Large at Cornell University. In 1995, while at the University of Colorado Boulder, he and Eric All ...

in 1995. The first

frequency comb In optics, a frequency comb is a laser source whose spectrum consists of a series of discrete, equally spaced frequency lines. Frequency combs can be generated by a number of mechanisms, including periodic modulation (in amplitude and/or phase) of a ...

demonstration was led by

John L. Hall John Lewis "Jan" Hall (born August 21, 1934) is an American physicist, and Nobel laureate in physics. He shared the 2005 Nobel Prize in Physics with Theodor W. Hänsch and Roy Glauber for his work in precision spectroscopy. Biography Born ...

at JILA. The first demonstrations of a

Fermionic condensate A fermionic condensate or Fermi–Dirac condensate is a superfluid phase formed by fermionic particles at low temperatures. It is closely related to the Bose–Einstein condensate, a superfluid phase formed by bosonic atoms under similar cond ...

and BEC-BCS crossover physics were done by

Deborah S. Jin Deborah Shiu-lan Jin (; November 15, 1968 – September 15, 2016) was an American physicist and fellow with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST); Professor Adjunct, Department of Physics at the University of Colorado; and a ...

. JILA's members hold faculty appointments in the Departments of Physics; Astrophysical and Planetary Science; Chemistry and Biochemistry; and Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology as well as Engineering. JILA’s Quantum Physics Division of NIST members hold joint faculty appointments at CU in the same departments. Research at JILA addresses fundamental scientific questions about the limits of quantum measurements and technologies, the design of precision optical and X-ray lasers, the fundamental principles underlying the interaction of light and matter, the role of quantum physics in chemistry and biology, and the processes that have governed the evolution of the Universe for nearly 14 billion years.

Staff

JILA's current faculty includes two

Nobel Nobel often refers to: *Nobel Prize, awarded annually since 1901, from the bequest of Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel Nobel may also refer to: Companies *AkzoNobel, the result of the merger between Akzo and Nobel Industries in 1994 *Branobel, or ...

laureates— Eric Cornell and

—and two John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Fellows—

Margaret Murnane Margaret Mary Murnane NAS AAA&S (born 1959) is Distinguished Professor of Physics at the University of Colorado at Boulder, having moved there in 1999, with past positions at the University of Michigan and Washington State University. She is ...

and

Ana Maria Rey Ana Maria Rey is a Colombian theoretical physicist, professor at University of Colorado at Boulder, a JILA fellow, a fellow at National Institute of Standards and Technology and a fellow of the American Physical Society. Rey was the first Hi ...

. David J. Wineland and

, both previous affiliated with NIST and JILA respectively, were also awarded the

Nobel Prize in Physics ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then " ...

, while Deborah Jin was previously awarded a

MacArthur Fellowship The MacArthur Fellows Program, also known as the MacArthur Fellowship and commonly but unofficially known as the "Genius Grant", is a prize awarded annually by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation typically to between 20 and 30 indi ...

. Each year, JILA scientists publish more than 200 original research papers in national and international scientific journals and conference proceedings.

References

External links

* {{authority control Research institutes in Colorado University of Colorado Boulder National Institute of Standards and Technology