Mineralogy Lecture Series: Richard Briggs

Description

Richard Briggs, a postdoctoral researcher at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, will give a talk entitled "Shocking Discoveries at X-ray Light Sources" as part of the Earth & Planetary Sciences' Mineralogy Lecture Series.

Richard Briggs graduated from his Ph.D. at University College London in 2013, investigating the melting curves of metals at high-pressure using laser-heated diamond anvil cells combined with X-ray diffraction techniques at 3rd generation synchrotron sources. Since then, he has performed several high-pressure experiments at various X-ray light sources across America and Europe using static techniques in the diamond anvil cell and some of the first laser shock experiments to be performed at 4th generation light sources. In this talk, Briggs will give an overview of the first laser shock experiments at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility, using X-ray absorption techniques to diagnose phase transitions and melting in iron, and results from experiments at the Dynamic Compression Sector that identified a new phase of gold, along with new results on copper at extreme compression that also revealed a shocking discovery.

Keep up with this lecture series by subscribing to the list.