Physics
The Physics department is committed to education and research in physics, the study of the fundamental universal laws that govern the behavior of matter and energy, and the exploration of the consequences and applications of those laws. Our department is widely known for its excellent teaching and student mentoring. Our department plays an important role in the university’s Core Curriculum. We have strong academic programs with several options for undergraduate physics majors, leading to the B.S. degree, as well as graduate curricula leading to the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees. Our research groups span a variety of fields within physics. Our principal concentrations are in Astrophysics, Relativity, Gravitation and Cosmology, Condensed Matter Physics, Lasers and Optics, Physics Education, Solar Physics, and the Space Science and Engineering Lab.
Sub-communities within this community
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Image and Chemical Analysis Laboratory (ICAL)
http://www.physics.montana.edu/ical
Collections in this community
Recent Submissions
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Ambipolar Heating of Magnetars
(American Astronomical Society, 2023-03)Magnetars, neutron stars thought to be with ultrastrong magnetic fields of 1014–15 G, are observed to be much hotter than ordinary pulsars with ∼1012 G, and additional heating sources are required. One possibility is heating ... -
NuSTAR Observations of a Heavily X-Ray-obscured AGN in the Dwarf Galaxy J144013+024744
(American Astronomical Society, 2023-01)We present a multiwavelength analysis of the dwarf Seyfert 2 galaxy J144013+024744, a candidate obscured active galactic nucleus (AGN) thought to be powered by an intermediate-mass black hole (IMBH, M • ≈ 104−106 M ⊙) of ... -
Multiwavelength scrutiny of X-ray sources in dwarf galaxies: ULXs versus AGNs
(Oxford University Press, 2023-01)Owing to their quiet evolutionary histories, nearby dwarf galaxies (stellar masses M⋆≲3×109M⊙) have the potential to teach us about the mechanism(s) that ‘seeded’ the growth of supermassive black holes, and also how the ... -
Auger electron spectroscopy mapping of lithium niobate ferroelectric domains with nano-scale resolution
(Optica Publishing Group, 2022-12)The +/−Z ferroelectric domains in periodically poled lithium niobate are characterized with Auger electron spectroscopy. The -Z domains have a higher Auger O-KLL transition amplitude than the +Z domains. Based on this, ... -
First Flight of the EUV Snapshot Imaging Spectrograph (ESIS)
(American Astronomical Society, 2022-10)The Extreme-ultraviolet Snapshot Imaging Spectrograph (ESIS) launched on a sounding rocket from White Sands Missile Range on 2019 September 30. ESIS is a computed tomography imaging spectrograph (CTIS) designed to map ... -
Intermediate-mass black holes and the Fundamental Plane of black hole accretion
(Oxford University Press, 2022-09)We present new 5 GHz Very Large Array observations of a sample of eight active intermediate-mass black holes with masses 104.9 M⊙ < M < 106.1 M⊙ found in galaxies with stellar masses M* < 3 × 109 M⊙. We detected five of ... -
Extracting the Heliographic Coordinates of Coronal Rays Using Images from WISPR/Parker Solar Probe
(Springer Science and Business Media LLC, 2022-09)The Wide-field Imager for Solar Probe (WISPR) onboard Parker Solar Probe (PSP), observing in white light, has a fixed angular field of view, extending from 13.5∘ to 108∘ from the Sun and approximately 50∘ in the transverse ... -
Nano-scale ferroelectric domain differentiation in periodically poled lithium niobate with auger electron spectroscopy
(Optica Publishing Group, 2022-03)A new method for characterizing lithium niobate +/-Z ferroelectric polarization domains using Auger electron spectroscopy (AES) is presented. The domains of periodically poled samples are found to be differentiable using ... -
Hundreds of Low-mass Active Galaxies in the Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA) Survey
(American Astronomical Society, 2022-09)We present an entirely new sample of 388 low-mass galaxies (M ⋆ ≤ 1010 M ⊙) that have spectroscopic signatures indicating the presence of massive black holes (BHs) in the form of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) or tidal ... -
Determining the Spectral Content of MOSES Images
(American Astronomical Society, 2022-06)The Multi-Order Solar Extreme Ultraviolet Spectrograph (MOSES) sounding rocket was launched from White Sands Missile Range on 2006 February 8th, to capture images of the Sun in the He ii 303.8 Å emission line. MOSES is a ... -
Wandering Black Hole Candidates in Dwarf Galaxies at VLBI Resolution
(American Astronomical Society, 2022-07)Thirteen dwarf galaxies have recently been found to host radio-selected accreting massive black hole (MBH) candidates, some of which are “wandering” in the outskirts of their hosts. We present 9 GHz Very Long Baseline Array ... -
Fossil turtle eggs from the Upper Cretaceous Gaogou Formation, Xiaguan-Gaoqiu Basin, Neixiang County, Henan Province, China: Interpretation of the transformation from aragonite to calcite in fossil turtle eggshell
(Elsevier BV, 2022-06)In 2007, a clutch of approximately 30 fossil eggs reported from the Upper Cretaceous Gaogou Formation, Xiaguan-Gaoqiu Basin, Neixiang County, Henan Province, China was assigned to the oofamily “Crocodiloolithidae”. After ... -
Environmental Factors Affecting Feather Taphonomy
(MDPI AG, 2022-05)The exceptional preservation of feathers in the fossil record has led to a better understanding of both phylogeny and evolution. Here we address factors that may have contributed to the preservation of feathers in ancient ... -
Thermal transport in two-dimensional nematic superconductors
(American Physical Society, 2022-06)We study the thermal transport in a two-dimensional system with coexisting superconducting (SC) and nematic orders. We analyze the nature of the coexistence phase in a tight-binding square lattice where the nematic state ... -
Correlated Spatio-temporal Evolution of Extreme-Ultraviolet Ribbons and Hard X-Rays in a Solar Flare
(American Astronomical Society, 2022-02)We analyze the structure and evolution of ribbons from the M7.3 SOL2014-04-18T13 flare using ultraviolet images from the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph and the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO)/Atmospheric Imaging ... -
The Sloan Digital Sky Survey Reverberation Mapping Project: UV–Optical Accretion Disk Measurements with the Hubble Space Telescope
(American Astronomical Society, 2022-02)We present accretion-disk structure measurements from UV–optical reverberation mapping (RM) observations of a sample of eight quasars at 0.24 < z < 0.85. Ultraviolet photometry comes from two cycles of Hubble Space Telescope ... -
The Energy Spectra of Electron Microbursts Between 200 keV and 1 MeV
(American Geophysical Union, 2021-10)This study investigates the energy spectrum of electron microbursts observed by the Focused Investigations of Relativistic Electron Burst Intensity, Range, and Dynamics II (FIREBIRD-II, henceforth FIREBIRD) CubeSats. ... -
The AGN Fraction in Dwarf Galaxies from eROSITA: First Results and Future Prospects
(American Astronomical Society, 2021-12)Determining the fraction of nearby dwarf galaxies hosting massive black holes (BHs) can inform our understanding of the origin of “seed” BHs at high redshift. Here we search for signatures of accreting massive BHs in a ... -
Toward a More Complex Understanding of Natal Super Star Clusters with Multiwavelength Observations
(American Astronomical Society, 2021-09)Henize 2–10 (He 2–10) is a nearby (D = 9 Mpc) starbursting blue compact dwarf galaxy that boasts a high star formation rate and a low-luminosity active galactic nucleus. He 2–10 is also one of the first galaxies in which ... -
Determination of anisotropy constants via fitting of magnetic hysteresis to numerical calculation of Stoner–Wohlfarth model
(AIP Publishing, 2021-08)Anisotropy constants of magnetic materials are typically determined through angle-resolved Ferromagnetic Resonance (ar-FMR) and torque magnetometry, which can be time consuming measurements, thus limiting their utility. ...
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