The Discovery of Superfluid \(\mathrm{He}^3\) as Seen Through the Eyes of a Graduate Student

Speaker(s): Douglas Osheroff

It was at the beginning of his fifth year of graduate study that Douglas Osheroff discovered evidence for the existence of two unexpected phase transitions in a mixture of liquid and solid He³, both within three thousandths of a degree of absolute zero. The speaker will describe this event, and give his personal account of the excitement and confusion that ensued over the next seven months as he and his two professors sought to understand the origins of these transitions and the nature of the ordered states.

Colloquium

Junior and senior physics majors attend our biweekly colloquium series, held on Tuesday afternoons at 4:30 p.m. in Shanahan B460. The talks are open to all students and to the public, and are frequently attended by scientists from the other Claremont Colleges, Cal Poly Pomona, and others. The series features speakers from a broad range of institutions and fields of physics.