Henk Stoof

Outreach & News

Information about our work intended for a broad audience:

A popular account of our work on Bose-Einstein condensation has appeared on February 5, 1998 in the periodical of Utrecht University, i.e., the U-blad. For more detailed information you can also look at the inaugural address of Henk Stoof.
A contribution to the Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Natuurkunde [NTvN 69, 286 (2003)] on the topic of atom-molecule oscillations can be found here.
There have appeared both a News Focus in Science and a News Feature in Nature on the race to achieve superfluidity in an atomic Fermi gas. The national newspaper the Volkskrant was interested as well.
Our proposal to create a nonrelativistic supersting with ultracold atoms was noticed by PhysicsWeb and KennisLink. Also the national newspaper the Volkskrant reported on our work. We have written a contribution to the Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Natuurkunde [NTvN 71, 248 (2005)] on this topic.
A summary of our work on imbalanced Fermi gases appeared on the FOM website. A Physics News Update was devoted to related work in collaboration with the experimental group of Randy Hulet. You can also look at a News Focus in Science.
Koos Gubbels has written a contribution to the Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Natuurkunde [NTvN 75, 144 (2009)] on the famous Renormalization Group paper of Kenneth Wilson.
A summary of our proposal to observe spin transport, in particular spin drag, in ultracold Bose gases has recently appeared on the FOM website. Our proposal was also discussed by Marco Polini and Giovanni Vignale in a Viewpoint Commentary in Physics [Physics 2, 87 (2009)]. In addition, it was noticed by ScienceGuide and blikopnieuws.nl. We have also written a contribution to the Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Natuurkunde [NTvN 76, 292 (2010)] on this topic. Spin drag was recently also observed experimentally in the group of Peter van der Straten.
The observation of preformed Cooper pairs in a semiconductor by the group of Jaap Dijkhuis was noticed by KennisLink and a summary of this work appeared on the FOM website. This work was also seen as a Research Highlight by Nature Physics. We have also written a contribution to the Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Natuurkunde [NTvN 79, 24 (2013)] on this topic.
Jildou Baarsma has written a contribution to the Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Natuurkunde [NTvN 79, 108 (2013)] on inhomogeneous superfluids or supersolids. With this contribution she won the third prize in the annual award for the best paper written by a PhD student in Physics given by the Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Natuurkunde.
A contribution to the Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Natuurkunde [NTvN 79, 128 (2013)] explaining the observation of the dynamical Casimir effect can be found here.
Our prediction in 2001 of the existence of monopoles in an antiferromagnetic Bose-Einstein condensate was confirmed experimentally in this Science paper. Science states that "Some grand unified theories of physics predict the existence of the so-called magnetic monopole. No such particles have been seen, but analogs of monopoles are observable in quantum fluids." See also the news website of Amherst College.
Our observation of a space-time crystal in a superfluid gas of sodium atoms was chosen as an Editors' Suggestion by Physical Review Letters. See also the website of the Utrecht University Science Faculty. It also received attention from engineersonline.nl and nplus1.ru.
On the day of her defense an interview with Adriana Correia appeared on the website of Utrecht University. Her thesis concerns the use of quantum computation for natural language processing.

On Tuesday March 26, 2002 Randy Hulet received an honorary doctorate from Utrecht University. See also the U-blad of March 21, 2002.

In 2003 Henk Stoof received the prestigious VICI (Innovative Research Incentive Scheme) award from NWO.

In 2006 Henk Stoof was elected to Fellow of the American Physical Society. The citation of the Council of the American Physical Society reads as follows: "For pioneering contributions to the many-body theory of ultracold atomic gases, and especially for the development of the theory of Feshbach resonances in strongly interacting Bose and Fermi gases."

In 2007 Rembert Duine received the prestigious VIDI award from NWO. In 2008 he received an ERC Starting Independent Researcher Grant and in 2016 an ERC Consolidator Grant. See also the website of the D-ITP.

In 2007 Henk Stoof was added to the Utrecht University Gallery of Honor.

In 2008 Usama Al Khawaja received the Abdul Hameed Shoman Award for Young Arab Researchers.

In 2008 Michiel Snoek received a VENI award from NWO.

In 2009 Dries van Oosten received the prestigious VIDI award from NWO.

The lecture notes of the course on Statistical Field Theory are presently being used in the Master's programme in Theoretical Physics of Utrecht University. These lecture notes have evolved into the textbook Ultracold Quantum Fields jointly published by Canopus Publishing and Springer. A review of this book by Peter McClintock appeared in Contemporary Physics. There exists also a customer review at Amazon.com and a list of errata.

In 2010 Koos Gubbels received the annual award given by the Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Natuurkunde for the best paper written by a PhD student in Physics. A summary of his thesis on Exotic Superfluidity in Imbalanced Fermi Gases appeared on the NWO website and on PhysOrg.com.

On April 1-2, 2010 the 60th birthday of Steve Girvin was celebrated at the High Magnetic Field Lab in Tallahassee, Florida.

In 2011 Koos Gubbels received a Humboldt Postdoctoral Fellowship.

In 2012 Henk Stoof was elected as an Outstanding Referee of the Americal Physical Society.

In 2012 the Delta Institute for Theoretical Physics received the prestigious NWO Gravitation Premium for consortia with an excellent scientific research programme that has the potential to make a substantial scientific contribution at the highest international level. The applicants are Carlo Beenakker (UL), Jan de Boer (UvA), Gerard 't Hooft (UU), Henk Stoof (UU), Erik Verlinde (UvA), and Jan Zaanen (UL). See also the website of the FOM. The award was presented by the minister of Education, Culture, and Science Jet Bussemaker on december 14th, 2012.

In 2014 Erik van der Wurff received the annual Lorentz award given by the Koninklijke Hollandsche Maatschappij der Wetenschappen for the best thesis written by a master student in Theoretical Physics. See also the website of the Utrecht University digital newspaper DUB and of the Utrecht University Science Faculty. The award was presented by the chair of the Lorentz Foundation Carlo Beenakker on november 28th, 2014.

In 2014 Henk Stoof was elected as a member of the Alumni Society "Mens Agitat Molem" of the Eindhoven University of Technology.

In 2014 the focus and mass area Complex Systems Studies was established by Utrecht University. As a result an interview with the programme leader Henk Stoof appeared on the website of the Science Faculty.

In 2016 the consortium consisting of Nigel Hussey (RU), Mark Golden (UvA), Erik van Heumen (UvA), Jan Zaanen (UL), Koenraad Schalm (UL), Milan Allan (UL), Stefan Vandoren (UU), and Henk Stoof (UU) received a FOM Free Programme Grant for the study of Strange Metals. See also the website of the D-ITP.

In 2016 Laurens Siebbeles (TUD), Daniel Vanmaekelbergh (UU) and Henk Stoof (UU) received a NWO-CW TOP Grant for the study of the Effects of the Nanogeometry of Two-Dimensional Semiconductors on the Dynamics of Multiple Excitons and Charge Carriers. See also the website of the Utrecht University Science Faculty.

In 2017 Enea Mauri received the annual Shell award given by the Koninklijke Hollandsche Maatschappij der Wetenschappen for the best thesis written by a master student in Physics. See also the website of the Utrecht University Science Faculty. The award was presented by Paul Mak, Shell Projects & Technology, on november 27th, 2017. See also the website of the Utrecht University digital newspaper DUB for an interview with Enea Mauri.

In 2017 Henk Stoof was recognized as an Outstanding Referee for the New Journal of Physics and obtained a Certificate of Reviewing by Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications.

On Monday March 26, 2018 Laszlo Barabasi received an honorary doctorate from Utrecht University. See also the website of Utrecht University.