History - Prof Steve Bramwell

Magnetism Neutron Scattering Solid State Theory Computer Simulations

Publications list tel: +44 (0)20 7679 4648 fax: +44 (0)20 7679 7463 internal: 24648 email: s.t.bramwell@ucl.ac.uk

My research is based at the London Centre of Nanotechnology (LCN) and I teach in the Chemistry Department. My main interest is in statistical mechanics, as investigated by neutron scattering on carefully chosen magnetic materials ("model magnets").

One of my better-known results is "spin ice" which I discovered with Mark Harris. This is a unique state of matter that occurs in rare earth oxides. The figures show the theoretical neutron scattering pattern (left) and an experimental pattern (right) recently measured by Bob Aldus, Tom Fennell (both UCL) and Pascale Deen (ILL) on the D7 diffractometer at the Institut Luae-Langevin, Grenoble.

I also have a long standing collaboration with Peter Holdsworth (ENS, Lyon) to study two dimensional magnets. We have recently been working with Andrea Taroni (UCL, moving to Upsalla) to classify phase transition in two dimensions.

As well as research and teaching at UCL, I have a number of external roles including Chairman of College 5B at the ILL Grenoble, member of FAP 4 at ISIS, External Examiner at Edinburgh University and (recently) member of STFC review committee for ISIS.

Selected publications

1. Harris, Bramwell et al., Physical Review Letters 79 2554 (1997) (discovery of spin ice).
2. Bramwell and Gingras, Science 294 1495 (2001) (review on spin ice).
3. Fennell, Bramwell et al., Nature Physics 3 566 (2007) (Kasteleyn transitions in spin ice).
4. Bramwell and Holdsworth, J. Phys. Condens. Matter 5, L53 (1993) (universal magnetization exponent for two dimensional XY magnets).
5. Bramwell, Holdsworth and Pinton, Nature 396 552 (1998) (universal fluctuations in correlated systems).

This page last modified 9 August, 2010