Members of the Molecular Beam Spectroscopy Research team in the summer of 1996 were Marc Welge, Matthew Feig, Roseanne Laine, Ann Gabrys, and Blaise Porter. Each of us has written a small paragraph below summarizing our contributions to the project.
The first few weeks of my summer research experience were spent primarily learning about computer programming and the beam. I also read some chapters in a modern physics book so I could understand what was going on inside the spectrometer and in the data analysis.
After I got to the point that I felt somewhat competent in these areas, I moved on and started modifying different computer programs with Blaise and Marc (whichever one happened to be on this continent on that particular day). Some of the changes were superficial: making a program appear better on the screen or easier to use. We worked our way up though, and by the end of the summer we made some important adjustments to how the fitting program "simp" calculates the time it takes a molecule to travel between the lenses in the spectrometer. No matter what we were working on, the three of us always had fun even though we FROZE in the AMCL.
The work I did for the first two months this summer was much different than I thought it would be. Instead of doing research, I ended up modifying the computer program (BEAMv10.0) that ran the molecular beam aparatus. Dr. Olson spent the first week and a half teaching us all to program in C. After the second week, Dr. Olson and Dr. Cederberg had me working on BEAM. I made quite a few changes ranging from display modifications to actual additions. Though it was frustrating at times, it was still fun in a twisted sort of way.
When I finished the program changes, I started helping Roseanne with her summer project. (See below for details.) In the midst of working on that, Dr. Cederberg recommended that we do something documenting our accomplishments this summer. Feeling creative, Roseanne and I started on the wonderful web pages you are now looking through.
This summer I worked on identifying the lines of the RbBr spectrum. I'll let you know right now that I did not find a match. This is so difficult because it is the first molecule that we have studied that there are no previous measurements for. Another complication comes from the fact that we do not have an isotopically rich sample and so we have a mixture of four isotopes. I began by trying to identify a line by fitting its Stark splittings to our files. I did not find an exact fit, so I went on to plot the ratio of the quadrupole moment of Bromine and Rubidium versus the natural log of the frequency of the transition. We had hoped that by matching our data to this theoretical prediction I would find a match. Ann joined my project in order to help make and check out our guesses, but as of yet nothing has worked out. It was very long, and very tedious, and I was informed today that we were switching to a new molecule, but that my work would not be in vain. Oh well, we came to the conclusion that more data is needed anyways. I also worked with Ann to develop the spectacular Molecular Beam web sites that you are browsing through.
Well, I'm the last one here. I began this summer engossed in measuring the RF voltage that we apply to the plates in the beam tube. Previously, all we knew was the voltage we were sending to the plates, but because of standing waves in the wire that is not what is actually on the plates. I ordered an RF probe from Hewlett Packard and set about testing it and writing a program that would record the RF measurement from the probe. I also documented the procedure for downloading and fixing up the molecular beam data using a macro I created in Excel. Right as we were about to test it, I headed off to Sweden to do some research at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm.
Upon returning we opened up the beam and attached the RF probe to the plates. After that, I spent many a day in the AMCL fighting the cold and the witching hour with Marc and Matt. We modified and created several programs such as: detabber and que (which are printing programs),mol_hfs, and a plethora of "simps" which actually fit the data we get from the beam. Finally, I looked at Rubidium Chloride after everyone had left and made some valiant attempts to fit the data by plotting the frequency of peaks observed vs. the sum of the squares of the RF and DC values.
I started my research this summer several weeks later than the rest of the crew due to my participation in the Saint Olaf Band's tour of the beautiful country of Norway. When I arrived, I found that I had missed out on the introductions to the apparatus and much of the underlying theory of our research, so I began by catching up on these aspects while jumping right into a computing project Matt had begun to tackle.
I spent the great majority of my time in the computing lab working on a variety of tasks, including debugging, making programs more user friendly, and finally incorporating significant changes in the way our data is being fit and analyzed, the culmination of my widget-based C programming experience. Additionally, I became well-acquainted with the beam and ran numerous measurements to help bolster our data on the alkali halide K41F. I had a great time being on the beam team, working with superb peers and incredibly well-informed advisers.