Visit Goteborg
I’m writting in a rather reversed chronological order, since I’ve been to Goteborg (correct English name would be Gothenburg) already more than two weeks ago. Yet it was a wonderful visit organized by Vitaly Shumeiko, and I ought to mention it.
Goteborg houses many nanoscientists, much more than Delft. Formally they are separated into Goteborg University and Chalmers Technical University, yet people from these different organizations sometimes even share offices. Owing to geographical proximity of former Soviet Union and rather harsh climate, an appreciable fraction of nanophysisists speaks Russian. Two of Goteborg faculty are my close university fellows: we graduated in 1982 from the same study-group of 18 people (where – guess now I have to mention it all the time – Andre Geim belonged as well). Know very well the most of Swedish-speaking elder faculty. However, despite many connections to the place, I have not been to Goteborg for 18 years.
Main events took place on Sept. 24. In the morning, I met Yari Kinaret: those were hours of nanomechanics. He introduced a bunch of students – of him, Leonid Gorelik and Robert Shekhter – and who did not have time and had to talk fast. In two hours I’ve heard more new nano- and micromechanical ideas than in two previous years. Leonid Kuzmin, with whom I worked in Moscow University many years ago, shared with me his ideas – some were more like dreams – about superconducting bolometers. He’s also shown interesting preliminary measurements of highly resistive superconducting forks. After lunch I met Per Delsing and Chris Wilson who do quantum optics with microwaves – and do it with zeal and style. They, Tsukuba gang and several other groups are active in microwave artificial atoms. Next was Serge Kubatkin, he was pioneered graphene on SiC substrate and has shown me astonishing Quantum Hall plateaus. Vitaly Shumeiko, fellow theorist, told about his work on Andreev dots under irradiation: a topic Ciprian and me will tackle soon.
To complete the (scientific) joy of the day, I was invited to a warm party and exclusive diner in Leonid Gorelik’s place. Officially we cannot talk about science at the party: yet me and Leonid went out for a smoke and there we discussed a bit of nanomechanics.
