From Miami to Frankfurt

I finished my bachelor thesis just in time at the day I left Kansas. I tried to take some days off in Miami before coming back to Germany. But unfortunately it was raining almost all the time. It’s supposed to be the sunniest City in the USA and I just chose the only rainy days of the year to visit the place. However, it was a nice trip. Today I just arrived in Frankfurt. On Monday I’m going to hand in my bachelor thesis and give a presentation on the work we did in Kansas.

On Wednesday we did a Combo Tour. We started with a city sightseeing tour and went on with a boat tour around the famous islands with houses of many celebrities. In the afternoon we did a trip to the Everglades National park. The air boat trip was awesome. We could actually see some wild alligators (and touch a chained one). In the evening even the sun came out for a few moments.

Lindsey Stirling concert

On Saturday we have been at a concert of Lindsey Stirling. She mixes dubstep with a violin: http://www.lindseystirling.com/music/

You can find a video of here here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49tpIMDy9BE

K-State Wildcats vs. Stephen F. Austin

On Saturday we went to an American Football game. The K-State wildcats were playing against Stephen F. Austin. It was the first game of this season. 52,820 people went to the Bill Snyder Family Stadium to see the match. 

I’ve never seen a football game before. It was very interesting, but I think 3 ½ hours are kind of long for an actual play-time of 1 hour. The game was followed by big fireworks.

To see a video I took during the half-time show, click here.

Bill Snyder Family Stadium 

Kansas City - Worlds of Fun

This weekend we did a trip to Kansas City. First we visited the World War I museum and then we went on to the City Plaza where we found the Cheesecake Factory – a good place to eat thousands of calories by just ordering a dessert.

Kansas City

The Cheesecake Factory

Kansas City

The next day we decided to go to a Theme Park – Worlds of Fun and Worlds of Ocean. It is a combination of Theme and Water Park.

World of Fun

HITS beam time and trip to the Cosmosphere

Last week we had beam time with the more powerful HITS laser. 

HITS

HITS

HITS

The problem was that the laser is too far away from our set up. We aligned the beam through 3 different rooms. Unfortunately we lost most of the power due to the long beam path. Furthermore the beam arrived at our set up with an elliptical shape and strange modes.

The "manipulation unit" was no longer
attached to the "movement stage"

On top of that we couldn’t move our grating anymore. For some reason the manipulator for the “movement stage” fell off. Thus we had to vent the chamber and open it to fix the stage. We decided to cancel our HITS beam time and thus gave it back to other groups.

Next beam time we are going back to the KLS laser.

Besides the bad news, we finally had a free weekend with no beam time. To use this opportunity Daniel, his roommate and I went to the Cosmosphere. It’s a museum about rocket science and space flights.

Cosmosphere

Cosmosphere

Cosmosphere

Cosmosphere

Cosmosphere 

Cosmosphere

KLS beam time and birthday cake

Last beam time we had some issues with the grating. We couldn't move it anymore, because an aperture blocked it. Thus we had to open the chamber and remove it. Besides some more issues, we made at least some progress and collected some data to optimize the setup.

J.R. Macdonald Laboratory

An aperture blocked the grating

On Wednesday Stephanie and Daniel prepared a cake for my birthday. After eating the cake with some friends, we went to some bars in Aggieville.

Daniel and Stephanie prepared a birthday cake

My birthday cake

Our next beam time starts on Monday. One week later we are probably getting “HITS” beam time to use much higher intensities. KLS was not powerful enough to investigate the molecular processes our supervisor wants to see.

First beam time

Today we had our first beam time at the Kansas Light Source (KLS). We couldn’t make any “real” measurements, because we had to align everything and to eliminate some troubles. We have to keep in mind to wear these fancy pink Laser Goggles at all times to minimize possible eye hazards.

Always wear your Laser Goggles 

Gas distribution for the COLTRIMS setups

When we are not “working” in the lab, most of the time we spend at the Recreation Complex. They have everything you need for sports and fitness. There are several squash, basketball, football, soccer and baseball courts and many more. The weightlifting, cardio and freestyle area is pretty large and they have anything you need. Actually there is an indoor running circuit to avoid the heat outside. Outdoors there are lots of playgrounds as well.

Recreation Complex

Recreation Complex - Outdoor courts

Rec - weightlifting area

Rec - freestyle area

Rec - multipurpose curt

Rec - basketball courts

The only thing that’s missing on campus is cheap and healthy food. There are just these crappy fast-food restaurants at their “canteen”.

Taco Bell and other crapp at the "canteen"

First days in Manhattan, Kansas

I'm in Manhattan, Kansas since Sunday June 29th. It's really hot here - everyday between 28°C and 36°C. Even at night it doesn't cool down much. It feels like Egypt or a desert except everything is green.

It seems like everyone in Manhattan is proud of its University. You can buy merchandise like everywhere - even at Walmart.

K-State Store

Merchandise at Walmart

The campus is huge and really beautiful. You could consider it like a Campus Westend of Frankfurts Uni times 30. It takes about 45 minutes to walk from the south-eastern to the north-western part of the campus. Most buildings have a mediaeval-like architecture.

Hale library

K-State Campus

K-State map

Cardwell Hall - Department of Physics

K-State

At the Department of Physics there is the J.R. McDonald Laboratory which specialized in Atomic, Molecular and Optical Physics. Daniel and I are going to take over an experimental setup which was built and used by a former PhD student. It contains a pump-probe setup. A higher harmonic EUV (extreme ultra violet) pulse is generated by a short IR (infra red) pulse. A COLTRIMS setup is used to image time resolved molecular dynamics. We should get our first beamtime by the end of this week.

Beam guidance, processing and interferometer

COLTRIMS setup