One goal...

Happy new year my dearest!

I've been quiet since Christmas eve, and there are two main reasons for that:

1) I needed the time to relax and be with my family - preparing my self for what will be an intense year. 

2) Someone broke into our car and stole half of the presents we got for Christmas (for example Anders' present for me :( ), and our suitcase with clothes and stuff. This was a mentally exhausting experience, which also stole a lot of time since we've been on the phone with different insurance companies and the police and everything. End of the story is that even though we had the best travel insurance in the biggest insurance company in Norway, we got nothing, since we happened to be inside our own apartment when it happened (the car could have been parked at exactly the same place; if we had been somewhere else when it happened, we would have been covered). After the day when it happened (in the middle of the day, the 27th of December) when I cried most of the day, I've wanted to just put this episode behind me, and I've tried focusing on all the fantastic things I've got in my life - Alexandra, Anders, health, amongst others, and I haven't really felt I had any time for blogging. Hope you understand.

But now I'm back! Back at the University, back on the blog, back with my research.

Maybe you've already guessed why I'm saying this will be an intense year... 

2016 is the year where I have really just one, main goal: to finish my PhD. There is a lot of work to do be done, and I think it will be hard, but with the support and help of especially Anders, and also my fantastic supervisors, I think I'll manage! I will of course share (almost) everything from the last part of this trip, from a Master of Science to becoming a Doctor ;) Hope you will follow me!

Merry Christmas!

First of all, the most important message to day is: MERRY CHRISTMAS to all my wonderful, fantastic readers - I love you all!

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To follow up on the last blog post about stars, here are two more facts about stars that I think suits the theme of this day (my favourite day of the year):

1) There is no “Star of Bethlehem”, or "Christmas star". What the wise men probably saw on their way to meet baby Jesus, was Halley's comet (there are other theories as well, but I like the comet theory :) ), which was visible 11 or 12 years BC.

We told Alexandra this the other day, and she replied by instructing us to change the word "star" into "comet" in the songs :D (For the record: I have no trouble singing "star" - this was her choice...)

2) The most poetic fact is that we are all made of star dust (or we can call it starstuff), and Carl Sagan said it so beautifully and fantastic, I will just finish this holiday blog post with his words:

Instamoments

Even though I didn´t manage to "complete" the advent calendar, there´s been quite a lot of (nuclear) physics related blogposts lately - and very little personal stuff. This is, of course, in one way is great, since nuclear physics is awesome, but it´s also important to talk about one self and everyday life, and not just physics - it´s hard to understand, but after all, life is more than physics and the lab :P 

It´s been too long since I shared some instamoments with you, so today is a good day to do so :) 

(If you want to, you can follow me here)

I´m learning to be Parisian - love <3 this book // halloween // morning selfie with my morning coffee

reading Einstein #oldschool // Paris with my mother // Alexandra swiimming

"whu science should be more pink" - my TEDx talk in Geneva // little sister Carina and her Magnus :) // ready for the christmas party with the wonderful people in Bulldozer Film

Andrea has spent the night at Rose castle // my fantastic colleague Ann-Cecilie and me on our way to Berkeley // morning swim selfie

flying Widerøe on my "tour" in the north of Norway // kiss me <3 coffee // fall

fun night with Henrik and Anders // the dress! // ready (almost) for "God morgen Norge"

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Now it´s time to go and get my make up on, fix my hair, put on a dress (haven´t decided which one yet), and fix Alexandras hair (she has been wearing her new christmas dress for hours already ;) ), and then I think it will be time for dinner and presents...

Merry christmas everyone!

I f****d up...

...or maybe not that bad - but I admit that I didn´t manage to see the advent calendar through :/ I blame christmas, though ;)

And, I guess, the fact that the last month probably has been the busiest one in a while - and in addition to rest of the christmas present wrapping that has to be done, there´s also the travel bill from the trip to Berkeley and a backlog of about 100 e-mails (that I should do today). Next year I´ll be more prepared for the advent calendar, so hopefully it will be even better than this year :P

Anyway, here are some snaps from my livingroom in Rose-slottet (Rose castle <3) last night and now - in ten minutes, or so, Alexandra will come, and we will fix the rest of the presents together, and suddenly my dad will be here, and then we´re driving home for christmas :D

Number 18

So, in the calendar today there are gammas (gamma radiation) - I´m giving you an ALFNA matrix :D xD <3

The ALFNA matrix/plot is a sort of 3 dimensional plot where there is the excitation energy of some nucleus (we don´t know which one - and this is what we/I try to figure out) on the y-axis, and on the x-axis is the energy of the gamma(s) the nucleus sends out. The thing is that when a nucleus is hit by a particle, the nucleus is excited, or sort of heated - it gets some extra energy, and to get rid of that extra energy it sends out  gamma radiation. 

From earlier experiments that have been done (the bible is here) we know quite a lot about what kind of gammas (which energies) the different nuclei will emit when they are excited to this and that energy. In this particular ALFNA matrix we believe that we have oxygen-17 (there is always some oxygen :) ) and beryllium-10 (the backing of the uranium foil/target is made from beryllium). The oxygen-17 peak for example, is supposed to emit a gamma ray with an energy of 870 kilo electron volts (keV), and here it is at around 1300 keV - which means that we are quite off, and everything needs to be calibrated (which is exactly what I´m working on now ;) ).

So this is the plot I´ve been staring at today (together with my supervisor, Sunniva <3). 

...and I´m staring even more now (pretending to have a really huge brain) - looking like this :P

Number 15

Only 8ish days ´til Christmas now...and in todays calendar is another cross-section graph - this time it´s the cross-section/probability of neutron capture on uranium-233:

On the y-axis is the value of the cross-section (the higher the number, the higher the probability of a neutron being captured by the nucleus when hitting it), and on the x-axis is the energy of the neutron.

But there are several graphs here...and they all show different values for this cross-section - the truth is that we don´t exactly know what it is (my research is into this...) :/ The blue, turqoise and red lines are the "official numbers" (evaluated nuclear data), the different dots are actual measurements (some with HUGE error bars), and the green line is calculated with the default input parameters about the nucleus.

It´s quite an important cross-section for the thorium fuel cycle, since it tells us about the probability of a neutron being captured by uranium-233 instead of making it fission (which is what we want it to do) - so it would be nice to know it better ;)

13 + 14

So, yesterday I didn´t get the chance to share a graph, so today you´ll get a double dose :D

Also, I got a complaint that the last graphs didnt´have any christmas decorations on them - so I´ve tried to do better this time...;)

Today you get two versions of ALPHA! 

ALPHA is the "capture to fission ratio" - it tells us how often a neutron is captured/absorbed, rather than causing a nucleus to fission. We want ALPHA to be as low as possible - since a low ALPHA means that little waste is produced :D

First there is ALPHA for neutrons with low energy:

The red line is for uranium-233, and the blue is for plutonium-239. For low-energy neutrons, ALPHA is lower for uranium-233 than plutonium-239, and this means that there is a smaller waste production from thorium-fuels than uranium...IF the neutrons have a low energy/are thermal (this can´t be said often enough ;) )!

Then there is ALPHA for neutrons with high energy - and here it changes (as it also did with ETA):

For neutrons with high energy the waste production is smaller for uranium-fuels than with thorium...

The 12th of December

Today is December the 12th, and in the calendar is the rest of what I gave you yesterday - it´s ETA again, but this time it´s ETA for neutrons with high energy (fast neutrons). The graph is very important for the neutron economy of a nuclear reactor...

ETA tells us about how many neutrons you get out for each neutron going in (to a nucleus) on average ("neutrons emitted/neutrons absorbed"). As you can see you get, on average, more neutrons from fission of plutonium-239 (blue line) than you get from uranium-233 (red line) - if the neutron going in has high energy/is a fast neutron. In other words: it´s exact opposite of what was in the calendar yesterday...!

So, since plutonium-239 is a better fissile material than uranium-233 (when hit by high-energy neutrons), you can produce more new fissile material from uranium, than you can from thorium :D Or, to sort of conclude: for thermal neutrons, thorium seems to be the way to do it, bur for fast neutrons, uranium/plutonium seems to be the way to do it <3<3<3

Number 11

In the calendar today is a graph that is very important for the thorium fuel cycle... 

Today I give you ETA!

ETA tells us about how many neutrons you get out for each neutron going in (to a nucleus) on average ("neutrons emitted/neutrons absorbed"). As you can see you get, on average, more neutrons from fission of uranium-233 (red line) than you get from plutonium-239 (blue line) - if the neutron going in has low energy/is a thermal neutron.

So, since uranium-233 is a better fissile material than plutonium-239 (when hit by low-energy neutrons), you can produce more new fissile material from thorium, than you can from uranium :D We like that <3<3<3

Number 10

In Berkeley it´s 3 PM December 10th, so it´s not too late with todays calendar graph ;)

In the calendar today is a very important and very preliminary plot - of the gamma ray strength function of uranium-234. Inside the heart is a little "bump" that is actually really important, and you will get a much better plot of this later (when the analysis is finished) - and also an explanation of what it is...but be patient, and remember that the advent season is about waiting ;)

December 9th

In the calendar today there´s a super nice graph I didn´t make myself, but I have of course made it even prettier than it already was ;)

Todays graph is a so called "cross section graph" for uranium-235.
The cross section sort of tells us about the probability that something will happen to a nucleus; in this case it´s about the cross section/probability that uranium-235 will fission <3 

On the x-axis is the energy of the neutrons hitting the uranium-235 nucleus, and on the y-axis is the cross-section. As you can see the cross-section is much bigger for low energy neutrons than for high energy neutrons - this means that there is a much much bigger probability for a nucleus to fission when it is hit by a neutron with really low energy.

December 8th

Since I´ve sort of travelled through time (at least that´s what it feels like) and now am in Berkeley I though todays advent calendar should be about why I´m really here :) So today i give you fission! 

Yes, again its´fission of uranium-234. This time its´gamma radiation from fission (there is always gammas when a nucleus fissions, and here you see 765 914 gammas at one time xD ), in opposition to a couple of days ago when I showed you particles from fission. 

Both of the axis are energy: The x-axis is gamma-energy (so energy of the gammas that are emitted), and the y-axis is excitation energy (energy of the nucleus before it fissions - the nucleus gets so excited that it just has to split in two :D )

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PS: I think time is very fascinating... here is a picture of me in on of SAS´ time capsules, just after we reached Canada. I´m looking down, around 12000 meters, at snow, and ice, and snow, and snow, and ice :P 

PPS: I think it´s just EXTREMELY fascinating and almost crazy that we can actually get a plane in the air - love it <3

Number 7...

Good morning the sweetest readers in the whole world <3

In this moment I´m at Gardermoen airport (again :P ), soon ready to go to Copenhagen and then to San Francisco (and from there to Berkeley). Since I´m going to spend quite some time in the air today - around 13 hours in total, or something like that - what could possibly be be better in todays calendar than a pretty dose/altitude graph?

I´m guessing nothing...;)

This graph is a little average, since the dose you get when you´re up in the air is a little different depending on where you´re flying (the dose is higher when you get closer to the poles, and lower when you get closer to the equator), and if there´s a lot of solar activity (more solar activity equals higher dose ;) ). Anyway; let´s say I´ll be spending 13 hours at 35000 feet (35 kfeet) today, I´ll be receiving a dose of 52 micro Sievert :D

PS: I´m much more worried about turbulense than radiation ;)

Number 6

And now there´s only 17 days left ´til christmas...! 

Today I´ve been working all day, and the rest of the evening I´ll be working a little more, and pack my bags to go to Berkeley tomorrow *excited*. But of course I have to share a graph today as well ;)

In the calendar today there is a typical "banana plot". The "bananas" are different particles, with different energies (energy on both the x-axis and the y-axis - they show deposited energy in two different detectors). The biggest banana is made out of protons, the middle one is from deuterons, and the upper one is made out of tritons.

(For the ones that are really really interested, the plot comes from uranium-234 and a 12.5 MeV deuteron beam :D )

December 5th

Since it´s Friday (again!) I want to show you some fission <3<3<3

Here´s a super pretty graph of uranium-234 fissioning :D

Yes, there it is! The red "banana plot" are particles from fission. Super cool stuff.  (Edit: I wrote gammas, and not particles, first. That was wrong. It´s just that I´ve been working on gamma plots all day... )

OMG!

POW!
ZONK!

SunnivaRose Advent calendar

So today´s December third, and today I´m giving my readers a not so pretty picture (but it has a very nice snowman, though <3 )...

Here´s what happens when I actually try to make everything very nice and clean (the 8 graphs are supposed to be more or less exactly on top of each other...) - but then f*** up (obviously). 

I know what I´ve done, and I´ve double checked my calculations, and actually can´t really find any mistakes (even though they have to be there). Something like this will almost always happen, and that´s why you keep an "ORIGINAL"-file, with the last numbers and calculations that actually made sense (you may have to learn this the hard way :P). So for me it´s not back to basics *relief*, but back to the version of the program that made results that actually looked quite good - at least compared to this mess.

The good thing about this graph is that it´s not difficult to see that something´s "off" *staying positive* :D

Luke nummer 2

Bak luke nummer 2 i SunnivaRose-adventskalender skjuler det seg....*trommevirvel*:

EN ØDELAGT DETEKTOR! Eller, i alle fall én strip på én detektor som det er noe galt med - ingen tellinger overhodet er lik noe er galt :P

Sånn kan det altså gå, og det er derfor det er veldig viktig å være tålmodig og gjøre et skikkelig og møysommelig arbeid - når 64 (!) detektorer skal sjekkes. 1 av disse 64 har altså ikke detektert ("talt") noen ting; vet ikke hvorfor, men akkurat nå bare vet jeg at det er sånn, og så får jeg finne ut av hva det faktisk er etter Berkley, før resultatene skal publiseres... Sånn er forskerlivet ;)

(Dette er forresten samme type plott som bak gårsdagens luke, der vi så at det var en av strippene på en av detektorene som ikke var skikkelig kalibrert. Mao så vet vi/jeg at 62 av 64 detektorer ser ut til å være gode, og så er det 2 det er noe "galt" med; og, som sagt, hva tar vi ikke nå når det er et såpass stort press på å få frem noen foreløpige resultater til neste ukes workshop :) )

Lykke til på EXPHIL-eksamen!

I dag ønsker jeg alle generelt, og lillesøster Carina spesielt, masse masse masse lykke til på EXPHIL-eksamen <3 

Selv tok jeg EXPHIL først da jeg var godt i gang med å skrive masteravhandlingen min - så for min del var det lite "forberedende" over det... Skal ikke gå inn på hva jeg tenker om kurset, men, vel, jeg utsatte i alle fall å ta det så mye jeg absolutt kunne (det var den aller siste eksamenen jeg tok før jeg hadde mastereksamen).

Siden november er over er det lov å høre på denne igjen; Maria Mena "Home for Christmas" - en av mine favorittjulesanger, tror jeg :)

Inspired

God jul, fineste...

Har en veldig merkelig følelse rundt dette med jul i år, og merker at det jeg aller helst fokuserer på er det at 2013 er over hvert øyeblikk, og at jeg ser frem til 2014 - antar det har en god del å gjøre med det at dette er første gang jeg ikke skal være sammen med Alexandra i julen...ja, faktisk skal jeg ikke se henne før det er blitt 2014.

Syns ikke egentlig det har virket så ille, men i går ettermiddag/kveld slo det meg litt som en knyttneve i magen - og det ble faktisk noen tårer.

2013 har jo virkelig vært en berg og dalbane av et år som startet med at jeg flyttet fra Tøyen i februar. "Karriere"-messig tror jeg at jeg kan oppsummere 2013 som et ganske vellykket år, mens på det emosjonelle planet har jeg nok vært mer mislykket - og det er vel denne vekslingen mellom å gjøre det veldig bra i ett felt, og ikke spesielt godt i et annet som gjør at jeg ser tilbake på dette året som, vel, en berg og dalbane. Vet at 2014 kommer til å bli veldig spennende - det er masse bra ting som skjer (som noen sa; du er ung og flott, og det er sååå masse bra som ligger foran deg - riktignok som en slags trøst, fra noen jeg ikke ville ha trøst fra, men nok om det), og jeg skal gjøre det jeg kan for å lykkes både når det gjelder jobb og privatliv <3

Romjulskort til dere

Hei hjerter <3

Siden jeg er så glad i dere alle, og full av julekjærlighet må jeg bare dele dette nydelige julekortet med dere. Og, ja, det er laget av noen i fullt alvor...:D