In 1996 Douglas Osheroff received the Nobel Prize in Physics together with David Lee and Robert C. Richardson for their discovery of the superfluid phase of helium-3, as a matter of fact, they actually discovered three superfluid phases. Superfluidity is a remarkable and unusual property that had previously been observed only in helium-4 and manifests itself by, for example, a lack of viscosity. As a result a superfluid liquid cannot be stored in an unglazed ceramic vessel, because it seeps out through the microscopic pores in the ceramic.Furthermore, if an empty beaker is lowered part way into the liquid, the liquid flows upward along the outside wall, creeping along the surface, , over the edge and down into the beaker until if finds its own level.
Last week Osheroff visited the University of Alberta and gave a presentation entitled “How advances in science are made”. In his talk Osheroff gives a brief history of low-temperature physics recapitulating his own discovery that led to the Nobel Prize. Out of his historical overview emerged a tale of five key strategies for making groundbreaking advances in science. According to Osheroff, the key research strategies that led to his prize winning discovery were,
- Use the best technology available.
- Do not reinvent the wheel, borrow technologies if possible.
- Look into unexplored regions of the landscape, or parameter space.
- Failure might be an invitation to try something new.
- Be aware of subtle unexplained behavior. Don’t dismiss it!
Ofcourse, making a ground breaking discovery might not be enough to get acknowledged. In Osheroff’s own words “If you want to win a Nobel Prize, you also have to live long enough”.
This was one of those talks where you loose track of time. It was not until it was over that I realized that it had gone on for over 90 minutes. The slides for the talk are available at Osheroff’s home page at Stanford University.
This is from the “Mario’s Entangled Bank” blog ( http://pineda-krch.com ) of Mario Pineda-Krch, a theoretical biologist at the University of Alberta.
