Paul Kim won the Micrograph Award 2017 and tells us about his research and the trip to the École de physique des Houches in France:
The RAITH150 Two system was at the heart of all my experiments during the six years of graduate research, where I fabricated on-chip optomechanical devices to study nanoscale magnetism. As I was gaining valuable experiences with this EBL system, I was able to achieve exquisite torque sensitivity for small sub-picogram scale devices. After publishing my results, I wanted to attend and present at a prestigious conference called “spinmechanics5” joined with “NanoMRI6”. It is a rather a small but specialized group that fits well with my project for studying hybrid systems of mechanics and spin systems. I was aware of this RAITH image competition and I quickly submitted my recent work. I was delighted to know that I won the first prize, which sponsored my attendance at École de physique des Houches in France during February 2018.
First of all, I was excited to visit Europe for the first time at a desirable location in the Alps. In addition to the great scenery and delicious cheese, I came to love the conference site for historical reasons as well, where the first lectures of quantum mechanics were held in the 1950s. Many Nobel Prize winners have given lectures in this very place. For spinmechanics5 and NanoMRI6, the qualities of the talks were astounding. It was an opportunity to expand my mind, learn new techniques, and gain valuable insights on future projects. As a contribution, I have presented a poster for two nights where I networked with leaders in this field. I truly learned a lot, and I will treasure this experience.
Overloaded with much information, I was grateful to stay one more day in Geneva to sight see and to taste Swiss chocolate. It was somewhat difficult to leave the place.
I am grateful for a wonderful week in France and Swiss. It enriched my mind and body. I truly had a great time! Thanks!
