Heuristic Physics Home

Heuristic physics is the personal wiki developed by Isaiah Richardson

In the beginning

The beginning of my physics journey began early in my life. During this time, I struggled with learning and coping in an educational environment. I clearly remember my father repeatedly trying to teach me the slope-intercept formula. He always stressed the importance of self-sufficiency and performance in the workplace. As I grew up, he taught me to fix and build computers, cars, bicycles, and more to develop technical and mechanical skills. My father and those who supported me inspired me to strive through thick and thin to improve my learning skills and become a useful person. With inspiration and perseverance, I gradually achieved excellent learning skills and success in academia. My lifelong search was to find a place where I can apply my talents, perform, and belong. In my search, I finally stumbled into the world of experimental physics. With experimental physics, I can use practical know-how and mathematics to explore the fundamental questions of the universe.

The college experience

Every class receives my full effort to achieve a maximum yield from my education. My devotion is displayed through the receiving of academic awards such as the Dean's List and the President Award regularly throughout my education. The first big research opportunity in my physics career was during the summer of 2019 where I attended an REU with Texas A&M at the Cyclotron Institute. At Texas A&M, I worked with Dr. Brian Roeder and Dr. Antti Saastamoinen to do nuclear physics research in producing exotic radioactive beams on the proton dripline. Using the Momentum Achromat Recoil Spectrometer (MARS) and K500 cyclotron, a $^{35,36}Ca$ beam was produced with a 40 MeV/u $^{40}Ca$ beam impinged upon Al, Be, and Ni targets. I presented these results at two conferences;

1. Physcon 2019 held in Providence, Rhode Island
2. the 2019 DNP CEU in Arlington, Virginia.

These conferences gave me first-hand experience at poster presentations that improved my ability to present in front of others and professionals physicists.

Old Dominion University

At Old Dominion University, I worked on atomic physics research for my senior thesis with Dr. Charles Sukenik and Mr. Josh Freechem. This thesis project involved the study of nonlinear absorption laser spectroscopy for laser stabilization to atomic transitions of Rubidium. I conducted optical experiments utilizing saturated absorption spectroscopy and polarization spectroscopy to study the hyperfine transitions of Rubidium at 780 nm for the $5S_{1/2}\rightarrow 5P_{3/2}$ transitions. Due to COVID-19, I was unable to fully complete the thesis project as intended due to atomic physics lab shutting down. In the future, we plan on using polarization spectroscopy to study the $5S_{1/2}\rightarrow 5D_{5/2}$ 778 nm two-photon transition in Rubidium.

Michigan State University

My academic goal is to obtain a Ph.D. in nuclear physics while working at MSU. The fields I am pursuing are particle, nuclear and accelerator physics. Currently, I am working for FRIB under Brad Sherrill doing research on beam production and identification on ARIS. I am working on experimental particle, nuclear, atomic, or accelerator physics ithat coordinates with RIKEN. I intend on working with physicists around the globe on groundbreaking scientific research similar to how physicists work at the Solvay Conferences. I am looking forward to performing great works as an experimental physicist in particle, nuclear and accelerator physics.