Annual Postgraduate Conference held at CI

The annual Cockroft Institute Postgraduate Conference (CIPGC) was held on the 15th of November 2022 in the Merrison Lecture Theatre of Daresbury Laboratory. The CIPGC is an important annual event for all CI postgraduates and it provides a platform for them to network and present research results to their peers and experienced academics. The conference was organised in-person only with the exception of overseas contributions.

Participants at the CI Postgraduate Conference 2022.

The day began with a welcome from the CI director, Prof Peter Ratoff. He reported highlights and feedback from the recent CI Scientific Board Committee meeting. The welcome was completed by the conference organiser, Dr Oznur Apsimon, who gave an overview of the plan for the day and introduced the panel members.

Catherine Swain from the University of Liverpool presenting a talk in the Novel Accelerator session.

This year again, there were a total of 16 presentations from students representing all areas of research at CI. The presenters were questioned by the audience and the judging panel composed of academic staff and CI partners. The panel then judged each presentation against a set of criteria and awarded prizes for the best three contributions.

Prizes awarded to, Alex Warwick (‘Moment tracking to improve PIC codes for astrophysical plasmas’) and Sam Smith (‘Using optimisation techniques to improve industrial linac designs’) from Lancaster University and Thomas Gallagher (‘Improved Beam Dynamics Through Control of Magnetic Fringe Fields’) from The University of Liverpool. There was no order in this year’s prizes. The awards were announced by Prof Ratoff.

Prof Peter Ratoff with the prize winners Tom Gallagher, Sam Smith and Alex Warwick (from left to right).

This year’s post-conference social event was back on! Many attendees and speakers enjoyed a few games of bowling in Warrington after the conference and following pizza night.