Department of Physics, Engineering Physics and Astronomy Graduate Theses
Recent Submissions
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Quasinormal-mode theory and design of elastic Purcell factors, mechanical cavity modes and Fano resonances in optomechanical beams
In optomechanical systems, the radiation forces exerted by photons are exploited to manipulate and measure mechanical motion, finding applications is optics, nanophotonics, mechanics, and gravitational wave detection. To ... -
Characterization of pyrene films for background rejection in liquid argon dark matter experiments
About a hundred years after the first references to dark matter, the mystery around the nature of that elusive type of matter has still not been solved. Direct detection dark matter experiments are getting more and more ... -
Rocks and Stars, Earth and Mars: a Deluge of Distinct Dark Sector Detectors
The nature of dark matter remains among the most confounding conundra in modern physics. This thesis studies the potential consequences of the existence of relatively high-mass, strongly-interacting dark matter. In particular, ... -
Theory and Computation of Intrinsic Propagation Losses and Disorder-Induced Modes in Topological Photonic Crystal Waveguides Using Mode Expansion Techniques
Photonic crystal (PC) slabs are promising optical systems for manipulating the flow of light on the nanoscale as a result of their combined in-plane lattice structure and slab waveguide properties. By introducing a line ... -
Measurements of a DC Gas Discharge
To investigate properties of gas discharges and to evaluate the design and implementation of a Langmuir probe diagnostic, an array of several probes was designed and inserted into an intermediate pressure direct-current ... -
Valley polarization in biased bilayer graphene using circularly-polarized light
There exist two inequivalent local minima in graphene's electronic band structure known as valleys or Dirac points which are labelled K and K'. The valley index is binary and the concept of using this two-state system to ... -
Neutron Calibration System for the Cryogenic Underground Test Facility (CUTE)
The mystery of Dark Matter in our universe has puzzled scientists over the past century, and a large number of experimental ventures have been conducted hoping to find an answer. The Weakly Interacting Massive Particle ... -
Dark Matter-Neutrino Scattering in the Galactic Centre with IceCube
While there is evidence for the existence of dark matter, its properties have yet to be discovered. Simultaneously, the nature of high-energy astrophysical neutrinos detected by IceCube remains unresolved. If dark matter ... -
Experimental speed distribution measurements and NHC self-assembly on Au(111)
In Part 1, I present experimental measurements of the speed distribution in atomic beams produced by physical vapour deposition. These measurements are still needed in the literature, especially in collisionless beams ... -
The Bilayer Polymer Light-Emitting Electrochemical Cells
Polymer light-emitting electrochemical cells (LECs) are solid-state polymer devices that form light-emitting p-n junctions in situ from electrochemical doping, which occurs under an applied voltage or current bias. LECs ... -
Development of Low-Energy Calibration Techniques for SuperCDMS using LEDs Operated at Cryogenic Temperatures
The desire to unveil the mystery of dark matter which, according to compelling astrophysical and cosmological evidence, constitutes about 85% of the matter in the Universe, drives physicists to continuously develop their ... -
Pulse fitting for event localization in high purity germanium point contact detectors
P-type Point Contact (PPC) detectors are used in rare-event searches, such as neutrinoless double-beta decay and dark matter searches, due to their low radioactive backgrounds and low energy thresholds. The Majorana ... -
Laying Foundations for a Nanophotonics Research Centre and an Emergency Communications Network
An interdisciplinary collaboration at Queen's is aiming to advance the frontiers of nanophotonics through shared equipment that will be introduced to the new Nanophotonics Research Centre (NanoRC), enabling picometer- and ... -
Search For Invisible Nucleon Decay in SNO+ With Improved Sensitivity
The water phase of the SNO+ (Sudbury Neutrino Observatory) experiment has completed after the collection of ~305 days of total livetime worth of data, divided into two main sets. The effective concentration of U-238 and ... -
Temperature Dependent Emission of Acrylic Relative to Tetrapheynl Butadiene (TPB)
After decades of astronomical observation and study, the majority of mass in the universe is known to be composed of dark matter, an unknown substance which is strictly non-luminous unlike the more familiar baryonic matter. ... -
Molecular-level study of N-heterocyclic carbenes: Binding modes and self-assembly on Au(111)
Self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) of organic molecules are extensively used to functionalize surfaces for a wide range of applications from medicine to nanophotonics. However, creating a SAM that is sufficiently stable has ... -
Solar KK axion search with NEWS-G
In theories with extra dimensions, the standard QCD axion has excited states with higher mass. These Kaluza-Klein (KK) axions would have a signi cantly shorter decay time and, when produced by the Sun, would remain ... -
Anisotropic Fluid Solutions to Einstein's Equations in Spherical Symmetry
The main objective of this thesis is to develop and investigate a class of spherically symmetric solutions to Einstein's field equations for anisotropic matter distributions. This work is partially motivated by a recent ... -
Neutron Measurements and Reactor Antineutrino Search with the SNO+ Detector in the Water Phase
The SNO+ experiment is a large-scale liquid scintillator neutrino experiment with a wide range of physics objectives. SNO+ has adopted a staged approach where the detector was first filled with ultra-pure water before ... -
Quantum Trajectory Theory of Open Cavity-QED Systems with a Time Delayed Coherent Optical Feedback
The emergence of integrated (or solid state) photonic systems, including quantum dots, waveguides, and cavities, has provided a base to harness quantum optic phenomena for use in current and future quantum technologies. ...
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