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HEPL, founded in 1947 as Stanford's first Independent Laboratory, provides facilities and administrative structure enabling faculty to do research that spans across the boundaries of a single department or school—for example: physics & engineering or physics & biology/medicine. The Independent Laboratory concept, in many ways unique to Stanford, facilitates world-class research and teaching. The icons above represent 15 research programs currently administered by HEPL. Click on any icon for more information about that program. For more information about HEPL research, see the Research page.

News in Brief

The geodetic and frame-dragging measurements and the Schiff Equation for calculating these relativity effects.

August 19, 2011

New method developed by HEPL's Solar Research Group detects emerging sunspots deep inside the sun

The first clear detection of emerging sunspot regions prior to any indication of the region in magnetograms was publishe today in the journal, Science.

Sunspots, dark features in the solar photosphere with strong magnetic field, have been observed for more than 400 years. They are the most visible components of regions where solar flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) occur, and these eruptive events may cause power outages and interruptions of telecommunication and navigation services on the Earth. Although it is widely believed that sunspot regions are generated in the deep solar interior, the detection of these regions before they emerge from the convection zone into the photosphere has remained undetected until now.

More...

LWS/SDO-3/SOHO-26/GONG Workshop poster

Coming October 31 - Nov 4

LWS/SDO-3/SOHO-26/GONG-2011 Workshop
Solar Dynamics and Magnetism from the Interior to the Atmosphere

Bechtel Conference Center – Encina Hall

The goal of the workshop is to discuss recent advances and new problems in the exploration of the Sun's interior structure, solar dynamics and dynamo, mechanisms of sunspot and active regions formation, sources of solar irradiance variations, and links between the subsurface dynamics, flaring and CME activity.

Important Dates

  • Applications for travel support: August 15, 2011
  • Abstract submission deadline: September 1, 2011
  • Early registration deadline: September 19, 2011
  • Foreign national NASA tour signup deadline: September 26, 2011

Online Information and Registration

https://sdo3.lws-sdo-workshops.org/

View/Download PDF Conference Flyer

 

The geodetic and frame-dragging measurements and the Schiff Equation for calculating these relativity effects.

May 4, 2011

Gravity Probe B Announces Final Experimental Results at NASA Headquarters

On 4 May 2011, NASA Headquarters in Washington DC hosted a 50-minute GP-B Science Update for the purpose of announcing the final results of the Gravity Probe B experiment to the press, media and the public.

This event, which was televised live on NASA TV and streamed live from the NASA TV website, featureda panel of five presenters:

  • Francis Everitt, GP-B Princial Investigator
  • Bill Danchi, Senior Astrophysicist and GP-B Program Scientist at NASA Headquarters
  • Rex Geveden, President of Teledyne-Brown Engineering
  • Colleen Hartman, Senior NASA Advisor and Research Professor at George Washington University
  • Clifford Will, Professor of Physics, Washington University, and Chairman of the GP-B Science Advisory Committee

The experimental results are in agreement with Einstein's theoretical predictions of the geodetic effect (0.28% margin of error) and the frame-dragging effect (19% margin of error). More...