Adrian

..a passionate physicist,
adventurous Scout,
energetic musician and
eager Wu Shu Kwan instructor.

Welcome to my website!
Adrian

I love physics!

I dived into physics with a theoretical education at the University of Bern. I then decided to focus on researching collective effects of charged particle beams. After my PhD and Senior Fellowship at CERN, Geneva, I am now working as an accelerator physicist in collective beam dynamics on the FAIR project at GSI in Germany. See my ORCID records to learn more about my physics passion.

As a kid I fell in love with programming my pocket calculator...

... and now, in my research on beam dynamics, I often develop particular numerical simulation software. High-performance-computing techniques such as GPU computing play a major role in my modelling. Have a look at my GitHub profile. I especially like the PyHEADTAIL playground repository where I contribute some cool projects. They are exhibited in CERN's SWAN gallery on beam dynamics which I initiated.

Some selected publications

Simulation study of the space charge limit in heavy-ion synchrotrons

A. Oeftiger et al.
Published in Phys.Rev.Accel.Beams 25 (2022) 5, 054402.


PRAB published tune diagram for FAIR SIS100 beam loss with space charge
HPC simulations. Central aspects: direct space charge is a key performance limitation for delivering highest-intensity heavy-ion beams to the FAIR experiments (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research). An approximative and a precise self-consistent 3D simulation model are established, involving a measurement-based detailed field error model for SIS100, the central synchrotron. The space charge limit is predicted and powerful mitigation approaches are explored to significantly push the machine performance.

Self-consistent long-term dynamics of space charge driven resonances in 2D and 3D

I. Hofmann, A. Oeftiger and O. Boine-Frankenheim.
Published in Phys.Rev.Accel.Beams 24 (2021) 2, 024201.


PRAB published long-term 3D dynamics around envelope instability
Conceptual groundwork. Findings: in Gaussian distributed beams, space charge driven coherent resonances of nonlinear order are Landau damped. Incoherent resonance stop-bands surround the remaining coherent stop-bands on time scales as relevant for synchrotrons. Frozen nonlinear space charge models are a valid fast tool and appropriately predict resonance-free tune areas where the beam remains unharmed.

Proof-of-Principle Direct Measurement of Landau Damping Strength at the Large Hadron Collider with an Antidamper

S. Antipov, A. Oeftiger et al.
Published in Phys.Rev.Lett. 126 (2021) 16.


PRL published measured stability diagrams
New experimental approach. Insights: the transverse feedback system in the LHC is used as a controllable impedance source to characterise the stability boundaries. The threshold gain and phase of the feedback are identified where an instability starts to be driven. The thus created stability diagram gives a new and straight-forward measurement of the Landau damping provided by the intrinsic non-linearities of a synchrotron.

Requirements and Results for Quadrupole Mode Measurements

A. Oeftiger
Published in Conf.Proc. HB'2018.


HB published quadrupolar beam response
New beam diagnostics technique. Baseline: quadrupole beam response measurements of a bunched beam give access to directly quantify space charge strength from quadrupole mode frequency shifts. The quadrupolar spectrum of elongated bunches is found to feature entire bands of quadrupole mode eigenfrequencies.

Beam Instabilities in Hadron Synchrotrons

E. Métral, A. Oeftiger et al.
Published in IEEE Trans.Nucl.Sci. 63 (2016) 2, 1001-1050.


IEEE published hollow bunch simulation
Overview paper of collective beam instabilities. My contribution: rf gymnastics simulations showing how to create hollow bunches, which serves to make bunches less sensitive to space charge detuning while keeping the same bunch intensity.

Find more...

...of my published works on:

Google Scholar, ORCID and on INSPIRE-HEP

Teaching activities

2022 – now: Lecturer

Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology, TU Darmstadt (Germany)

Numerical Methods of Accelerator Physics

2021 – now: Lecturer

Joint Universities Accelerator School, European Scientific Institute, Archamps (France)

Accelerator Design Workshop
(course taught together with Bastian Härer)

2014 – 2015: Instructor

Laboratory of Particle Accelerator Physics, EPFL Lausanne (Switzerland)

Introduction to Particle Accelerators
(course taught by Prof. Dr. Leonid Rivkin)

2009 – 2013: Teaching Assistant

Institute of Theoretical Physics, University of Bern (Switzerland)

Physics with Mathematical Methods I and II
(courses taught by Prof. Dr. Urs Wenger)

Quantum Mechanics I
(course taught by Prof. Dr. Uwe-Jens Wiese)

Statistical Thermodynamics II
(course taught by Prof. Dr. Urs Wenger)

Supervised student projects

My thesis projects

Longitudinal phase space of hollowed particle distribution
WMAP image of Universe timeline

Master Thesis

On cosmic scales our Universe expands ‐ but does your bedroom expand with it? Albert Einstein's general relativity gave me answers.. Investigating the effect of global cosmological expansion on local dynamics, I found essentially two distinct behaviours: some physical systems such as atoms or our Solar System remain bounded, while gravitationally attracted intergalactic objects recede with the Hubble flow. (Think e.g. of galaxy groups at distances of 10 million light years and farther..)

Image credit: NASA/WMAP Science Team


Lamé potential energy bands

Bachelor Thesis

Supersymmetric quantum mechanics is an intriguing off-the-beaten-path technique to solve the quantised energy spectra of potentials. I am particularly interested in periodic systems ‐ and so I investigated the Lamé or ellipsoidal harmonic potentials as a highlight of this thesis. They feature energy band structures which can actually be expressed in semi-analytical form.


Volunteer work for Scout Movement

I entered the Scouts at the age of 7. It is here where I discovered my love for playing the guitar, exploring Nature, taking responsibility for myself and others, creating wonderful projects in supportive teamwork, and shaping ground-breaking international Scout collaborations.

A few highlights of my Scout life: 4 years of youth leadership in our city's local group "Ata Ulf", team leading conductor in the ScoutingTrain 2014 adventure, organising a "quint-national" long-term programme called S-TEAM in 2015–2016 and establishing a Franco-German Scout organisation partnership with a youth leader exchange platform "XPRO" which regularly takes place since 2017.

Between 2016 and 2019 I shared my passion for physics with the Swiss Silver Scouts in our annual event, where I guided twenty to thirty participants from all across Switzerland through CERN, motivating our fundamental research in physics.

Since 2019 I am working in a small team of volunteers on Azimuth, an online platform to connect Scouts and Guides from all across the European Region. We launched the full platform in autumn 2021 with already a few dozen countries onboard.

My private life

Family Oeftiger

Family Hikes

I love hiking with my dear wife and daughters. We continue to explore beautiful places in the world... the more off the beaten track the better! The photo shows us hiking across a mountain ridge in Iceland.


Kicking self-defence technique

Wu Shu Kwan

While some call it a style of Kung Fu, Wu Shu Kwan really is a distinguished martial art by itself. I draw so much energy and focus from our self-defence training. Exercising always feels like meeting family, no matter whether it's our local Wu Shu Kwan trainings which I teach in Darmstadt or when we organise sessions with inspiring UK instructors.

Image shows a kicking self-defence technique with Lucy (3rd Degree Black Belt), credit: Alex Sutter.


Soul'd'Out in concert

Soul'd'Out

Let me introduce you to my funk&soul band Soul'd'Out. Our groovy sessions in Geneva pumped me up, backing our amazing singer Anne with my Nord Electro or with the Hammond X-5 and my Leslie P3300! We've had some great nights in the Montreux jazz cafe, the famous hotel Beau Rivage, the notorious Pickwick's bar, and many more places.


Work Address


GSI Helmholtz Centre
for Heavy Ion Research,
Planckstr. 1,
D-64291 Darmstadt,
Germany

Email


my first name [at] my last name .net

Phone