Welcome to the

Scottish Universities Summer Schools in Physics

WEB Site

For information on the forthcoming school see

SUSSP80
2nd High-Pressure Single-Crystal X-Ray Diffraction Summer School
22-26 July 2024
University of Edinburgh, Scotland

A Brief History

The Scottish Universities Summer School in Physics, SUSSP, was established in 1960 by the four ancient Scottish Universities (Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Glasgow and St. Andrews) to contribute to the dissemination of advanced knowledge (in Physics) and the formation of contacts among scientists from different countries through the setting up of a series of annual summer schools of the highest international standard. The subject area of each school would be such as to reflect the research interests of one or more of these Universities. The number of Scottish Universities supporting SUSSP has since increased to include Dundee, Glasgow Caledonian, Heriot-Watt, West of Scotland and Strathclyde. In the early years, one School was held annually but with the recent increase in the number of Scottish Universities, it has been possible in some years to hold two and sometimes three Schools.

School Format

Each School is organised by its own Executive Committee which is responsible for inviting lecturers of international standing to contribute an in-depth lecture series on one aspect of the area being studied. The participants come from all over the world and are mostly at the post-graduate or post-doctoral stage of their careers. Schools are typically of two or three weeks duration and are held in one of the many historical beauty spots within Scotland where quiet surroundings enable participants and lecturers to interact in a relaxed and effective way. In addition to the formal programme of lectures and seminars, an extensive social programme is included to contribute to the overall informal atmosphere which has become the tradition of SUSSP.

Governing Committee

The Governing Committee is responsible for overseeing and supporting the ongoing series through the Organising Committees. It meets annually in March, with its Business Committee meeting in October/November. Its ex-officio membership comprised the Professors of Physics and of Astronomy at the participating Scottish Universities and the appointed Governing Committee Office Bearers. Since 2015 the Governing Committee comprises the appointed Trustees, namely the Governing Committee Office Bearers, the Scottish Universities Physics Alliance representative for each of the eight SUPA universities and two elected independent representatives.

Support

In addition to financial contributions from the participating Scottish Universities, SUSSP was, from the beginning, indebted to the Scientific Affairs Division of NATO for generous support through ASI awards. More recently, support has been made available by the European Commission, by the UK research councils, STFC and EPSRC, and by the Scottish Universities Physics Alliance (SUPA). From 2007, funding was also been made available through a Memorandum of Understanding between STFC, EPSRC and the European Science Foundation (ESF). There are currently no such agreements in place and the Executive Committee of each School seeks its own funding from appropriate sources.

Publications

An important aspect of each school is the wider dissemination of knowledge through the publication of the proceedings of each School in the SUSSP series. Recent editions have been published in the Scottish Graduate Series by Taylor & Francis through their CRC Press division which now markets existing titles and has assumed responsibility for volumes up to and including those of the 2009 School (link to on-line catalogue). Thereafter, proceedings were published in the Scottish Graduate Series by  Springer. Since 2014 hard copy proceedings have been replaced by audio-visual recordings posted online.

Previous Schools


1
1960
Dispersion Relations

2
1961
Fluctuation, Relaxation and Resonance in Magnetic Systems

3
1962
Polarons and Excitons

4
1963
Strong Interactions and High Energy Physics

5
1964
Nuclear Structure and Electromagnetic Interactions

6
1965
Phonons in Perfect Lattices and in Lattices with Point Imperfections

7
1966
Particle Interactions at High Energy

8
1967
Methods in Solid State and Superfluid Theory

9
1968
Physics of Hot Plasmas

10
1969
Quantum Optics

11
1970
Hadronic Interactions of Electrons and Photons

12
1971
Atoms and Molecules in Astrophysics

13
1972
Electronic and Structural Properties of Amorphous Semiconductors

14
1973
Phenomenology of Particles at High Energy

15
1974
The Helium Liquids

16
1975
Non-linear Optics

17
1976
Fundamentals of Quark Models

18
1977
Nuclear Structure Physics

19
1978
Metal Non-metal Transitions in Disordered Solids

20
1979
Laser-Plasma Interactions 1

21
1980
Gauge Theories and Experiments at High Energy

22
1981
Magnetism in Solids

23
1982
Lasers: Physics, Systems and Techniques

24
1982
Laser-Plasma Interactions 2

25
1983
Quantitative Electron Microscopy

26
1983
Statistical and Particle Physics

27
1984
Fundamental Forces

28
1985
Superstrings and Supergravity

29
1985
Laser-Plasma Interactions 3

30
1985
Synchrotron Radiation

31
1986
Localisation and Interaction

32
1987
Computational Physics

33
1987
Astrophysical and Laboratory Spectroscopy

34
1988
Optical Computing

35
1988
Laser-Plasma Interactions 4

36
1989
Physics of the Early Universe

37
1990
Pattern Recognition and Image Processing

38
1991
Physics of Nanostructures

39
1991
High Temperature Superconductivity

40
1992
Quantitative Microbeam Analysis

41
1992
Spatial Complexity in Optical Systems
42
1993
High Energy Phenomenology

43
1994
Determination of Geophysical Parameters from Space

44
1994
Simple Quantum Systems

45
1994
Laser-Plasma Interactions 5: Inertial Confinement Fusion

46
1995
General Relativity

47
1995
Laser Sources and Applications

48
1996
Generation and Application of High Microwaves Power

49
1997
Physical Processes in the Coastal Zone

50
1998
Semiconductor Quantum Optoelectronics

51
1998
Muon Science

52
1998
Advances in Lasers and Applications

53
1999
Soft and Fragile Matter: Nonequilibrium Dynamics, Metastability and Flow

54
2000
The Restless Universe: Applications of Gravitational N-Body Dynamics to Planetary, Stellar and Galactic Systems

55
2001
Heavy Flavour Physics

56
2002
Ultrafast Photonics

57
2003
Large Hadron Collider Phenomenology

58
2004
Hadron Physics

59
2004
Soft Condensed Matter Physics in Molecular and Cell Biology
  60 2005
Laser Plasma Interactions
  61 2006
Neutrino Physics
http://www-archive.ph.ed.ac.uk/sussp61/
  62 2007
Extra-Solar Planets
http://www.astro.gla.ac.uk/users/martin/skye07/

63
2008
High Pressure Physics
http://www.csec.ed.ac.uk/SUSSP2008/

64
2008
Advanced Techniques in Electron Spin Resonance
http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~eprschool

65
2009
LHC Physics
http://www.ippp.dur.ac.uk/Workshops/09/SUSSP65

66
2010
Ultrafast Nonlinear Optics
http://www.sussp66.hw.ac.uk

67
2011
Quantum Coherence and Quantum Information
http://sussp67.phys.strath.ac.uk

68
2011
Laser Plasma Interactions and Applications
http://sussp68.phys.strath.ac.uk

69
2012


2013
Computational Astrophysics (cancelled)

70
2014

71
2015
Frontiers in Quantum Dynamics & Quantum Optics
http://sussp71.phys.strath.ac.uk

72
2016
Photonic Systems for Sensing and Metrology
http://www.cdtphotonics.hw.ac.uk/summer-school

73
2017
Gravitational Wave Astronomy
http://www.supa.ac.uk/research/sussp73.php

74
2018
Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Photonics
https://www.cdtphotonics.hw.ac.uk/summer-school-2018

75
2019
Nuclear Physics and Its Applications
https://sites.google.com/a/york.ac.uk/uknpss2019/


2020
No Summer School held due to Covid-19 pandemic

76
2021
Photonic Imaging, Sensing & Analysis
https://cdtphotonics.hw.ac.uk/event/summer-school/

77
2022
From Stardust to Extrasolar Planets: Dynamics of Exoplanetary and Solar System Bodies
www.astrocelta.org

78
2023

79
2023
Photonic Sensing and Spectroscopy
https://cdtphotonics.hw.ac.uk/event/sussp79/

80
2024
Second High-Pressure Single-Crystal X-Ray Diffraction Summer School
https://indico.ph.ed.ac.uk/event/282/overview

Future Schools


--
2025+
Details to be announced

Further Information

For general information contact Alan Walker (email: a.walker at ed dot ac dot uk), Trustee and Former Secretary-Treasurer of the SUSSP Governing Committee. Information on recent Schools can be obtained by contacting the appropriate SUSSP School web site above.

SUSSP is a Scottish charity registered with the Office of the Scottish Charities Regulator (OSCR) with registration number SC014864.

(Last revision 3 July 2024, Alan Walker)