Christopher Ridgers
Professor

Profile

Career

Qualifications: MSci (Cambridge); PhD (Imperial College London)

Previous Posts:

• Postdoctoral research assistant, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (Oct 2007-May 2008);
• Postdoctoral research assistant, Imperial College London (May 2008-Oct 2010);
• Postdoctoral research assistant, University of Oxford (Oct 2010-Jan 2012)

Summary of expertise:

• Kinetic theory of laser-produced plasmas
• simulations of inertial confinement fusion plasmas (ICF) plasmas
• Theory and simulation of laser-produced quantum electrodynamic (QED)-plasmas

Roles in the School of Physics, Engineering and Technology

• Programme Leader MSc in Fusion Energy

Research

Overview

Research group: 

Research interests

• Theory and simulations of non-classical transport effects in inertial confinement fusion plasmas; considering, in particular, the role of non-locality and inverse bremsstrahlung in the presence of magnetic fields.  The development of reduced non-local models for inclusion in radiation hydrodynamics codes and benchmarking these reduced models with kinetic simulations.
• Relativistic electron beam propagation and collimation in laser-produced plasmas.  Investigation of self-collimation and novel collimation schemes relevant to fast-ignition inertial confinement fusion.
• Quantum electrodynamic (QED) plasmas produced by ultra-high intensity lasers.  The development of a kinetic theory to describe such plasmas and the use of this theory to describe basic QED-plasma phenomena such as the absorption of electromagnetic waves.

Projects

Laser absorption to gamma-ray photons and electron-positron pairs in laser-produced QED plasmas, kinetic modelling of ICF plasmas.

Teaching

Undergraduate

• Stage one electromagnetism

Postgraduate

• MSc Further plasma physics

Other teaching

• MPhys and BSc projects on topics in plasma physics