Marshall Stoneham

Contact details: Office: Room 5C2 Tel: +44 (0)20 7679 1377 Ext: 31377 Fax: +44 (0)20 7679 0595 Email: ucapamsucl.ac.uk

Research Interest
Very wide interests in modelling, especially including defects and defect processes in solids. Examples of current interests include:

• Solid state approaches to quantum information processing
• Mesoscopic modelling (biomedical, ablation, solid state e.g., ceramic superconductors, organic light-emitting diodes)
• Electronic structure of defects in insulators and semiconductors
• Defect processes and non-radiative transitions, including classical and quantum diffusion
• Routes to spontaneous organisation in physical and biological systems
• Random fields in solids and their consequences
• The physical basis of biological behaviour, e.g., olfaction
• Reliability of non-destructive inspection
• Materials for fusion reactors
• Diamond
• Quantum dots and nanoscale behaviour
  
  

Other activities

2005-present  I retired at the end of September 2005, continuing research as Emeritus Massey Professor. UCL have also made me a UCL Honorary Fellow I have a visiting Senior Fellowship in the Department of Materials, University of Oxford. I was Lloyd Braga Professor in the University of the Minho, Portugal, in October 2005. Iam a Founding Director of Oxford Authentication Ltd, a physics-based SME  that authenticates art ceramics; this firm has the major part of the top-end world market. Currently Editor in Chief, Journal of Physics Condensed Matter.

Recent Publications

A M Stoneham and J H Harding 2003 Not too big, not too small: the appropriate scale Nature Materials  2  77-83  Establishes the basis for mesoscopic modelling for a wide range of systems, avoiding the brute force methods. It brings together a range of original studies by AMS and JHH.

A M Stoneham, A J Fisher, P T Greenland Optically-driven silicon-based quantum gates with potential for high temperature operation 2003 J Phys Cond Mat 15 L447-451 See also the News Feature in Nature. It was the basis of our £3.7M grant, and of a patent application going through the system. The underlying idea is optical control of electron spin entanglement in a way that could work with materials from a regular semiconductor fabrication plant and which might operate at room temperature.

A M Stoneham, J R Matthews, I J Ford 2004 J Phys Cond Matt 16 S2597-S2621 Innovative Materials for Fusion Power Plant Structures: Separating Functions Fusion is moving towards the “fast track” and will need materials developments beyond the current old ones. This is the first serious attempt to identify what might work.

A M Stoneham, J Gavartin, A Shluger 2005 J Phys Condens Matter 17 S2027-S2049. The oxide gate dielectric: Do we know all we should?  Defines the way forward for gate dielectrics, which may limit future microelectronics.  It is based on earlier papers that showed how detailed state of the art electronic structure calculations could lead to an understanding of previously unexplained features of silicon oxidation (kinetics, layer by layer growth, roughness oscillations, isotope incorporation), and possible improvements of gate dielectrics. It also links directly to my work on modifying materials by electronic excitation.

1995-2005         Massey Professor of Physics (Dept of Physics and Astronomy, and London Centre for Nanotechnology). Director, Centre for Materials Research, University College London.
The Centre for Materials Research,  an inter-departmental network involving nine UCL departments, was a key component of theLondon Centre for Nanotechnology. Both Centres actively bring together researchers from the physical and biomedical areas. In UCL Physics there was no   condensed matter research until just before I joined. Now (2004) there are over 20 academic staff. Major grants include my Basic Technology award (about 5M Euros) for quantum information processing, the UCL Interdisciplinary Research Collaboration in Nanotechnology with Bristol and Cambridge, and Carbon-based Electronics. My research, funded by industry as well as research councils, covers wide areas of modelling, e.g., quantum information technology, the nanoscience of physical and biological systems, modifying materials by electronic excitation, the scientific basis of olfaction, and applied sciences like non-destructive inspection and minimal invasive dentistry.

1993-1997                     Chief Scientist, AEA Technology (part-time from 1995 when at UCL)

1990-1993                     Director of Research, AEA Industrial Technology

1989-1990                     Division Head, Materials Physics and Metallurgy Division

- In 1989 I was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, and also a Fellow of Wolfson College, Oxford (my Wolfson Fellowship ended with my 1995 move to UCL).

1974-1989                     Group Leader, Solid State and Quantum Physics, Theoretical Physics Division, Harwell. I won Individual Merit promotions to Band level (SPSO) in 1974 and to Senior level (DCSO) in 1979.            My Group covered wide areas of modelling, with strong links to experimental and applications teams in AEA and in industry. In the 1980s, much of its work was commercially funded, and was very varied in technical content. The group maintained a high scientific profile despite the commercial demands: at the time I left the Group, it consisted of two FRS’s, 5 PSO’s and 2 SSOs, with funding mainly from non-UKAEA sources. From 1988-1990 I was also Head of Technical Area for the Department of Energy’s General Nuclear Safety Programme.       

1965   Ph D, University of Bristol

1961   B Sc, Physics, 1st Class Honours, University of Bristol.

I was Merchant Venturers’ Scholar 1958-1961.

Publications     I have published over 500 papers, many in the area of semiconductor science and engineering, especially involving defects and interfaces; others include quantum and classical diffusion. I have also written a number of books, including these:  Theory of Defects in Solids (Oxford University Press 1975, 1985, also in Russian 1977, 1978; this book is still in  print as an Oxford Classic),   Defects and Defect Processes in Non-Metallic Solids (with W Hayes; Wiley 1985, and recently re-issued by Dover Books),  Reliability of Non-destructive Inspection (with M G Silk, J A G Temple; Adam Hilger 1987), GeSi Strained Layers and their Applications” (with S C Jain, Institute of Physics Publishing 1995) and Materials Modification by Electronic Excitation (with Noriaki Itoh; Cambridge University Press 2001). I have co-authored two books on music: Wind Ensemble Sourcebook (1997, Greenwood Press), which won the Oldman Prize of the International Association of Music Librarians as the best music reference work of 1997,  and The Wind Ensemble Catalog (1998 Greenwood Press).  One of my several articles on music is cited in the Neue Mozart Ausgabe.

Research 

The self-trapped exciton in α-quartz. The green and light blue atoms are silicons, and the red and dark blue atoms are oxygens. When when the exciton is created, the hole localises on an oxygen, and displaces from its site. The electron localises on one of the silicons. This suggests a possible mechanism of generating oxygen vacancies and interstitials. The relaxation leads to avery large Stokes shift, a  major difference between optical absorption and emission energies.

Indicators of esteem / contribution to research environment (please estimate an overall RAE rating):   

Fellow of the Royal Society (elected 1989);

Fellow of Institute of Physics;

Winner of the 2006 Guthrie Prize of IoP (the IoP’s oldest Premier award)

Winner of the 1995 Royal Society Zeneca Prize

Winner of the 1997 Oldman Prize of the International Association of Music Librarians and Archivists

My Theory of Defects in Solids is now an Oxford Classic

Fellow of American Physical Society;

Fellow of Inst of Materials, Mining and Minerals

Fellow, Royal Society of Arts

Lloyd Braga Professor 2005, Universidade do Minho

Visitng Senior Fellow, Department of Materials, University of Oxford 2005-

Cockroft-Walton Lecturer (IoP/Indian Physics Association) 2004

Honorary Member, Pakistan Society for Semiconductor Science and Technology

Invited author of the DTI/OST Foresight Report on Materials Modelling and its sequel

Member of the Royal Society Working Group on Depleted Uranium

Editor in Chief, J Phys Cond Matter 2002-2006

Member of EPSRC College since its inception

Chair of EPSRC Materials Modelling Initiative Steering Committee

Member of Fusion Board (overseeing Culham Laboratory’s programme for EPSRC)

Founder member, IEE Electronic Materials Steering Committee