Physics, from Ancient Greek φύσις, "nature" and φυσική, "knowledge of nature". This discipline has preoccupied mankind since antiquity. Personally, I have evolved from an aspiring physicist to a practising diophysicist. Check out my Sosigenes blog.

For general physics news, please consult Nature Physics.

Almost ten years ago I wrote a paper on an experiment used to simulate the density of cosmic strings, a form of topological defect that is a candidate for the formation of large scale structures in the universe. Today, through galaxy surveys and precision measurements of the cosmic microwave background, the formation of large scale structures in the universe fits an evolution out of random, gaussian fluctuations, with the yet undetermined role of dark energy and dark matter in the process. These precison observations therefore tend to rule out a significant role of cosmic strings. Nevertheless, cosmic strings became the main theme of my graduation paper (official, handed in version is here) written under the supervision of D^r A.J. Gill and Prof D^r Michel Droz.

D^r A.J. Gill is now running his own company in London.

A reformatted and corrected version is here: "Les cordes cosmiques dans le ⁴He superfluide".

The reference articles that provided the base for the paper are listed below.

Cosmological Experiments in Condensed Matter Systems
W. H. Zurek (Los Alamos National Laboratory, USA)
Cosmological Structure Formation with Topological Defects
R. Durrer (University of Geneva, Switzerland)
Quench Induced Vortices in the Symmetry Broken Phase of Liquid ⁴He
A. J. Gill, T. W. B. Kibble (Imperial College, UK)

For more information on cosmic strings, search the web for Cosmic Strings.