Physicists from around the nation gathered in Huntsville for the first Annual International Alabama Plasma Physics Conference (AIAPC), which was held from October 28 to 30.

The conference — which attracted scientists, researchers, faculty, and students — is part of statewide efforts to make Alabama a hub for the plasma science and engineering (PSE) industry.

Future Technologies and Enabling Plasma Processes (FTPP), which is supported by a five-year $20 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF), is at the center of these efforts.

“Successful completion of the current FTPP grant, now in its second year, positions Alabama to capture the NSF Regional Innovation Engines grant for $160 million,” said FTPP representative Jim Steele.

Members of FTPP believe that Huntsville has the potential to emerge as a center for plasma physics research, much as it evolved into a capital for space exploration in the post WWII era.

Dr. Gary Zank, principal investigator for the FTPP grant, chaired the conference committee.

The conference was titled “AI-Informed Plasma Physics: the Opportunities.”

While the public has become increasingly familiar with Artificial Intelligence (AI) in recent years, plasma physicists have been utilizing AI and machine learning for nearly a decade, Zank told the Business Journal.

“One of the things Huntsville is, and should be, interested in is the utilization of this new information age that’s being developed as we speak,” said Zank.

Zank would like to see the broader public have a more full understanding of the potential of AI in the sciences.

“In particular, I want our students to get a far better understanding of the opportunities that AI and machine learning offer and the kinds of science that can be done with this — how it can augment what we already do and how it can take, in this case, plasma physics to application domains that have not really been thought about and which can make a huge difference to society,” said Zank.

Dr. Paulo Alves, who is an assistant professor at UCLA, traveled from California to attend the conference.

“I think this is a great place for us to share ideas and learn from each other. We are still figuring out the most exciting ways to harness these new tools to make scientific advances,” Alves told the Business Journal.

AI is known for being useful at pattern recognition across massive amounts of data, and there are not many fields of scientific inquiry that are more complex than plasmas.

Dr. Vyacheslav (Slava) Lukin, program director at the National Science Foundation (NSF)’s Division of Physics, elaborated.

“Applying machine learning seems to have real promise in understanding this very complex system where we actually don’t know how to write down equations on a finite piece of paper,” said Lukin.

Alves simplified this complex topic when he explained the basic definition of plasma.

“Plasmas are very hot gasses,” explained Alves. “They are often referred to as the fourth state of matter. Plasma is ubiquitous in the universe.”

While plasma is not frequently encountered on Earth, it is the most abundant state of matter in the universe, stated Alves.

Dr. Enrico Camporeale, a research scientist at the University of Colorado Boulder, studies space weather. The equations that answer the questions encountered by Camporeale are rooted in plasma physics.

“The sun is very active. It continuously ejects something that we call the solar wind, which is a kind of plasma — mostly electrons and ions,” explained Camporeale.

If these winds are energetic enough they can release particles that can have negative effects on satellites.

“On the ground, we are interested in the effects on the power grid, which are upset by changing electric fields,” said Camporeale. “There have been some cases in the past where there were regional blackouts.”

In space, NASA and SpaceX are interested in how space weather might interact with their missions.

Camporeale and his peers are working to develop models to predict space weather patterns far enough in advance that measures may be put in place to mitigate potential negative outcomes of these space weather events.

Plasma physics is leading to promising applications in the medical, information technology, agricultural, and automotive industries as well.

“I have colleagues, as part of the FTPP program, who are making stents,” said Zank.

Zank explained that plasma physics can be utilized to make medical technologies with specific, desirable properties. In the case of stents, the tubes can be treated in a way that resists blood coagulation. This helps prevent blood clots from forming around the stents.

While discussions of plasma physics may feel lofty or inaccessible to the average layperson, the benefits the field is anticipated to have on the local and regional economy may be widely felt.

Zank anticipates that plasma physics will join biology and information technology as three of the leading disciplines of the 21st century.

“If you’re going to be part of the 21st century workforce, and you’re going to create an industry around that topic, you better be on the cutting edge of where that discipline is going,” said Zank. “And that discipline, in part, is being driven by ideas of AI and machine learning because it’s one of the few really new tools that allows you to handle this enormous amount of data.”

Adam Smith, a physics Ph.D. candidate at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and conference presenter, hopes to be part of the workforce that will leverage plasma physics to solve issues that pose challenges to society.

Smith studies superconductivity and employs AI to simulate the behavior of a vast number of particles. He is excited about the future of his field.

“It’s propelling us toward the future of material science, towards discoveries that might change our world — like fusion — in terms of creating sustainable, clean energy,” Smith told the Business Journal.

The opportunities that this emerging industry will bring to Huntsville, and to the Southeast, will be both high paying and meaningful.

“Data shows that somebody who has a degree, even a Bachelor’s degree — certainly advanced degrees — in physics and sciences are eminently employable at a high level of income,” said Lukin. “It’s the critical thinking and the perseverance skill set that they obtain as scientists that then carries them forward in the career and the job market.”

The field of plasma physics is promising, both for those who will find rewarding work in the field and for those whose quality of life will be improved by technologies developed through its study.