Amanda Petford-Long facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Amanda Petford-Long FREng
Born	Amanda Karen Petford
Alma mater	University College London (BSc) University of Oxford (DPhil)
Scientific career
Institutions	Northwestern University Argonne National Lab Arizona State University
Thesis	Structural studies of various β-aluminas (1984)
Doctoral advisor	Colin Humphreys

Amanda Karen Petford-Long is a very important scientist. She is a Professor of Materials Science. She also works as a Distinguished Fellow at the Argonne National Laboratory. She is also a professor at Northwestern University.

Becoming a Scientist

Amanda Petford-Long studied physics at University College London. She finished her first degree in 1981. She then earned her PhD degree from the University of Oxford in 1985. Her research was about special materials called Beta-alumina solid electrolytes. Her teacher for this research was Colin Humphreys. She was a student at St. Cross College, Oxford.

Her Work and Discoveries

Professor Petford-Long worked as a professor at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, starting in 2002. She studied tiny materials called nanocomposites. She also worked with magnetic nanoparticles. These are super small magnets. She used a special tool called an atom probe to study them.

In 2005, she was chosen as a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering. She was the only woman to receive this honor that year. Later in 2005, she moved to Argonne National Laboratory.

Leading Research

From 2010 to 2014, she was the director of the Center for Nanoscale Materials. Here, she helped create new ways to study materials at a very tiny scale. She gave a talk about science and technology in Chicago in 2014.

She has explored how tiny structures and magnetic fields work together. This includes materials called multiferroics. She also works with another scientist, Jacqueline Johnson. They study a special type of glass called fluorozirconate glass. They use a method called pulsed laser deposition to make very thin layers of these materials.

Her work showed that tiny crystals forming in glass can change how light passes through it. She can control how special elements like europium are spread out. This helps make new materials for things like solar cells. She even talked about her work on NPR in 2018.

Studying Magnetic Materials

Professor Petford-Long also develops new ways to look at magnetic materials. She uses a method called in situ magnetised transmission electron microscopy (TEM). This lets her see how magnetic thin films behave. She uses another method called Lorentz transmission electron microscopy. This helps her understand how tiny magnetic areas act.

She has even created special magnetic patterns called skyrmions. These are like tiny swirls of magnetism. They don't have an electric charge. She used an ion-beam to make these patterns. This allowed her to create skyrmion-like structures of different sizes. She also found that non-repeating patterns in quasicrystals could be used to store information.

Supporting Other Scientists

She was the chair of the American Physical Society Division of Materials Physics from 2018 to 2019. She also helps guide research at the Centre for Research on Adaptive Nanostructures and Nanodevices. This center is at Trinity College Dublin. She is also the Chair of the Argonne National Laboratory Chief Research Officer Council.

Professor Petford-Long is a strong supporter of women in engineering. She works to encourage young girls to study engineering in college.

Awards and Honors

Professor Petford-Long has received many honors. She is a Fellow of the American Physical Society. She is also a Fellow of the Royal Microscopical Society. And she is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering. She was also named a Distinguished Fellow at Argonne National Laboratory.