Stuart Wilkins

After earning a M.Sci degree from the University of Durham, UK in 1999, WIlkins earned a Ph.D. from the University of Durham in 2002. After his Ph.D. Wilkins worked as a post-doc at the Institute for Trans-Uranium elements in Karlsruhe, Germany while at the same time working as a visiting scientist at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) in Grenoble, France. In 2005 he started at the ESRF as a staff scientist on beamline ID20 before leaving in 2006 to start as an assistant physicist at Brookhaven National Lab. Wilkins was awarded the D. A. Wright prize at the University of Durham for his thesis work and in 2008 was awarded the ESRF Young Scientist Award.

His research is currently focused on soft x-ray scattering studies of strongly correlated systems. Transition metal oxides are typical strongly correlated electron systems in which interactions strongly determine the electronic properties. Coulombic repulsion between the d-electrons of the transition metal ions tends to localize the electrons at atomic lattice sites whereas hybridization within the metal - oxygen bond to the oxygen 2p states tends to cause delocalization. These very subtle valances make transition metal oxides excellent candidates for studying metal-insulator transitions, orbital ordering, spin orbiting and lattice effects. These systems are known to be characterized by large numbers of competing, and complex, ground states, extreme sensitivity to perturbations, and to exhibit many remarkable, and potentially useful, properties.