Sea monsters inspired both fascination and fear in the minds of the ancients. In this paper, I aim to examine several traditional monsters of antiquity with a multi-faceted approach that couples classical background with modern day zoological knowledge. Looking at the examples of the ketos and the sea serpent in Roman and Greek societies, I evaluate the scientific bases for representations of these monsters across of variety of media, from poetry to ceramics. Through the juxtaposition of the classical material and modern science, I seek to gain a greater understanding of the ancient conception of sea monsters and explain the way in which they were rationalized and depicted by ancient cultures. A closer look at extant literature, historical accounts, and artwork also helps to reveal a human sentiment towards the ocean and its denizens penetrating through time even into the modern day.

Matter wave interferometry with laser pulses has become a powerful tool for precision measurement. Optical resonators, meanwhile, are an indispensable tool for control of laser beams. We have combined these two components, and built the first atom interferometer inside of an optical cavity. This apparatus was then used to examine interactions between atoms and a small, in-vacuum source mass. We measured the gravitational attraction to the source mass, making it the smallest source body ever probed gravitationally with an atom interferometer. Searching for additional forces due to screened fields, we tightened constraints on certain dark energy models by several orders of magnitude. Finally, we measured a novel force mediated by blackbody radiation for the first time.

Utilizing technical benefits of the cavity, we performed interferometry with adiabatic passage. This enabled new interferometer geometries, large momentum transfer, and interferometers with up to one hundred pulses. Performing a trapped interferometer to take advantage of the clean wavefronts within the optical cavity, we performed the longest duration spatially-separated atom interferometer to date: over ten seconds, after which the atomic wavefunction was coherently recombined and read out as interference to measure gravity. This work demonstrates the feasibility and utility of bringing a cavity to atom interferometry.

The emergence of natural gas (NG) as an abundant, inexpensive fuel in the United States has highlighted the possibility that it could play a significant role in the transition to low carbon fuels. It is often cited as a “bridge” to low carbon fuels in the transportation sector. Major corporations are already investing billions of dollars to build NG fueling infrastructure to expand its use in U.S. trucking fleets.

In California, NG fueling infrastructure is expanding, especially in and around the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, and the use of NG-fueled medium- and heavy-duty fleets is currently on an upswing. The state is relying in part on the development and use of alternative fuels such as renewable natural gas (RNG) and hydrogen, which have low greenhouse gas and criteria pollutant emissions, to meet its climate change and air quality goals.

This policy brief summarizes findings from the research project which examines how NG infrastructure can be economically and technologically synergistic for both NG and RNG in the near term, and for RNG and other renewables such as hydrogen in the long term. In particular, it examines optimum paths for developing infrastructure in the near term that will accommodate alternative fuels once they become available at the commercial scale. The original design of California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) provides time for the development of advanced, near-zero technologies. The research considers the use of LCFS credits in its analysis.

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