Teen Researching FEL Improvements Named Intel Science Talent Search Semi-Finalist

Newport News native Anne Watson is one busy teen.

There's her part-time job working for SandSecurity, a computer security firm in Poquoson, and her violin lessons. She’s a member of the National Honor Society and the French Club, and produces the morning live news show at Menchville High School. When not at Menchville she's at the New Horizons Governor's School for Science and Technology, taking additional classes. She studies Cuong Nhu, a Vietnamese form of self-defense through her church, and she mentors middle-school students.

Two mornings a week and part of the day on Friday, she's at Jefferson Lab, working with scientist Michelle Shinn in the Free-Electron Laser Division.

Anne Watson is pictured here with her "apodization test stand"  - some of the equipment she used to conduct her FEL resear.

Watson's not just doing a lot – she's achieving as well. In January, she placed as one of the 300 semi-finalists out of a pool of 1,602 applicants in the 2008 Intel Science Talent Search, often referred to as the "Junior Nobel Prize." Being named a semi-finalist earned her a $1,000 scholarship award.

Her application for the scholarship contest, included a paper about her work at JLab's FEL, titled "Apodizing Apertures to Optimize Laser Performance." Her project had two parts: first, a modeling stage where she used computer code, after first ensuring that it accurately reflected reality, to model how a laser beam would diffract around a circular object with smooth "unapodized" or jagged "apodized" edges, and then a testing stage where she set up and took data from the same optical setup that she had modeled and derived results from before.

In summarizing her work for the panel of distinguished judges, Watson wrote: "Lasers play an increasingly important role in diverse areas of study such as medicine or defense. In order to maximize their output, it is essential to have efficient optical equipment. Apodization of optical apertures is a valuable technique to reduce harmful diffraction while still retaining intensity. The most commonly used apodization function, the Bartlett function, was investigated through modeling and physical testing. A code called the Optical Propagation Code was utilized to assist in theoretical analysis, and experimentation took place using a Helium-Neon laser. The beam's intensity was analyzed to determine that the Bartlett function provided a significant improvement."

It is important research, according to Watson, because lasers are playing an increasingly important role in commercial applications, medicine and defense. In order to maximize a laser's light output it is essential that the optical system is functioning as efficiently as possible. The research that Shinn has mentored Watson through is helping to identify ways to improve laser optics efficiencies.

Being named a semi-finalist of the Intel Science Talent Search "added an element of accomplishment to my and Michelle's work," Watson notes. "I knew the research on apodization was going to be important by increasing the efficiency of the laser, and it felt good to be recognized nationally to that effect. I have earned other awards at regional and state science fairs on my work in other areas, specifically computer science (wireless networks, cryptography), but this award from Intel was very special. Part of the process of sending in my research included answering questions about my views on scientific reasoning, applications of research, and similar items; this helped me think about and broaden my views concerning research and where I might potentially go with science for the rest of my life.

"Michelle of course has always been there to explain, encourage, and question with me (not for me) topics that arose throughout this investigation of laser light diffraction and related areas."

Watson first came to JLab last year as a high school junior and started to work in the FEL Division as part of her studies at New Horizons. She was hired this past summer to continue working part-time through this school year.

"While Anne has not officially graduated from high school, her talents and maturity are on par with most graduate students I've worked with," comments Shinn. "It speaks well for her individually, the efforts of her family, the Newport News public school system, and the opportunities afforded her by the Commonwealth. I think Anne has a very exciting and rewarding career ahead of her, and I feel privileged to have gotten to know her as well as work with her."

The middle child of Chip and Peggy Watson (He is JLab’s High Performance Computing Group leader), Anne has applied to numerous colleges, but said she doesn’t have her heart set on any particular one. What she hopes, however, is to follow her passion for working in computer security and encryption/decryption, and to have the opportunity to study in France, where her family lived for a year while her dad was on sabbatical at CERN.

By Judi Tull
Feature Writer