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Helen Margolis is the Head of Science for Time & Frequency and now an NPL Senior Fellow in Optical Frequency Standards and Metrology. She joined NPL in 1998 following a temporary lectureship at the University of Oxford, where she worked on a range of experiments designed to test the theory of quantum electrodynamics by spectroscopy of highly charged ions.
While working at NPL, Helen has made many notable contributions in the field of time and frequency metrology, many stemming from the femtosecond comb capability she has established. Under her leadership, these frequency combs have been used to reduce the frequency uncertainties of NPL's optical clocks, to validate their performance through international comparisons and to make improved tests of fundamental physical theories. This work is a key part of our research programme towards a redefinition of the SI second.
Helen represents NPL on the Consultative Committee for Time and Frequency and several of its working groups. She has made particularly significant contributions to the Frequency Standards Working Group, developing new approaches to analysing the worldwide body of clock comparison data to derive optimised frequency values and uncertainties for secondary representations of the second. This work is improving the stability of International Atomic Time by maximising the contributions of optical clocks prior to a redefinition of the second.
She is also the Technical Authority for the National Timing Centre programme, which she helped position NPL to win through her contributions to two Blackett reviews led by government. She chaired the Executive Committee of the European Frequency and Time Forum from 2018 - 2021, has been a Visiting Professor at the University of Oxford since 2017 and was awarded an MBE in 2019 for her services to metrology.
Find out more about Helen here
12 Jan 2023