Research activity:
I'm currently a contract Professor of History of Physics and an affiliated member at the Department
of Physics of the University of Trento. My research activity concerns Condensed Matter Theory, with special emphasis
on electronic structure of low-dimensional systems and Quantum Monte Carlo methods and, with increasing importance
(and satisfaction) in recent years, interdisciplinary topics at the crossroads between Physics and Philosophy, which
I like to think as a roadmap to the "conscience" of Physics.
1. Philosophy, History and Teaching of Physics.
What is the role of physics in the contemporary world? What could it rather be? How does
it relate with other disciplines, in particular the humanities?
A programmatic reflection has been published in:
L.C., Bridging the two cultures, Physics World, 24, (6), 16 (2011)
Analysis and overturning of Wilhelm Dilthey's thesis on the
demarcation between natural- and spiritual sciences. Results are being publish
in
Overturning Dilthey's view on Natural Sciences, Epistemologia. An Italian Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 2/2014.
In this paper I also address the problem of unification
of the "two cultures" in a somewhat provocative way: it is the natural science which
should be seen as a spiritual one (e.g. taking Edmund Husserl's reflections on how
the world is given to our consciusness), rather than the opposite (e.g. as proposed by Positivism).
Physics is not only a booster for technology: it is an incubator of powerful concepts, though
this attitude is rarely highlighted.
What is the meaning related to these concepts? Consider for example such overall concepts as continuity/discontinuity,
causality, locality or more specific ideas like perturbation or field: can they be exported to other subject matters?
A reflection on this - with a deep incursion into philosophy, with special reference to Husserl's Phenomenology -
would show how physics, and natural sciences in general, connect
to the so-called spiritual science (2014 - Ongoing research).
A didactical reflection on this subject has already been presented in:
L.C., Dare significato alla fisica, La Fisica nella Scuola, XLVII n.1, 17-27 (2014)
Relationship between physics and literature. Is it possible any conciliation between the aridity of physics (e.g.
as seen by Husserl) and the warmth of literature? A reflection, based on the above idea of a semantic content
of physics concepts which would be larger than the strict physical use of these concepts,
is being publish in a collective book on the subject (edited by the Erlangen Center for Literature and Natural Sciences).
Quantum mechanics has the merit to have brought the subject back into the world studied by physics. This is
the central theme of a study performed under a grant by the Department of Physics in 2011:
L.C., Il "lamento di Schroedinger" e il ruolo della soggettivita' nelle scienze fisiche ("Schroedinger's lamentation" and the role of subjectivity in physics), Atti Acc. Rov. Agiati, a.261, 2011, ser. VIII, vol. XI, B: 21-41
Past works have focused on the introduction of epistemology in the physics classroom.
See for example the two papers:
L.C., On Dragons and Turkeys: Physics for Future Citizens, School Science Review, 91 (337) (2010)
L.C., Valore e attualita' dell' insegnamento della fisica, La Fisica nella Scuola, XXXVIII, 2 (2004)
A couple of papers concern short reconstructions of the development of electromagnetism (as the first
scientific enterprise conducted across several nations):
L.C., Dalla pila alla radio: una storia stilizzata dell'elettromagnetismo e relativa epistemologia, Fillide, 2/2011
and of some humor which worked out surprisingly efficiently in developing methods and theories of physics:
L.C., Una breve aneddotica al servizio dell'epistemologia della fisica, Fillide, 1/2010
A major effort in approaching the history and philosophy of physics in an original and communicative way is
condensed in a book published in 2011 by Lindau, Torino (Italian edition) and in 2014 by Little Seed, Seoul (Korean edition):
Leonardo Colletti, Quadri di un'esposizione. Le grandi idee della fisica attraverso 32 capolavori della pittura, Lindau, Torino, p.272, 2011.
Exhibition Paintings. The Great Ideas of Physics Through 32 Painting Masterpieces.
Sommario:
"Paolo e Francesca, due giovani amici con la passione rispettivamente per la fisica e per l'arte, si confrontano quasi per gioco davanti ad alcune opere dei piu' grandi artisti: da Magritte a Boccioni, da Bruegel il Vecchio a Seurat, da Chagall a Manet, da Murillo a Matisse, da Otto Dix a Escher, da Giotto a Caravaggio. Ogni quadro, riprodotto puntualmente nel libro, permette di ripercorrere i passaggi decisivi nella storia della fisica, di cui vengono esposti i concetti, i principi e le leggi fondamentali: dall' entropia alla massa, dalla quantistica alle radiazioni cosmiche, dai moti turbolenti alle propagazioni, dall'inerzia alle buche di potenziale. La grande competenza dell'autore, insieme a una non comune capacita' divulgativa, fanno di questo libro un'efficace introduzione, accessibile a qualunque lettore, a una materia complessa e in costante divenire." (lafeltrinelli.it)
Abstract:
"Paolo and Francesca, two young friends loving respectively physics and art, have fun confronting each other in front of some works of the greatest artists: from Magritte to Boccioni, from Bruegel the Elder to Seurat, from Chagall to Manet, from Murillo to Matisse, from Otto Dix to Escher, from Giotto to Caravaggio. Every painting, repro- duced in the book, guides through the most important stages of the history of physics. In it, we find the concepts, the principles and the basic laws of physics: from entropy to mass, from quantum theory to cosmic radiations, from turbulent motions to propagation, from inertia to potential holes. The great competence of the author, together with uncommon explanation skills, makes this book an effective introduction, accessible to all readers, to a complex and constantly developing subject. For many people, physics and art express opposite polarities of the human mind. And yet, writes Leonardo Colletti, the works of the great art masters, can be an opportunity for discussing in original way scientific concepts such as "energy", "light", "matter", and to compare the possibilities and the limits of the scientific method. This book addresses readers who see physics as a cold and difficult subject (that is to say, most of us), but who, at the same time, are curious about it and interested in a high-level scientific divulgation."
(Frankfurt Book Fair, 2011, Rights List, Lindau)
Recensioni (Book reviews of the Italian edition):
"Esempio raro, in Italia, di divulgazione scientifica" (L'Adige)
"una piacevole introduzione" (Club 3)
"Getta un ponte tra scienza e umanesimo [...] Le associazioni sono di
rado scontate [...] La capacita' divulgativa di Colletti e' di ottimo livello [...] e
rende questo libro utilissimo" (il Venerdi, La Repubblica)
"un incredibile viaggio [...] un piccolo caso letterario" (Alto Adige)
2. Computational methods for the solution of many-body problems and electronic low-dimensional systems.
Ongoing research concerns the use of Quantum Monte Carlo to calculate low-energy excitations
of quantum dots via a proper inversion of the correlation function (grant by the Autonomous Province of Bolzano-Bozen)
.
Past research has dealt both with the development of simulation methods to address the Fermion Sign problem
and with the use of Quantum Monte Carlo and Density Functional approaches for predicting energy levelsand other properties in electronic quantum dots.
Results have been published in:
L.C., F. Malet, M. Pi, F. Pederiva
Quantum Monte Carlo study of few-electron concentric double quantum rings, Physical Review B 79, 125315 (2009)
L.C., E. Lipparini, F. Pederiva, C. J. Umrigar
Polarizability in quantum dots via correlated quantum Monte Carlo
in Recent Progress in Many-Body Theories, Vol. 11 (2008)
L.C., E. Lipparini, F. Pederiva, C. J. Umrigar
Spin- and charge density excitations in quantum dots via Quantum Monte Carlo simulation
, Physica status solidi (b) 244, No.7, 2317-2321 (2007)
F. Pederiva, F. Reboredo, D. Bressanini, D. Guclu, L. C., C. J. Umrigar, M. H. Kalos
, The Fixed Hypernode Method for the Solution of the Many Body Schroedinger Equation
Chapter 7 of Advances in Quantum Monte Carlo, Editors: J. B. Anderson and S. M. Rothstein (2007)
M. H. Kalos, L. C., F. Pederiva, Fermion Monte Carlo calculations of liquid He-3
Jour. Low. Temp., 38, 3/4, 747 (2005)
L. C., F. Pederiva, E. Lipparini, C. J. Umrigar, Investigation of excitation energies and Hund's rule
in open shell quantum dots by Diffusion Monte Carlo
Eur. Phys. Jour. B, 27, 385-392 (2002)
M. Barranco, L. C., A. Emperador, E. Lipparini, M. Pi, Ll. Serra
, Wave-vector dependence of spin and density multipole excitations in quantum dots
Phys. Rev. B, 61, 12 8289-8297 (2000)
L. C., Atomi Artificiali
Le Scienze, 374, 78-86, Ottobre 1999
- also published in NUOVI MATERIALI, Le Scienze Quaderni, Settembre 2000
- also published in NANOTECNOLOGIE, Le Scienze Dossier, Aprile 2002
N. Barraza, L. C., M. P. Tosi, Vacancies in quantal Wigner crystals near melting
Solid State Communications, 112 (1999) 261
E. Lipparini, L. C., G. Orlandini, Ll. Serra, Collective spin states
in the electron gas in different dimensions and geometries
Czech. Jour. of Phys., 48 (1998)
Courses 2014/2015:
Contacts:
Dipartimento di Fisica, Universita' degli Studi di Trento
via Sommarive, 14 I-38123 Povo (TN)
colletti@science.unitn.it
Papers & Talks
ph.
