While students are flocking in (except for freshmen, who are already here) this weekend for classes to start on Monday, for the faculty, it begins tomorrow. We have a day filled with the joy of meetings: all faculty in the university followed by a college meeting and finally one for the department.
On the other hand, we do get fed twice, once by the university and once by the college. But by the department meeting we're all full and just ready to go home. Thus, it starts with a meeting of mostly announcements and is over pretty quickly. There will be another department photo this year, so watch for this next on the blog.
So, all you students and former students, just realize that the work starts sooner for us (and in May lasts longer). While you are out having the last party before classes this weekend, we're having a last fling as well home making final preparations for class and getting our syllabi and notes in order.
This morning one of our 1985 graduates, Gregory Meeks, send along a link to a video that gives a good explanation what NASA is doing and why it should be supported. Gregory is the NASA Liaison to the State of Florida and works at the Kennedy Space Center.
This fall we have 33 enrolled in Phys 105. This isn't quite a record, but it is within a few of our largest class. According to the declared degree programs and majors for these folks we have
1 major pursuing a BA degree, 32 in the BS program.
2 majors in the pre-physician assistant program.
3 in the pre-med program.
1 in pre-law
1 in pre-professional secondary education
8 are women
The pre-professional students in the program indicate that the word is getting out that physics is the best place to start such a career. We are trying a combination of making this explicit in the catalog and educating the orientation advisors.
Secondary education and the BA degree continues to appear in very small numbers. Nevertheless, they are still present. With a new effort starting this fall to encourage students into teaching, having only one on the list now is not indicative of the graduation rate down the road four years. The BA degree, in its current incarnation, will always be appealing to a small number of students.
Perhaps most encouraging is the presence of 8 women in the class (yeah!). This puts us at just shy of 1/4 of the class being female. This is a strong showing and is just a bit on the high side of the national norm.
Since Phys 105 meets on a Tuesday in a 75 minute time slot, we are going to start taking full advantage of this and schedule two faculty presentations in most class meetings. Thus, instead of a 50 minute presentation on one topic, we'll get two 35-minute discussions by two different people. This way, the entire faculty fits into the semester with room left over for pizza and demos.
Looking forward to the beginning of an exciting new year.
Getting gold film to adhere to plastics is a tricky task. Finding a sure-fire, low-cost way to accomplish it would be a real breakthrough for a number of industries from biomedicine to computer chip manufacturers. Professors Brian Augustine (JMU Chemistry) and Chris Hughes (PandA), along with students they advised, are on to something. Check out their story in the latest issue of Madison Scholar.
Information is routinely posted here about the size of our major as measured by the number of students. Today we look at the number of faculty. Consider the chart above. This shows the average size of physics departments in the US sorted by the highest degree granted. A data point has been added to show the current size of our department at 21. While individual departments vary in size and finding a few much larger than the average is possible, we are larger than the average size of both BS and MS granting departments by a lot.
For every MS granting department our size, there must be, on average, two with 7 or 8 faculty. It gets hard to imagine a successful MS program with a faculty this small. For every BS granting department our size there must be 7 with, on average, 4 faculty. Departments this size certainly do exist and are quite common.
Since I fear that the last post left everyone feeling kinda down about the whole business of studying physics and having a rewarding career, consider this from Payscale.com.
Annual pay for Bachelors graduates without higher degrees. Typical starting graduates have 2 years of experience; mid-career have 15 years. See full methodology for more.
In case you were worried about studying physics at JMU, fret no more. Nearly everyone of the career paths opened by these degrees is available to a physics grad. And even physics is doing pretty good. Except for petroleum engineering, the mid career salaries are all with errors. Who wants to crawl about on an oil rig any way!?
This kind of plot sorts many things into one pile. The 'physics' category must include all us academic types who don't really get paid $100,000/year. (We wish!) That means there must be lots of jobs out there with even better paying jobs.
Buck up campers! The world is a good place for physicists.
Just so you don't feel that I've shorted the other sciences, here they are
In these uncertain economic times, physics departments are among the first places states and universities look for budget savings. Enrollment is typically low and laboratory based programs are expensive. Here at JMU we are fortunate to be a large department that is thriving in spite of the troubles. However, we have neighbors that are struggling to survive.
The July issue of the American Journal of Physics has an editorial in which the authors, Anura Goonewardene, Marian Tzolov, Indrajith Senevirathne and Donald Woodhouse, describe a new nanotechnology minor and applied physics track in the major at Lock Haven University. With this addition, they are finding success in growing their program and staying alive.
Although their success is to be applauded, the background against which this effort is undertaken is scary.
In Pennsylvania, according to this article, there are 14 universities. Of these, one does not have a physics major and one of the remaining 13 is closing in 2012. The article states that the state of Pennsylvania says,
Programs that averaged less than 6 students per year for the past 5 years are deemed “low enrolled” and are subject to review.
Of the 12 currently continuing departments, 9 are in danger. The authors note
The remaining programs are scrambling to develop strategies for survival, including collaboration with other schools and online delivery of low-enrolled upper division courses to reduce costs. If fewer than 6 graduates per year becomes the criterion for a low-enrolled program, 73% of the 505 bachelor’s-only degree granting institutions in the U.S. is “under enrolled.” Some, if not many, of these programs might be eliminated or significantly scaled back to the status of a “service” discipline unless they take active steps to increase enrollment. In these times the benefits to students of a thriving physics program are often secondary to the bottom line.
This is a terrifying prospect for physics in this country.
Although we graduated only 13 this year, we have been averaging 18-20 in recent years and there's reason to believe that the 2012 graduating class will be of a size more typical for us. Nevertheless, being among the top ten largest undergraduate departments in the nation with graduating classes still in the teens is worrisome.
Physics programs are always small. It is not a topic for everyone -- we understand that. Let's just hope that legislatures realize before it is too late that even graduating small numbers, physics departments make a significant impact on our increasingly high-tech economy. If success is only measured by dollars spent and seats filled in a classroom, we are all in trouble.
A new feature has been added to the blog - Apture. This is a web site enhancement app that makes it possible to explore topics more easily. Now, if you highlight a word or phrase, you will see a "Learn More" button. If you click (or even hover over) the button, you'll get a new window with the results of a search on that topic. It will also search the blog to show (possibly) relevant information. If a word or phrase is selected often enough, it will automatically be given an underline and be turned into a link for everyone.
Fun for everyone! Those who know what the phrase means already can laugh at the stupid web answer and those who don't get to learn something. Great fun for all.
So yesterday was the last shuttle launch. To the crew of STS-135: the last safe travels!
You know what else happened in the past day or so? The House Appropriations Commerce, Justice, and Science Subcommittee has recommended: “$4.5 billion for NASA Science programs, which is $431 million below last year’s level." The bill also terminates funding for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). This is not the end of JWST, but it is no good news.
While it is undeniable that the project has had large cost overruns and is behind schedule, it is also very clear that the project, once complete, will be a tool of enormous worth to the (world-wise, not only the U.S.) scientific community — and, through them, to the general population.
JWST is recognized as the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope and will ensure US leadership in space astronomy for the next decade. The telescope is the cornerstone of future space astronomy and is the foundation upon which the 2010 Astronomy Decadal Survey, "New Worlds, New Horizons in Astronomy and Astrophysics", was built.
JWST will see the first stars and galaxies, and follow the Universe's ionization history.
JWST will study the assembly and evolution of galaxies and their dark matter, stars, and metals.
JWST will find liquid water on planets around other stars.
JWST will reveal the births of stars and planetary systems.
JWST is the “Hubble” for the next generation of young scientists and engineers. Its research accomplishments and images will be equally profound and the discoveries will be just as unimaginable. JWST will explore the Universe beyond what Hubble could see. Much like it happened with the Hubble Space Telescope when it was designed and lunched, many things JWST will find are so revolutionary they’re simply beyond our ability to predict.
There are so so so many reasons for which it would be senseless to throw away the $3 billion already spent on JWST and to forego discoveries we can only imagine right now. To see just a few (in plain English):
Here's a list of members for the Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Subcommittee who recommended that the JWST be stripped of funding:http://1.usa.gov/q7VYYr.
A search is now underway for a position that combines two critical components of our departments activities. The successful candidate will be responsible moving us forward with our astronomy outreach programs and for orchestrating our annual recruiting efforts. The review date is set for September 10 and, with any luck, we will have a new person in place by January. Just in time to learn the recruiting ropes from Jon Staib.
According to the June 28 numbers from the folks in Freshman Orientation, we have 28 freshman majors coming this fall. Another good class coming in.
Saturday, July 02, 2011
It seems that there is a movement in the math world that is slowing gaining some attention. The idea is that , the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter, should be replaced by , the ratio of the circumference to the radius. This replacement, argued by Bob Palais, is much more natural and leads to frequent simplification in many cases. For example, 1/4 of a circle is radians not . Using , the fractions always match making it easier to remember and avoid mistakes. There are also many math and physics equations where appears (for example: ) that are simpler to write and read with this substitution. Euler's equation, , becomes , a much nicer thing to write.
OK. So you are not convinced. Consider this: With this substitution, we have day instead of (in addition to?) day. this moves the celebration to June 28th. March is cold and we're all in school. June is warm and we're all on the beach (mentally at least) and it is clearly a much better day to be celebrating.
If you are still not convinced, give this a look. This is a video of being set to music. It is really quite nice.
Fine. So we we won't be switching to any time soon. But it is good to know that the mathematicians are thinking about such things and preparing the world for ever more rational thought.
I wonder if we can find a way to set Newton's laws or Maxwell's equations to music? The lagrangian for Quantum Chromodynamics (that describes the strong interaction) might just be a delight to hear.
And, lest you think that you'd have to go relearn in place of and are worried since you've got to 20 or 30 digits, consider the plight of this young woman...
On Friday Giovanna Scarel and Steve Whisnant attended a meeting in Newport News at Jefferson Lab to learn about current facilities and new ideas for light sources. JLab currently has a free-electron laser (FEL) that can produce light in the wavelength range from microns to about about 300 nm. In addition to this facility, there is a plan developing to build a new, so-called, Next Generation Light Source (NGLS) that can provide light (not coherent in this case) up into the soft x-ray region. This facility will provide unprecedented brightness and luminosity.
What is really interesting about this idea is that it would put a world-class light source a short drive from JMU. This will make it possible to expand the horizons of our faculty and students to explore the world in new ways. We are at the beginning of the process. Much work to do to make this happen.
This video of a camera attached to a hula-hoop gives a nice perspective of how the world looks from a different reference frame. Think of this as the person in the middle representing the sun and the spot on the hula-hoop representing the earth. From the perspective of the person in the middle, the motion is fairly simple and easy to understand. From the perspective of the camera, life is quite different.
Of course, with multiple planets all moving at different speeds around the sun, the motion of the solar system appears to be much more complicated from the earth. We see planets that appear to move sometimes faster, sometimes slower, and sometimes even in reverse. Add to this the motion of the moons around the planets and the solar system is an apparently complicated place indeed.
However, if you put the camera in the right place it all gets easy to understand.
Maurice Goldhaber, one of the pioneers of modern physics whose experiments helped create the current understanding of how the world works, died May 11 at his home onLong Island, N.Y., after a short illness. He had celebrated his 100th birthday less than a month earlier. Goldhaber was "one of the world's most distinguished nuclear and particle physicists," the U.S. government said in 1998 when it presented him the prestigiousEnrico FermiAward. His innovative and thought-provoking experiments provided much of the foundation for the standard model of physics that now paints our view of the universe, and his leadership and vision as head of theBrookhaven National Laboratoryduring the 1960s led to three Nobel Prizes in Physics for the Long Island institution.
, the ratio of the circumference to the radius. This replacement, 
