On April 23, 2015 during the undergraduate poster session, the 2015 inductees of the Society of Physics Students (SPS) were announced. SPS mentor and Prof. Phil Barbeau shared some history: SPS at Duke is the the second oldest SPS chapter in the country. Barbeau also presented the six new members with certificates and invited them to sign their names in a book kept since 1925. This book contains the names of those undergraduate members of the Physics Department that were inducted in the Sigma Pi Sigma, the… read more about Society of Physics Students 2015 Inductees »
In the field of physics, it’s considered de rigueur to complete a postdoctoral position, or postdoc, after earning a PhD and before beginning a faculty job. “It’s expected that you’re going to broaden beyond your PhD work,” says Duke Physics Interim Chair and Prof. Dan Gauthier. “Search committees want to see to what extent you were able to jump into another lab and another environment, and to what extent you’re able to come up to speed quickly and start to generate publications. If you do well at… read more about The Postdoc Experience in the Duke Physics Department »
In February, an international group of physicists came together to form a proto-collaboration to build the Hyper-Kamiokande experiment. A follow-up to the currently operating Super-Kamiokande experiment, Hyper-Kamiokande would enclose almost a megaton of water and be more than twenty times larger than its predecessor. Hyper-Kamiokande is designed to study neutrino oscillations, astrophysical sources of neutrinos such as supernova and the stability of matter. At the ceremony, which was attended by both scientists and the… read more about Prof. Walter Represents the U.S. at Founding of Hyper-Kamiokande Collaboration »
As program chair of the 2015 April Meeting of the American Physical Society in Baltimore, MD, Prof. Berndt Mueller had the pleasure of participating in a special dinner honoring the three plenary speakers of the Kavli Memorial session. The photo below shows (from left to right): John Mather (NASA - leader of the COBE experiment), Kate Kirby (CEO of the APS), Stuart Shapiro (Univ. of Illinois Urbana-Champaign), Clifford Will (Univ. of Florida), and Prof. Mueller. In the plenary session on May 13 sponsored by… read more about Prof. Mueller Chairs APS Meeting, Dines with Plenary Speakers »
Prof. Maiken Mikkelsen, with others, has been published in Nature Communications. Read the paper "Real-time tunable lasing fram plasmonic nanocavity arrays" online here. read more about Prof. Mikkelsen Published in Nature Communications »
Recently Prof. Haiyan Gao gave a plenary talk on "Proton - a fascinating relativistic many-body system - remains puzzling'' at the April APS meeting in Baltimore in the session: Session W1: Plenary Session III: Probing our Limits of Knowledge. Watch the talk on YouTube here. Additionally, Prof. Gao was interviewed by Deutschlandradio, the German equivalent of NPR, about her APS talk. Here you can see the written piece and hear the radio piece, both in German, although pieces of Gao's voice can be heard on… read more about Prof. Gao Spoke at April APS Meeting, Featured on Deutschlandradio »
Graduate student Georgios Laskaris successfully defended his thesis "Photodisintegration of 3He with Double Polarizations" on April 6th, 2015. Laskaris has been a member of the Medium Energy Physics group of Duke University since the winter of 2008 and performed all of his thesis experiments at the HIgS facility of TUNL under the supervision of Prof. Haiyan Gao. Laskaris will join Prof. Giorgio Gratta's group at Stanford University in Neutrino Physics. read more about Laskaris Successfully Defends Thesis »
David Rosin, who did his PhD research with Prof. Daniel Gauthier and received his degree from the Technical University in Berlin (co-supervised by Eckehard Schoell there), recently won prizes for his dissertation. He won the Springer Dissertation Award and his thesis was published by Springer (available on Amazon). He also competed and co-won the Dissertation Prize of the German Physical Society. He was one of four finalists for this prize. read more about Rosin Awarded Prizes for Dissertation »
Prof. Daniel Gauthier's recently published paper "High-dimensional quantum cryptography with twisted light" was discussed on physicsworld.com. Read the article "'Twisted light' gives quantum cryptography a boost" here. Prof. Gauthier's paper with others was published in New Journal of Physics and can be read here. read more about Prof. Gauthier's Paper Discussed on physicsworld.com »
SPIN2014: The International Symposium on Spin Physics, of which Prof. Haiyan Gao was a large part, was featured in a thorough February article of CERN Courier. You can read "Spin goes Chinese" by clicking here. read more about SPIN2014 Detailed in CERN Courier »
Undergraduate Connor Hann was designated a Faculty Scholar for the Class of 2016 by the Academic Council and its Faculty Scholars Committee. This is the highest honor Duke University faculty can award undergraduates. Hann's advisors are Profs. Shailesh Chandrasekharan and Joshua Socolar. He is currently working with Prof. Chandrasekharan on trying to understand the origin of the sign problem in frustrated quantum spin systems. Such systems are known to be at the heart of… read more about Undergraduate Hann Awarded Faculty Scholar for Class of 2016 »
Two papers by the Super-Kamiokande collaboration documenting analyses by postdoc Alex Himmel and former postdoc Tarek Akiri, both from the neutrino group, were highlighted on the front page of the Physical Review D March 25, 2015. The first paper "Limits on sterile neutrino mixing using atmospheric neutrinos in Super-Kamiokande" Phys. Rev. D 91, 052019 (2015) sets new limits on hypothetical new non-interacting neutrino types. This was an analysis undertaken by Dr. Himmel… read more about Super-Kamiokande Papers by Duke Postdocs Highlighted by Physical Review D »
Graduate student Sean Finch successfully defended his thesis "Double-Beta Decay of 96Zr and Double-Electron Capture of 156Dy to Excited Final States" on March 25, 2015. Finch's advisor is Prof. Calvin Howell. read more about Finch Successfully Defends Thesis »
Prof. Ashutosh Kotwal was recently invited to co-convene a three-week workshop at the Hong Kong Institute of Science and Technology, titled "The Future of High Energy Physics." The workshop was hosted by the Institute of Advanced Study at HKUST. The theme of the workshop was the energy frontier in particle physics. After the discovery of the Higgs boson, the priorities at the energy frontier are the precise measurement of Higgs properties and searches for new physics. The existence of dark matter and the… read more about Prof. Kotwal Convenes "Future of HEP" Workshop in Hong Kong »
Prof. Patrick Charbonneau has been promoted to Associate Professor with Tenure, effective April 1. Prof. Charbonneau’s outstanding scholarship in multiple areas of soft matter chemistry and physics, and especially in the nature of the glass transition, is having a great impact in his scientific community across the globe, just as his creative and energetic teaching and service contributions have had a tremendous impact here on campus. He is in Paris at the moment (where he is broadening his pedagogical impact, for those who… read more about Prof. Charbonneau Promoted to Associate Professor »
Prof. Al Goshaw's and his research group member and graduate student Mia Liu have recently made a measurement of one of the rarest processes observed in experiments at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. They have observed the production of three electroweak bosons by using the full LHC Run 1 data set of proton-proton collisions at a center of mass energy of 8 TeV. The final state consists of a W boson plus two high energy photons. This provides a test of the Standard Model's… read more about Goshaw and Liu Measure Rare Process at CERN »
Physics and Pre-Med senior Laurel Kaye is one of 100 finalists being considered for the Mars One human colonization project and television series that will fund it. Kaye will graduate in May 2015. The first unmanned mission is projected to launch in 2018 and the Mars One settlement could happen as early as 2022. You can read a brief article and watch an interview with Kaye on Duke Today here as well as on Time Warner Cable News here. Her Mars One profile is here and you can read her blog "Laurel the… read more about Physics Undergrad Laurel Kaye a Finalist for Mars One Colony »
Graduate student Ben Cerio successfully defended his thesis "Evidence of Higgs Boson Production Through Vector Boson Fusion" on February 23, 2015. Cerio's advisor is Prof. Ashutosh Kotwal. read more about Cerio Successfully Defends Thesis »
Prof. Maiken H. Mikkelsen has received a CAREER award from the National Science Foundation. The CAREER award is NSF's most prestigious award and supports faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through outstanding research, excellent education and the integration of education and research. Information about Prof. Mikkelsen's award can be found here and general information about the program here. read more about Prof. Mikkelsen Receives CAREER Award »
Graduate student Miaoyuan Liu, advisee of Prof. Al Goshaw, successfully defended her dissertation on January 13, 2015. The topic of her dissertation was "Gauge Boson Coupling Measurements in Final States with a W Boson Produced with Additional Photons Using the ATLAS Detector." Congratulations to Dr. Liu. read more about Liu Passes Dissertation »
Prof. Steffen A. Bass has been selected for APS Journals' Outstanding Referee Program. Annually the program recognizes 150 of the roughly 60,000 currently active referees. You can find more information on their website here. read more about Prof. Bass Selected as Outstanding Referee »
Prof. Kate Scholberg is featured on Science360 News' radio show "People Behind the Science." Click here to listen to the interview and learn about new discoveries in neutrino physics. read more about Prof. Scholberg Featured on People Behind the Science »
Prof. Charles Townes passed away yesterday January 27, 2015 at the age of 99. As many of you may know, Prof. Townes received the Nobel prize in the 1960's for his contribution to the invention of the laser. What you may not know is that he received his MS degree from Duke Physics in 1936. Prof. Townes visited Duke many times over his career, including giving a keynote address in the Fitzpatrick Institute for Photonics during one of its annual meetings a few years back. We also have a graduate fellowship… read more about Prof. Charles Townes Has Passed Away »
Prof. Maiken Mikkelsen is a recipient of the 2015 Air Force Young Investigators Research Program (YIP) award. The Air Force YIP supports scientists and engineers who have received Ph.D. or equivalent degrees in the last five years and show exceptional ability and promise for conducting basic research. Read the official press release and see the full list of recipients here. Congratulations to Prof. Mikkelsen! read more about Prof. Mikkelsen Receives 2015 Air Force YIP Award »
Over the weekend January 16-18, 2015, Duke University hosted the American Physical Society Conference for Undergraduate Women in Physics (CUWiP) in the North Carolina Research Triangle on East Campus, in collaboration with North Carolina State University, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and North Carolina Central University. It's the tenth year the conference has been held (it was at Duke in 2010 and NCSU in 2011). For the past few years, CUWiP has been organized centrally by the American Physical Society and… read more about 2015 APS Conference for Undergraduate Women in Physics Held at Duke University »
Prof. Henry Everitt has been featured in a DukeToday story about his laser research with toxic gas detection. Read the article "Laser Sniffs Out Toxic Gases From Afar" online here. read more about Prof. Everitt's Laser Research Featured in DukeToday »
Prof. Steffen Bass was elected as an APS Fellow in 2014 for his pioneering work on the development of transport models for the description of relativistic heavy-ion collisions and their application to the extraction of the properties of the quark gluon plasma. The election to APS fellowship is a great honor for an APS member. Warmest congratulations to Prof. Bass! read more about Prof. Bass Elected APS Fellow »
The Physics Department welcomes back Prof. Daniel Gauthier to the chair's seat. Prof. Gauthier is on board as Interim Chair for the next year and a half as Prof. Haiyan Gao has stepped down a bit early in order to continue her role with Duke Kunshan University (DKU) in a larger capacity as Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs. Read more on that story here. Good luck to Prof. Gao and welcome back Prof. Gauthier! read more about Prof. Gauthier Returns to Chair »
Prof. Steffen Bass will take on the leadership position of Associate Chair for Teaching (ACT) in Physics for a three-year term starting July 1, 2015. Thank you to thank Prof. Ashutosh Kotwal for doing a terrific job as ACT in the last three years. In the next several months, Profs. Kotwal, Bass and incoming Interim Chair Daniel Gauthier will work closely to ensure a smooth transition. read more about Prof. Bass Will Be the New Associate Chair for Teaching »
On November 13, 2014 a group of twenty students, instructors and parent chaperones from the Hawbridge Charter School in Saxapahaw, NC traveled to Duke University to tour the physics labs at Triangle Universities Nuclear Lab (TUNL), the Free Electron Laser (DFELL) and the Laboratory for Experimental Astrophysics (LENA). The student body on the tour was comprised of young women and men enrolled in the physics and math program at Hawbridge with interest in pursuing undergraduate careers in the field of physics. The tour lasted… read more about Hawbridge Charter School Returns With New Group to Tour TUNL, FEL and LENA »