Congratulations to Joel Greenberg and Henok Mebrahtu, this year’s winners of the Fritz London Graduate Fellowship. The award is given each year to graduate students doing work related to the interests of Fritz London, who was a professor of physics and chemistry at Duke from 1939 until his death in 1954. London was an internationally distinguished leader in the fields of quantum mechanics, quantum chemistry, low-temperature physics, and… read more about Fritz London Graduate Fellowship Winners, 2010 »
Joshua Bienfang, BS 1994, made the news this summer when he developed and demonstrated a way to send high speed encrypted messages using quantum physics. Bienfang worked in Prof. Dan Gauthier’s lab as an undergraduate and as a research scientist for one year, then went to the University of New Mexico for graduate school. He is now a physicist at the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST). Check out the articles about him in the Washington Post here and here. read more about Joshua Bienfang, BS 1994, in the news »
The 2010-2011 academic year is upon us at Duke Physics. This week the Duke Physics department welcomes 16 new graduate students for fall of 2010. In addition to welcoming new students to the program, the Duke Physics department is also ushering in a new graduate curriculum and a new undergraduate degree in biophysics. In fact, this issue of the newsletter features two stories about a Duke alumna and a Duke professor working in the field of biophysics. This summer members of the Duke Physics community stayed busy with… read more about Welcome to the August Duke Physics Newsletter »
Prof. Chris Walter's website serves as a resource for his personal research as well as a source of news updates for neutrino research at High Energy Physics experiments worldwide. read more about Website of the Month »
See the rest of Prof. Dan Gauthier's images from his conference trip to Paris, France, as well as other images from our 2010 Summer Research Photo Collection at our Flickr page. read more about Photo of the Month - The Louvre in Paris by Dan Gauthier »
This year's Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) program at TUNL finished up August 6. Eight students from universities around the country traveled to Duke to pursue research with TUNL professors. Click here to see pictures of this year's group. read more about 2010 TUNL REU program »
John D S Gibson, BS Physics 1951 wrote to Duke Physics News to give us an update on his life since graduation. Here's what he had to say: Half way through my senior year, Dr. Walter Nielsen, the Department Chair, stopped me in the hall and in the kindest way told me that the department could not recommend me for graduate school. I had no problem completing the requirements for a BS degree in Physics on time, but had to wonder what the job market would be for one with only a BS… read more about Alum Update from John Gibson, '51 »
Susan Clark, a former Duke Physics undergrad who graduated in 2004, was recently awarded a post doctoral fellowship at the Joint Quantum Institute between University of Maryland and the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg, Maryland. Clark, who studied atom-light interactions in Prof. Daniel Gauthier's lab, will begin her fellowship after the completion of her graduate studies at Stanford University where she worked in Yoshi Yamamoto's lab and studied optical… read more about Alum Update from Susan Clark, '04 »
NOTE: SOME LINKS HAVE BECOME BROKEN DUE TO WEBSITE REDESIGN This summer the Duke Physics News team collected both images and stories from members of the Duke Physics Department who have been traveling around the world for research, conferences, and relaxation. We stayed in touch with both faculty members, graduate students, and undergrads. Links to both stories and photos are below in case you missed the updates! Our Summer News Stories: August Updates July Updates June Updates… read more about Summer Research Updates - A Collection of Stories and Photos »
Dr. Hannah Petersen joined the nuclear theory group in January 2010 to work with Professors Mueller and Bass. Her research is focused on the dynamical description of heavy ion collisions at ultra-relativistic energies as they are produced at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) and soon will be studied at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN in Geneva. In these collisions, nuclear matter is heated and compressed to reach a state of matter similar to the early stage… read more about Post-Doc Hannah Petersen Joins Nuclear Theory Group »
Although the biophysics major is new at Duke for 2011, many physics alums over the years have melded physics and biology in their careers. Leslie Molony, ‘75, for example, has worked as a researcher and as an executive in the pharmaceutical industry. “I use my physics background just about every day of my life,” she says. “I use physics to figure out the science of pharmaceuticals and how chemicals interact with cells and with protein molecules,” she says, “particularly the physical aspects of an… read more about Alumni Profile: From Physics to Pharm »
Physics professor Calvin Howell and his students are working with Duke biologists on an interdisciplinary project to discover more about how plants absorb and use carbon dioxide—a question of particular relevance as levels of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere continue to climb. Howell and his colleagues use positron emission tomography (PET) to track molecules of carbon dioxide—tagged with radioisotopes—as they are absorbed by leaves. Howell, director of the Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory (TUNL)… read more about Faculty Research Update: Physics Sheds Light on How Plants Use Carbon Dioxide »
NOTE: LINKS HAVE BECOME BROKEN DUE TO SITE REDESIGN This week the Duke Physics department welcomes 16 new graduate students to the program for fall of 2010. These 16 students were accepted out of a pool of almost 200 applicants and they will be the first to experience the department's new graduate curriculum. Students in the incoming class have come from five countries and their research interests represent a variety of physics sub-disciplines. This week they are attending both University-wide and Departmental Orientations… read more about Physics Welcomes 16 New Graduate Students »
NOTE: LINKS HAVE BECOME BROKEN DUE TO SITE REDESIGN This week the Duke Physics department welcomes 16 new graduate students to the program for fall of 2010. These 16 students were accepted out of a pool of almost 200 applicants and they will be the first to experience the department's new graduate curriculum. Students in the incoming class have come from five countries and their research interests represent a variety of physics sub-disciplines. This week they are attending both University-wide and Departmental Orientations… read more about Welcome, New Graduate Students! »
NOTE: SOME LINKS HAVE BECOME BROKEN DUE TO SITE REDESIGN In our new photo album at Flickr, newly-minted Duke graduates are seen celebrating their achievements at the Duke Physics commencement ceremony. The ceremonies awarded diplomas to students who earned their Doctorates in Physics in May of 2010. Good luck and congratulations to our recent graduates! They are Huidong Xu, Wei Chen, James Joseph, Mary Kidd, Phillip Wu, and Xing Zong! Follow this link to see more information about graduate student… read more about Duke Physics Commencement Ceremony 2010 »
Physics graduate student Jonathan Mueller, who works with the Capture group under Prof. Henry Weller and Prof. Mohammad Ahmed, received a graduate fellowship award with the new Department of Energy Graduate Fellowship program. He was one of 150 students awarded and each will be provided tuition, living expenses, and research support for three years to work with U.S. academic institutions. The Department of Energy Graduate Fellowship program aids young students in an effort… read more about Physics Grad Student Jonathan Mueller Receives Fellowship »
This summer, Prof. Chris Walter has traveled to Japan, South Dakota, Greece, Japan, Chicago, and is now back in Japan. He is pulling a shift right now at the Super-Kamiokande experiment, which is a Cherenkov neutrino detector that consists of 50,000 tons of water in an underground tank. The experiment has to be observed 24 hours a day, so all the collaborating scientists take turns doing so. In a couple of weeks, Walter will head to Tokai, Japan for a meeting about the Tokai-to-Kamioka (T2K) experiment, in… read more about Chris Walter Racks Up More Frequent Flier Miles »
Prof. Berndt Mueller will travel to Geneva, Switzerland from August 16 to September 10th. He'll be working at the LHC co-directing a four-week CERN Theory Institute called "The First Heavy Ion Collisions at the LHC." Mueller will be co-directing with three other international collaborators - Urs Wiedemann from CERN, Krzystof Redlich from Wroclaw, and Edward Shuryak from Stony Brook. Their team will be looking at some of the first results from LHC. Duke Prof. Steffen Bass and Hannah… read more about Prof. Berndt Mueller co-directing CERN Theory Institute »
Duke Physics graduate student Joel Greenberg attended the the 19th annual International Laser Physics Workshop in Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil, this month. The conference included an excursion to a nearby National Park. (Read Part 1 of this story here.) Here’s what Joel said about it: On July 7 (midway through the conference), a group excursion was facilitated by the conference organizers. All of the participants boarded buses and made the several-mile journey to the Parque Nacional do Iguaçu,… read more about Joel Greenberg's Trip to Brazil - Part 2 »
Duke Physics graduate student Joel Greenberg attended the 19th annual International Laser Physics Workshop in Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil, this month. Here’s what he had to say about it: The conference ran from July 5 – 9, 2010, and had nine different sessions dealing with optics-related material. I presented an invited talk entitled “Super-charging nonlinear optical processes through collective effects”on July 6 as part of the session on “Modern Trends in Laser Physics.” Also in attendance were… read more about Joel Greenberg Attends Laser Conference in Brazil »
Prof. Berndt Mueller is heading to the Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics (YITP) in Kyoto next week to attend the first two weeks of a program on hot and dense matter, called “High Energy Strong Interactions: Parton Distributions and Dense QCD Matter.” He will be giving a presentation on the study of thermalization in AdS/CFT. For more information on the conference, click here. read more about Berndt Mueller going to YITP in Kyoto »
Prof. Patrick Charbonneau will be in Lausanne, Switzerland, this week at the CECAM workshop “Crystallization: from colloids to pharmaceuticals.” Charbonneau will give a talk titled “How rare is hard sphere crystallization?” CECAM is the Centre Européen de Calcul Atomique et Moléculaire. Earlier in the summer, Charbonneau traveled to the Kavli Institute in Santa Barbara; click here for more on that trip. read more about Prof. Charbonneau at CECAM Workshop, Switzerland »
Duke undergraduates Siyuan Sun and Zongjin Qian flew to Geneva June 2 to work at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN until July 28. Their work is funded by a 2010 Dean’s Summer Research Fellowship. “It is a very exciting time here for particle physics with the LHC up and running,” Sun says, “but that also means a ton of work. I have been involved with the Z prime and W prime searches. Even as an undergrad, you can do quite a bit of work that directly contributes.” His advisor Prof.… read more about Siyuan Sun's Summer Travel to CERN »
In the last week of April, Prof. Harold Baranger attended the workshop “Spin Related Phenomena in Mesoscopic Transport” at the International Institute of Physics in Natal, Brazil. Natal is on the easternmost tip of South America. Baranger gave a talk titled “Interaction-Induced Localization in Quantum Dots and Wires: Quantum Monte Carlo Studies.” View of Natal, Brazil After the conference, Baranger visited two former Duke post-docs. First, he… read more about Baranger Attends Conference, Visits Former Post-Docs in Brazil »
Duke’s nuclear physics specialty was ranked #8 in the U.S. News and World Report’s 2011 graduate school rankings, which came out April 15. The department as a whole placed 30. The last time the rankings were compiled, in 2006, the department ranked 29. “I am very pleased to see our efforts in nuclear physics recognized,” says Prof. Dan Gauthier, department chair. “On the experimental side, we continue to have internationally known facilities on campus, including the High Intensity Gamma Ray Source… read more about Nuclear Physics Number 8 in U.S. News Rankings »
Prof. Ashutosh Kotwal will soon be traveling to Blois, France, to give an invited plenary lecture at Rencontres de Blois—an annual multidisciplinary conference. This year’s conference, which runs July 15-20, is titled “Particle Physics and Cosmology: First Results from the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).” Kotwal will speak on “Precision Tests of the Standard Model” on July 17. “The start of the LHC is a tremendously exciting time,” he says, “and this is a good time to take stock of what we have learned so far… read more about Prof. Kotwal to speak in France »
View from UW, towards Mt. RainierProf. Berndt Mueller is currently co-directing an eight-week program at the Institute for Nuclear Theory at the University of Washington called "Quantifying the Properties of Hot QCD Matter." The program, which lasts from May 24th to July 16th, is, according to Prof. Mueller, "incredibly intense, with almost uninterrupted lectures and discussions between 9 am and 6 pm each day. The group attending the program is analyzing how matter… read more about Prof. Mueller at the Institute for Nuclear Theory at UW »
Prof. Patrick Charbonneau, who has appointments in both Chemistry and Physics at Duke, spent three weeks in May at the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics in Santa Barbara. While at the Kavli Institute, Charbonneau attended the program on "The Physics of Glasses: Relating Metallic Glasses to Molecular, Polymeric and Oxide Glasses." Prof. Charbonneau gave a seminar on "How Hard Is It To Form A Glass? Insights From Beyond 3D." The slides and video for his seminar can be seen at the Kavli… read more about Patrick Charbonneau at the Kavli Institute »
Zongjin Qian, a freshman physics major at Duke, was awarded a 2010 Dean’s Summer Research Fellowship for travel to CERN this summer, where he is doing research with Prof. Al Goshaw and the Duke High Energy Physics group. Zongjin left for CERN in June, and is now involved with the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider. He'll be at CERN, in Geneva, Switzerland, from June 2 to July 28. After that, Zongjin will continue to work at Duke in August. Zongjin'… read more about Zongjin Qian's Summer Travel to CERN »
l-r: Prof. Daniel Gauthier, Prof. Stephanos Venakides, Prof. Glenn Edwards Prof. Dan Gauthier delivered a contributed oral presentation at the 11th Experimental Chaos and Complexity Conference in Lille France on June 1, 2010. The conference included over 180 participants from 31 countries and focused on a wide range of nonlinear dynamics problems, where experimental results were discussed as well as new theoretical insights and how they apply to experiments. His talk was on "Observation of chaos… read more about Summer 2010 Research Travel Update: France »