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College of Science and Technology
PHYSICS
College of Science and Technology 1803 N. Broad Street 400 Carnell Hall Philadelphia, PA 19122
UPDATE FALL 2015
For more news, go to phys.cst.temple.edu
DEAN’S DISTINGUISHED LECTURE Saul Rappaport, CST ’63 Professor of Physics, M.I.T Planetary and Stellar Science from the Kepler Mission November 11, 2015, 4PM Science Education and Research Center (SERC) 1925 N. 12th Street, Temple University, Main Campus Philadelphia, PA 19122 Look for details at cst.temple.edu
Department launches ‘studio physics’ courses for intro classes To enhance student engagement, comprehension and success, this fall all introductory-level classes in both mechanics and in electricity & magnetism will be transitioned form large lecture hall formats involving several hundred students to smaller classes of up to 60 students. Developed under the leadership of Associate Professors Zbiegniew Dziembowski and Bernd Surrow, the “studio physics’ concept has been updated by various universities. It was successfully piloted at MIT, where Surrow previously taught and utilized the teaching program. The format combines elements of lecturing and recitation with interactive response systems, group problems and discussions. “Based on studies conducted at MIT,” said Surrow, “the problemsolving sessions, two- and three-dimensional visualizations, as well as collaborative desktop experiments, web-based assignments and personal response systems-based conceptual questions, significantly enhance students’ understanding of the subject matter.” The courses will be taught in two dedicated, high-tech classrooms in the new Science Education and Research Center (SERC) equipped will small tables that allow for three-student learning teams. Labs will also be conducted in new SERC undergraduate teaching labs. Eventually, the two calculus-based introductory physics classes for pre-med students and two algebra-based introductory physics classes will follow the same format.
Alexander Gray earns prestigious Young Investigator award Alexander Gray, a new assistant professor of physics, has received a prestigious Young Investigator Program award from the U.S. Army Research Office. Gray specializes in the development of new, ultrafast X-ray spectroscopic and imaging techniques. These techniques aim to understand how new phases of matter arise far from equilibrium and how ultrafast electric-field pulses can be used to separate and control fundamental physical interactions on the nanoscale. A 2011 recipient of a PhD in physics from the University of California, Davis and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Gray is an expert in bulk-sensitive and depthresolved X-ray spectroscopic and imaging probes of electronic structure. During his graduate career he pioneered new X-ray techniques, such as hard x-ray angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy (HARPES) and standing-wave excited angleresolved photoelectron spectroscopy (SW-ARPES). These techniques have been since successfully applied by Gray, collaborators and other researchers to bulk- and interfacesensitive studies of key materials in the field of spintronics, as well as to the interfaces of relevance to low-dimensional heterostructuring and energy-efficient field-effect devices. Previously Gray spent three years as an experimental research associate at the Institute for Materials and Energy Science at Stanford University, where he conducted research at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory.
Message from the Chair OUR DEPARTMENT’S MOVE LAST FALL INTO THE NEW SCIENCE EDUCATION AND RESEARCH CENTER (SERC)—and our ongoing recruitment of outstanding faculty members to maximize the building’s exceptional research and teaching resources—have dramatically heightened the department’s stature. Hires to our growing faculty of 22 since 2012 include: Bernd Surrow, a high-energy collider researcher from MIT; Alexander Gray, a former material science Stanford University postdoctoral research associate; Darius Torchinsky, a quantum electronics researchers from Caltech; and John Perdew and Adrienn Ruzsinszky, from Tulane University. Perdew is a leader in density functional theory and author of a top-100 cited paper according to Thomson Reuters Web of Science database. And I joined Temple after 20 years at Rensselaer with a focus in experimental nuclear and particle physics. Recent highlights also include: • Our hosting a nuclear physics town meeting that attracted about 250 physicists from the U.S. and around the world to help determine the direction of our country’s nuclear research. • The designation of our Center for the Computational Design of Functional Layered Materials directed by Perdew as one of just 10 new federal Energy Frontier Research Centers. • The successful test and implementation of Rongjia Tao’s technology to enhance the flow of crude oil through pipelines. To witness the exciting research and teaching that is occurring here, please visit us online at phys.cst.temple.edu or in person. Jim Napolitano Interim Chair, Department of Physics
phys.cst.temple.edu
Town meeting at Temple will guide future U.S. nuclear physics research
About 250 prominent physicists attended a three-day town meeting hosted last September by the College of Science and Technology’s Nuclear Physics Group to chart the future direction of nuclear physics research. At stake was which of two U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) laboratories would best house a new electron-ion collider (EIC) facility that would utilize the world’s brightest and most versatile microscope—either the Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island or the Thomas Jefferson National Acceleratory Laboratory in Newport News, Virginia. The new facility would offer an alternative to the high-energy Large Hadron Collider near Geneva, Switzerland, that in 2012 enabled physicists to finally detect the long-sought Higgs bosun particle. Professor James Napolitano, interim chair of the Department of Physics and co-chair of the town meeting, said, “Probing nucleons with the highest resolution microscopes is another way to investigate the structure and dynamics of nucleons—which would be the purpose of a new collider at either BNL or JLab. This collider would ensure U.S. leadership in the field of nuclear science for decades to come.” Meeting attendees voted unanimously in favor of constructing an EIC. As Physics Today reported, when and where that occurs will begin to be determined later this year. “It was a prestigious honor for Temple and the Department of Physics,” says meeting co-chair and Associate Professor Bernd Surrow. “When I told a colleague at the Department of Energy that we would be hosting the meeting, he said, ‘Now Temple is on the map.’”