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Department News
Adam Clark Delivers Talk on Supersymmetry
Dr. Adam Clark

Adam Clark visited New College of Florida this summer to collaborate with researchers on a project involving violations of the principle of relativity in quantum field theory and String Theory.  While there, Dr. Clark gave a talk for undergraduate physics majors on the Standard Model of Particle Physics and Supersymmetry, which is one of the leading candidates for beyond the Standard Model physics.  Supersymmetry is also a key ingredient in String Theory, though this was not part of the talk.  Dr. Clark’s talk emphasized the importance that key ideas from standard undergrad physics courses play in cutting edge research. 

 

Math, Computer Science & Physics Student Lounge Opens

New Lounge

The new lounge, located on the first floor of Trumbower Hall, opened on September 15th, 2009. It offers comfortable seating, a large blackboard and computer access.

The new lounge will serve as a convenient gathering place for students to relax and work.

See more pictures of the ribbon cutting and celebration of the lounge opening here.

Jane Flood Leads Solar Scholars Team

In November 2008, the Sustainable Energy Fund awarded $15,000 to the College to support the installation of two 1.6 kW solar photovoltaic arrays on the roof of Seegers Union. The arrays were erected during a week-long intensive course coordinated by Dr. Jane Flood. Twelve Muhlenberg students worked with solar installers Bill Hennessey, Jesse Waters and Vera Cole from the Mid-Atlantic Renewable Energy Association (MAREA) from building the supports to the completion of wiring during the week between finals and Commencement. Juniors Diana Ortiz and Kathleen Henley, and Dr. Flood are currently working to evaluate the performance of the arrays and to identify optimal settings to maximize electricity production.

Jane Flood Receives Empie Award

Dr. Jane Flood was the 2009 recipient of the Paul C. Empie Memorial Award. The award, presented annually during the Commencement ceremony, recognizes a faculty member whose teaching and service is characterized by a search for meaning and value in academic life. Dr. Flood has a long-term interest in the connection between science and societal issues, as illustrated by her course Energy and the Environment, and her first year seminar Organic, Local and Fair Trade.

Brett Fadem is Awarded A National Science Foundation for a Research at Undergraduate Institutions (RUI) Grant

 

Muhlenberg College will receive $153,000 over three years to support research in nuclear physics.

A large fraction of the money will support the summer research program Dr. Fadem initiated after arriving at Muhlenberg. Each year, four or five students accompany him to Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) to work with the PHENIX collaboration. Six Nobel prizes have been awarded for research conducted at BNL. The PHENIX collaboration has built (and with the help of Muhlenberg College, continues to upgrade) a world-class detector to analyze collisions of atomic nuclei produced by the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC). To date, PHENIX has published 80 papers in the finest physics journals, and the discovery of a new state of matter at RHIC was listed by the American Physical Society as the Story of the Year in 2005.

In addition to helping with the construction of a new detecting subsystem for PHENIX, Muhlenberg is engaged in an analysis project using existing data that will help to probe the very hot matter created in RHIC collisions. In fact, the matter created at RHIC is similar to the state of matter throughout the universe millionths of a second after the Big Bang. In this sense, RHIC is like a time machine that takes us back to the beginning of the universe and allows us to examine its properties.

In addition to the work at BNL, a portion of the money will be used to build an undergraduate teaching laboratory in nuclear physics on site at Muhlenberg.

Joshua Adams ‘09 Inducted Into Sigma Pi Sigma (SPS), The Physics Honor Society

Josh Adams was inducted into Sigma Pi Sigma, the Physics Honor Society, on May 1st , 2009. Dr. Brett Fadem performed the induction. Founded in 1921, Sigma Pi Sigma is a member honor society of the Association of College Honor Societies. The society has some 75,000 historical members. Election to Sigma Pi Sigma is a lifetime membership.

 

Bestowment of Certificate

 Josh Adams is presented with his SPS membership certificate by Dr. Brett Fadem as fellow students look on.

Sigma Pi Sigma exists to honor outstanding scholarship in physics; to encourage interest in physics among students at all levels; to promote an attitude of service of its members towards their fellow students, colleagues, and the public; to provide a fellowship of persons who have excelled in physics. Sigma Pi Sigma’s mission is not completed in the induction ceremony with the recognition of academic accomplishment. In the four dimensions of Honor, Encouragement, Service, and Fellowship, the mission of Sigma Pi Sigma takes a longer view.

For more information concerning Sigma Pi Sigma please see this link.

Three Muhlenberg students present summer research at the American Physical Society's (APS) fall Division of Nuclear Physics (DNP) meeting.

In late October, 2008 David Broxmeyer, Caitlin Harper, and Thalassa Sodre presented posters explaining their summer 2008 research at the American Physical Society's (APS) fall Division of Nuclear Physics (DNP) meeting.  

All three were awarded scholarships through the Conference Experience for Undergraduate's program that has become a yearly part of the fall DNP meeting.  Their research focused on the assembly and quality assurance testing of resistive plate chambers that will be used to increase the sensitivity of the PHENIX detector at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC).  As a result of this upgrade, advances will be made in the understanding of the angular momentum of the proton, a topic of fundamental importance.

Student Group PhotoStudent at APS Meeting

David is in the second row to the right in the blue shirt, Tally is to his right and Caitlin is to his left.

In addition, Dr. Fadem, who supervised the student's summer research presented a talk entitled, "Transverse Energy with the PHENIX MPC."  The talk described Muhlenberg's progress analyzing data using a new PHENIX subsystem called the Muon Piston Calorimeter (MPC).  This research will help us to better understand the strongly interacting quark-gluon plasma created in ultra-relativistic heavy ion collisions at RHIC.  Another student, Josh Adams (’09), has been playing a key role in this analysis.

Finally, Dr. Fadem and Muhlenberg College are among the authors of the new PHENIX paper "Onset of π° suppression studied in Cu+Cu collisions at √sNN = 22.4, 62.4, and 200 GeV,” published October 17, 2008 in the prestigious Physical Review Letters.

 
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