ΦYAST ΦLYER
The Homer L. Dodge Department of Physics and
Astronomy
The University of Oklahoma
Volume 17, Number 1 · Winter, 2009 · Dick Henry, Editor; Debbie Barnhill, Production
Web site: http://www.nhn.ou.edu
FROM THE CHAIR: A 2008 RETROSPECTIVE
By Ryan Doezema
It
was a good year for the Department in 2008: we hired our first Dodge Chair, saw
most of the Nielsen Hall renovation completed, and chose a new Chairperson.
After
the disappointing failure to find an astrophysicist to fill an endowed chair in
2007, we were delighted with the success of our search for a high-energy
physicist. Our new occupant of the Homer
L. Dodge Chair in High-Energy Physics is Howie Baer. Howie, who came to us from Florida State
University, is a phenomenologist: that peculiar breed of theoretical
high-energy physicist that bridges the divide between theory and
experiment. Howie, as well as students
and post-doc, has enthusiastically joined in the life of the Department,
teaching courses and seminars, serving on committees, planning conferences, and
pushing his aggressive research agenda.
We are lucky to have him!
Although as of this writing,
several tasks remain to be completed (not the least of which is the hallway
lighting!) most of Phase III of the Nielsen Hall Addition and Renovation
Project has been finished. This last
phase of the project is a renovation of old Nielsen Hall, built in 1948, and
last renovated in 1980. That
“renovation” in many respects spoiled some of the more pleasing aspects of the
building. In particular, the beautiful,
arched ceilings of the first and second floor hallways were replaced by flat
ceilings to make way for heat and air ducts.
But it did get us air-conditioned!
The current renovation has returned the arched ceilings and added tiles
and wood accenting to these hallways to re-create the “feel” of the original
building. It has also renovated all
offices and spruced up lab space in the old building. The building was given a desperately needed
new roof and furniture was replaced in the main office area. Very importantly, we were able to move all
our teaching labs from the third floor to the second floor and equip them with
modern lab furniture. The old windows
were replaced with modern, but “look alike,” double pane windows so that, when
the exterior stonework has been reworked, the building will look great outside
and inside, complementing the new construction of Phase I (2000) and Phase II
(2005).
The
completion of Phase III fulfills the promise of OU President David Boren nearly
15 years ago to “do all three phases of our building and renovation
project.” It is also important to note
that the hiring of Howie Baer and the Phase III project are direct results of
the 2005 gift of $6M from the Avenir Foundation. We are grateful indeed for President Boren’s
leadership and for the continuing benefits of the Avenir gift.
During
much of the year 2008, the faculty was talking and meeting to figure out who
should replace me as Chair beginning in July 2009. Late in the year, we elected our colleague
Greg Parker, and the dean agreed to recommend him to the higher
administration. The handoff to Greg
promises to be very smooth and I look forward to helping to ease him into the
job and to observe very successful years ahead!
WELCOME TO NEW GRADUATE STUDENTS
The Department welcomed 11 new graduate students last fall. Their
names and previous institutions are:
Christopher Bares, OU; Henry Bradsher,
OU; Shayne Cairns, Cal State
Fullerton; Daniel Habchi, University
Blaise Pascal; Biao Jiang, Nanjing
University, China; Andre Lessa,
Florida State University; Craig
McMlellan, California University of Pennsylvania; Scarlet Norberg, Kent State University; Nima Pourtolami, Amirdabir University of Technology; Shivakumar Rajagopalan, Florida State University;
and Daniel Stanley, Marietta
College. We wish these students much success in the years to come!
RECENT DISSERTATION DEFENSES
Three
individuals have recently and successfully defended their doctoral
dissertations.
Aida Nava defended her thesis, “Is
The Scatter In N/O of Metal-Poor Systems Real?
Do H
II Regions Become Significantly Self-Enriched In O?”, on July 23, and is now
preparing to move to Baltimore, where she will begin a postdoc with Claus
Leitherer at the Space Telescope Science Institute in early February. Aida’s
advisor was Dick Henry.
Blake
Laing
defended his thesis, "Confined Quantum Systems:
Beyond Harmonic Order in Dimensional Perturbation Theory," on November
19. He is now a postdoc in Brett Esry’s group at Kansas State University. Blake
was a student of Deborah Watson.
Xuan
Li, a
student of Greg Parker, defended his dissertation, “Coherent
Control and Geometric Phase”, on December 8. Xuan is now a postdoctoral fellow working with Moshe
Shapiro at the University of British Columbia.
Congratulations
to these three new graduates. We wish you successful careers!
ROMANISHIN
SPEAKS AT THE OKIE-TEX STAR PARTY
In early October of last year, Bill Romanishin journeyed to Black
Mesa at the far western end of the Oklahoma Panhandle to attend the 25th annual
OkieTex Star Party hosted by the Oklahoma City Astronomy Club. Even with $3 a
gallon gasoline, there was a record attendance of over 300 amateur astronomers
at the week-long event, where telescopes of all shapes and sizes were set up
for viewing under some of the darkest skies this side of the Hubble Space
Telescope. Dr. Bill gave two talks at the event, including the Saturday night
keynote talk entitled "Boy Beyond Neptune", an account of his
research on the Kuiper Belt and a general overview of our state of knowledge of
the outer solar system.
EYE
WITNESS TO THE OLYMPIC GAMES
By Xifan Liu (OU Physics PhD
1992)
I
had the opportunity to cover the 2008 Summer Olympic Games at Beijing, China,
as a photojournalist. I worked for World Journal, New York City based, the
largest Chinese newspaper in North America with a 350,000 daily circulation.
As the sole photojournalist
for the newspaper, my credential allowed me to be on the sidelines of any
competing venue. To take advantage of
this, I covered 32 different competitions, plus opening/closing ceremonies
during the course of the summer games.
The most exciting competitions I experienced were the US/Chinese
basketball game (all NBA stars made for a deluxe line-up), Soccer final (team
Nagel and team Argentina played with passion), men’s 100m and 200 m world
records runs (Mr. Bolt sprinted 5 m in front of my cameras), men’s fencing and
field bicycle (my first experience to cover these sports), gymnastics—women’s
all-round (Team USA received gold and silver medals), and Triathlon (nice lake
and biking/running courses, sunshine and breeze).
I
arrived in Beijing on 7/27 and received my media pass at the airport. Media shuttle took me to media hotel without
any delay. I filed my first report and
first set of photos to NYC on the same day.
Our media lodging site was about 2 km from the main Olympic center, and
there were regular shuttle services. We
didn’t have to worry about traffic—there were designated lanes for our media
shuttles. I tried to cover
everything—for our readers and for my own experiences. I could only sleep 4-5 hours daily from July
27-Aug 26 with no time for regular meals.
My working condition was very harsh—hot temperatures in the season (many
100F plus days) and 40 lbs. of photos gears bounded with me. Plus, I had to fight for photo positioning
consistently with others. After each
game, I needed to sort through my
photo files and email them
back to NYC ASAP.
Worldwide,
there were 5,500 official registered journalists to report the games at Beijing. There were more than15,000 media credential
requests in USA. USOC (US Olympic
Committee) only has 450 journalist credential quotas (about 350 regular
reporters and 100 photojournalists) from IOC (International Olympic
Committee).
Beijing
is my hometown. My parents live
there. However, I just got to see them
twice. I don’t have to describe the
changes of the giant metro area. Not all
changes are positive. I like the city
image in the 1960’s. At that time, the
population was about 4 million.
Nowadays, it is 16 million.
By
the end of the games, I have 20,000 high quality photos in my portable hard
drive. My newspaper ran my photo page on
a daily basis and occasionally, I contributed articles.
I teach physics at Oklahoma
School of Science and Mathematics. And I
have covered OU and Big XII sports since 1987 while I was a graduate student at
Nielson Hall. I am glad my hobby could
go that far and provided me many challenges, excitements and joys. Is there any connection between
photojournalist and physicist? Yes, I
know which new lens technology makes sense and which one is just for boosting
sale price.
By the way, I was on sideline to cover OU’s BCS Champion game for an Oklahoma media at Miami last week. As a Sooner, I did not like the final score. Yet, I enjoyed the excellent media accommodations. (Photos courtesy of Xifan Liu.)
ALUMNI
NEWS
From Jasper Jackson (B.S.
1948, M.S. 1950, PhD 1955): “One of the memories was in helping Prof. Nielsen reestablish
the weekly Thursday colloquium, which had been suspended during the war. In
1946, I
returned to OU after service in the Navy. My experience there as
an electronics technician had whetted my interest in physics and I transferred from
my prewar engineering major to physics.
“When Prof. Nielsen expressed interest in reviving the weekly colloquium,
I volunteered my car to drive us to the local TG&Y where we purchased a complete set of cups,
saucers, spoons and teapots, napkins, etc. Thus was reborn the tradition of the
Thursday Physics colloquium.
“Another memory of the early days was looking forward to the new
Research institute building (now Nielsen Hall, I believe), where the Physics department
would be housed in a single building. For many years, Physics had been split
between the University administration building and the pharmacy building,
with some of the research labs located among the pipes in the crawl
space umder the administration building.
“It was a great day when the new building was finished, even
though physics had to share it with other research labs. I took photos during
the construction, but only a couple survived to be sent to Prof. Fowler for his
book.”
(Editor’s note: Jasper has sent two group photos of students and
faculty taken in 1947 or 1948. These will appear on the Department website in
the near future.)
From Steve Warren (B.S. 1983, Meteorology): “I noticed your press
release on the International Year Of Astronomy and thought you might be
interested in knowing that I am a 1983 OU graduate with a BS in Meteorology.
I currently serve as the Superintendent of the U.S. Naval Observatory in
Washington, DC. Although my primary expertise is in Meteorology and
Oceanography (MS in Meteorology/Oceanography from the Naval Postgraduate
School), the Navy assigns the Observatory Superintendent position from the
Meteorology/Oceanography Officer Community in the Navy.
“Here at the
U.S. Naval Observatory, we are also working a schedule of events to participate
in the International Year Of Astronomy.Very good to hear from you.
The Superintendent provides operational,
scientific and administrative oversight for the U.S. Naval
Observatory (USNO). The Naval
Observatory has four operational departments: Astrometry, Time Services,
Astronomical Applications, and Earth
Orientation Departments.
We also have two subordinate activities: U.S. Naval Observatory
Flagstaff, AZ (the Navy's only dark sky observing facility) and an Alternate
Master Clock Facility in Colorado. Along
with our operational and research related astronomical activities,
we provide the Master Time for all Department of Defense applications (Universal
Coordinated Time (USNO)) and serve as a standard of time for the entire United
States. More information on our
activities can be found at <http://www.usno.navy.mil/usno>
“Of general interest in case you are unfamiliar with the Naval Observatory,
we share our grounds with the Vice President of the U.S. (new neighbor as of
yesterday). The Vice President's
residence was originally built as the Naval Observatory Superintendent's
residence in the late 1800's. I have been Superintendent of the U.S. Naval
Observatory since Oct '07. I regret I will be due to rotate out of the position
in June of this year. It will be tough
to leave such an interesting and unique position. Upon departure, I expect to move to a new
position related to staffing of environmental satellite program issues in
Silver Spring, MD.
“On a separate note, I had the opportunity to meet an OU astronomy/physics
grad student at the recent AAS Conference in Long Beach (I believe Leann Dang)
during her poster presentation (nice work).”
HENRY
RECEIVES 2008 KINNEY-SUGG AWARD
By David Branch
At the fall semester faculty meeting of the College of Arts and Sciences
(CAS), Professor Dick Henry was announced as the recipient of the 2008
Kinney-Sugg Award for Outstanding Professor in the CAS. Since 2002 this award
has been bestowed annually on a member of the CAS faculty who has
"established a record of outstanding teaching and scholarship" and
who is recognized for "dedication, effectiveness, and the ability to
inspire students to high levels of achievement."
This is hardly the first time that Dick's teaching has been
recognized. He is the past winner of several
awards, and since 2004 he has held the career title of David Ross Boyd
Professor, OU's highest recognition of "outstanding teaching, guidance,
and leadership of students". Dick's research efforts, directed toward
understanding how the chemical elements were synthesized in stars and how their
relative abundances have evolved over the history of the universe, have made
him a leading international authority on the subject and are supported by the National
Science Foundation.
The Kinney-Sugg Award is generously remunerative and the names of recipients
are inscribed on a plaque for permanent display in the CAS office. In addition to Dick Henry, the plaque bears
the name of another of our David Ross Boyd Professors, John Cowan, the 2004 recipient
of the Kinney-Sugg Award. Two for seven
in a college of some 500 faculty members isn't shabby.
INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF ASTRONOMY 2009
This
year both professional and amateur astronomers around the world will be
celebrating the 400th anniversary of Galileo’s first use of the telescope
in his study of astronomical objects. The United Nations, along with other
world organizations is recognizing 2009 as the International Year of Astronomy;
The Universe, Yours to Discover. A great deal of information is available at
the both the International and US websites, http://www.astronomy2009.org and http://astronomy2009.us
, respectively.
Our
Department is also getting involved. We are coordinating with Norman Public
Schools, the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History, and numerous other
organizations to offer the public monthly events. Each event will take place at
the Museum and will feature a public lecture followed by an opportunity to view
celestial objects through several telescopes set up on the Museum grounds. Door
prizes are being donated for each event by Astronomics, Inc., a Norman based
company. On January 13, the mayor and city council of Norman passed a
proclamation to make 2009 the International Year of Astronomy in Norman. (This
boosts the city’s sales tax by another 2%, with the revenue to be given
directly to our Department for building a 10 meter telescope and hiring five
new astrophysicists. Just kidding! Other than the recognition, we got zip.)
The
first program took place on Wednesday, January 21, at 7pm at the Museum. The
other 11 monthly events will fall on the first Thursday of each month. More
local details are available at http://nhn.ou.edu/iya09
.
ASTEROID
(20361) ROMANISHIN
Last summer, the International Astronomical Union (IAU) named an
asteroid, or minor planet, after Professor
Bill Romanishin. The asteroid now known as "(20361) Romanishin"
orbits the Sun every 4.3 years between Mars and Jupiter, in the main asteroid
belt. The IAU is the official international body that, among other
responsibilities, names astronomical bodies and geological features on other
planets.
The IAU citation reads: "William Romanishin (b. 1952) is a professor
of astronomy at the University of Oklahoma. An expert in imaging faint objects
using CCD cameras, Romanishin has recently concentrated on observing Kuiper
Belt Objects. With Stephen Tegler, he discovered the bimodal nature of centaur
colors."
The University of Oklahoma is an Equal Opportunity Employer
Institution 3/2001 460 copies of this publication, printed by the Physics and Astronomy
Department, have been prepared and distributed at a cost of $155.52
to the taxpayers of the state of Oklahoma.
