UNews - Canadian Association of Physicists

Physics students shine at CAP annual congress

trevor.kenney — Thu, 16 Jul 2015 19:55:22 +0000

A pair of ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge physics students managed impressive results at the Canadian Association of Physicists (CAP) annual congress that took place in Edmonton in June. Matthew Robbins (BSc ’15) and Jeremy Scott (BSc ’15) each won second place in their categories for student oral presentation and student poster presentation respectively.

“Both students presented undergraduate research at the national level and managed to beat students, some of which were graduate students, from the country’s largest schools,” says U of L physics and astronomy professor Dr. Locke Spencer. “This speaks very highly both to the quality of the students, and to that of the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ’s physics research programs.”

Jeremy Scott (BSc ’15, left) and Matthew Robbins (BSc ’15) each won second place in their categories for student poster presentation and student oral presentation respectively.

Robbins (a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council Undergraduate Student Research Award winner studying under Drs. Saurya Das and Mark Walton) received second place in his division for his oral presentation, Modifications of Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle Motivated by Quantum Gravity. He was competing in the Theoretical Physics Division against undergraduate and graduate students across Canada.

“As it is currently not possible to access the natural energy scale of quantum gravity (the Planck scale), it is important to look for low-energy effects,” says Robbins, summarizing his presentation. “One such avenue of approach is by studying the corrections to the Schrödinger equation via the Generalized Uncertainty Principle (GUP) proposed in various candidate theories of quantum gravity. After finding the GUP-modified wave function for the simple harmonic oscillator, I then determined a corresponding function (Wigner function) in phase space. The modifications induced by GUP to the simple harmonic oscillator were demonstrated by analyzing the perturbations, the probability distributions for the position and momentum, and the energy levels.”

Robbins plans on pursuing a Master of Science under the guidance of Das and Walton, beginning in Fall 2015.

Scott (also a former NSERC USRA student) began his Master of Science under Spencer in May 2015 and received second place in his category for his poster presentation, Prestellar Cores in the Aquila Rift. He was competing against undergraduate and graduate students from across Canada in the Atmospheric and Space Physics division.

Due to last-minute scheduling problems, Scott also had the opportunity to present a talk on behalf of Spencer about far-infrared astrophysics and the U of L's involvement in this field.

“My poster was comprised of some of the work I did during my last year as an undergraduate student, and it focused on analyzing starless and pre-stellar cores in the Aquila Rift, a region of active star formation,” says Scott. “This work combined photometric data from Herschel (both the Spectral and Photometric Imaging Receiver (SPIRE) and the Photoconductor Array Camera (PACS) instruments) with high resolution heterodyne spectroscopy of CO emission recorded with the instrumentation suite at the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT). I generated spectral energy distributions (SEDs) by employing four distinct photometry methods. These SEDs were then fit to a modified black body curve from which important parameters such as dust mass, temperature and emissivity were extracted. The CO emission spectra allowed the determination of the distribution and relative velocity of cold gas in these starless and pre-stellar cores. This work gives insight into the conditions and processes taking place in the early stages of star formation.”

Both Robbins and Scott are delighted to have received this recognition and are excited about the prospects of continuing their research through graduate studies in the Department of Physics and Astronomy.

Physics Department history reflects U of L story

trevor.kenney — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 22:13:50 +0000

The history of the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge is one of bold beginnings and independent ideals, traits that are reflected in the histories of the individual departments on campus. The evolution of the Department of Physics and Astronomy may embody that more than any other.

"Our story is really the story of the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ," says department Chair and associate professor Dr. David Siminovitch. "For us, in particular, there were some moments it could have gone quite badly and we might not even be here, but we are and we've triumphed."

The department's story has caught the eye of the Canadian Association of Physicists (CAP) and is featured in the latest edition of its quarterly magazine, Physics in Canada.

"CAP approached me several years ago to do this but I just didn't have the time," says Siminovitch. "Finally, a couple of years ago I sat down and said if I don't do it now, I'm never going to do it. I literally set aside two weeks where I dropped everything else and worked on writing the history of our department. Since then I'd spent a week here or there polishing it."

For Siminovitch, who came to the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ in 1990, the exercise proved to be very enlightening.

"There was a lot that happened before me," says Siminovitch.

"I had some help from the department and particularly from Dr. Arvid Schultz, one of the founding members, and from Drs. Keramat Ali and David Naylor. It was very satisfying for us to get it done and the nice thing is, it now goes into something that is read by virtually every member of the Canadian physics community, including faculty members but also graduate and undergraduate students."

The department's history spans four decades, each of which has significant milestones, taking the department from its establishment in 1967 as an independent unit of the Faculty of Arts & Science focused principally on teaching to today's comprehensive research and development group.

Over the past 40-plus years, the department's maturation has been anything but linear, and Siminovitch points to a particularly poignant period in history when the future of physics at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ was in question.

He describes a department lacking support as it approached its second decade, with a low sense of morale and experiencing high rates of attrition. In 1979, academic vice-president, Dr. Owen Holmes, requested an external, independent review of the department. Its resulting report was frank and blunt, recommending as a bare minimum step to rebuild and strengthen the department that two new faculty be recruited immediately, both active in experimental physics.

"Firstly, they had the good sense to go outside the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ to find out what they should do," says Siminovitch. "Then they had the courage to act on the recommendations, hiring both Dr. Ali and Dr. Naylor. The rest really is history. They did right back in 1979 and the department is alive and well because of that."

With the history now written and published, Siminovitch encourages other ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ departments to look into their pasts and to put down their own histories.

"I view this as both telling our story but also telling our story at a very important moment in the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ's history," he says. "The nice thing now is that this history lives on the web (www.uleth.ca/artsci/physics-astronomy/department-history) and it is dynamic, so we plan to continually update it, not only as we move along year to year but also adding to our past as more stories emerge."

This story first appeared in the January edition of the Legend. For a look at the Legend in a flipbook format, follow this link.

Physics Department history reflects U of L story

trevor.kenney — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 22:22:14 +0000

The department's story has caught the eye of the Canadian Association of Physicists (CAP) and is featured in the latest edition of its quarterly magazine, Physics in Canada.

For Siminovitch, who came to the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ in 1990, the exercise proved to be very enlightening.

"There was a lot that happened before me," says Siminovitch.

With the history now written and published, Siminovitch encourages other ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ departments to look into their pasts and to put down their own histories.

This story first appeared in the January edition of the Legend. For a look at the Legend in a flipbook format, follow this link.

UNews - Canadian Association of Physicists

Physics students shine at CAP annual congress

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Physics Department history reflects U of L story

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Physics Department history reflects U of L story

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