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APS News July 2018, Vol. 27. No. 7

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APS News July 2018, Vol. 27. No. 7 July 2018 • Vol. 27, No. 7 A PUBLICATION OF THE AMERICAN PHYSICAL SOCIETY Homer Neal 1942-2018 Page 3 APS.ORG/APSNEWS Update on the APS Strategic Plan Throughout 2018, APS mem- bers, leadership, and staff have been preparing a new Strategic Plan to guide the Society in coming years (see APS News, February 2018). Archiving Knowledge about Physics Teaching MISSION VALUES VISION The process began in early 2018 at By Charles Henderson and Paula Heron the APS Leadership Convocation Do laboratory experiments help at the founding and develop- when elected leaders of mem- students learn concepts? Why do ment of Physical Review Physics bership units (Divisions, Topical so few women choose to major in Education Research in 2005, now Groups, Forums, and Sections) pro- physics? What is the most impor- a central and open-access home for vided input. Town hall meetings tant skill for a high school physics this work. and invited focus groups convened teacher to develop? The close connection between at the APS March and April meet- and Increasing Organizational Physics education researchers PER and physics as a discipline ings to gather direct member com- Excellence. tackle these and many other ques- was acknowledged by the American ment. CEO Kate Kirby provided an At its June retreat, the Board tions about why students study Physical Society Council in its update at the annual APS Business spent considerable time discuss- physics, what they learn, and 1999 Statement on Research in common teaching strategies and Meeting on April 13 and a member ing progress on the Plan. In guid- how their experiences affect their Physics Education [1]. The Council tools were spurred by advances in feedback form was made available ing the ongoing effort, the Steering views about the discipline. Much of recognized that implementation of PER. These improvements could on the aps.org website. Committee will combine reports physics education research (PER) PER ideas was best accomplished not have been possible without a The APS Board of Directors is from each of the subcommittees into focuses on the concepts, principles, by having physicists within phys- strong research base that includes overseeing the work of preparing a draft Strategic Plan for consider- and habits of mind of physics, the ics departments who specialized systematic empirical investiga- the new Strategic Plan and has ation by the Board at its September traditional teaching methods and in PER. This statement came at a tion and theoretical speculation. delegated day-to-day efforts to a 2018 meeting and then by the APS the culture of physics. As a result, critical time for PER and helped Observations and insights, includ- Steering Committee and subcom- Council shortly thereafter. PER has for many years found a usher in an era of rapid growth ing accounts of both successful and mittees in four key areas: Ensuring The final Strategic Plan will be home in the professional associa- in the number of researchers, the unsuccessful interventions, must be a Meaningful Role in Scientific submitted to the APS Board and tions, conferences, and publication number of Ph.D. programs, and a widely disseminated and subject Research Dissemination; Serving Council for approval in November venues of physics. As the Physical broadening of the field of inquiry. to vigorous debate and replication. Communities (Membership, 2018. The approved Strategic Plan Review journal family marks its At the same time, the develop- Room must be made for investiga- Physics Community, and Society); will be rolled out at the 2019 APS 125th anniversary, we look back ment and adoption of many now- PER continued on page 6 Securing Financial Sustainability; Leadership Convocation. LIGO Labs Chosen as APS Historic Sites DON'T FORGET TO By James Riordon Check your email for information about the 2018 APS General The LIGO (Laser Interferometer Election. Voting is open from July 2 to August 10. For a full list Gravitational-Wave Observatory) of candidates, candidate biographies, and candidate statements laboratories in Livingston, please visit go.aps.org/aps-vote-2018 Louisiana and Hanford, Washington were declared APS Historic Sites in a ceremony on Diversifying the Dark Matter Portfolio June 20 at the Livingston LIGO Science Education Center. APS By Leah Poffenberger interacting massive particles President Roger Falcone and APS In 2012, CERN coaxed the long- (WIMPs), which are possibly Historic Sites Committee Chair sought Higgs boson into making an 100 times more massive than a Paul Halpern presented the labs proton. Over the past ten years, appearance, and in 2015, the Laser with identical plaques, each bear- The LIGO facilities in Washington and Louisiana have been designated APS Interferometer Gravitational-Wave direct dark matter detection experi- ing the citation shown in the figure. Historic Sites and will each receive a plaque honoring its contributions to Observatory directly observed an ments searching for WIMPs have LIGO Executive Director David direct detection of gravitational waves. elusive space-time wiggle. Both improved significantly, reaching Reitze noted that the LIGO historic phenomena were theorized about better and better sensitivities, but, site designation is unusual, consid- the observatories were upgraded the plaques, and Hanford is second, for decades before their eventual so far, the hypothesized particles ering that most other APS Historic to current sensitivities during the rather than conventional alphabeti- discovery. continue to evade even the best Sites recognize events that took Advanced LIGO (ALIGO) con- cal order. “I think that order is a So perhaps it is high time for detectors. place decades ago. “When I first struction phase that began in 2010. nod to the order in which the sig- dark matter, the mysterious stuff “I think this has been a little bit received word … that we had won The ALIGO upgrade was com- nals were received,” said Landry. “I that makes up around 27 percent of surprising—that no one has had this award,” said Reitze, “I was pleted in 2015, and, said Reitze, find it a little ironic that it took 1.3 the universe, to finally reveal itself. any indication of detecting dark initially quite surprised because, “Literally, almost the day we billion years for that signal to get But directly detecting particles that matter,” says Jodi Cooley, a phys- I thought to myself, well we made turned on our detectors we detected here, and yet when it was detected don’t reflect, absorb, or emit light ics professor at Southern Methodist these discoveries three years ago. the first gravitational waves from by the sites it was separated by 6.9 is no easy task, especially without University and collaborator on ... But then I thought about it a these colliding black holes.” milliseconds.” The difference in knowing what kind of particles SuperCDMS. “This is challenging little bit more. And I realized that, The LIGO labs are the 41st arrival time gives Livingston a one they are—or how they interact with theorists and experimentalists to no, this was exactly the right thing entry into the APS Historic Site part in 1019 priority as the first site regular matter. start looking in new directions.” to do because even though LIGO ledger, which was signed by Roger to detect gravitational waves. One of the prevailing hypoth- So does this absence of burst onto the scene … in 2015, Falcone on behalf of APS and In gratitude for the NSF’s eses for many years has been that WIMPs—and a subsequent uptick this is something that’s been going David Reitze on behalf of LIGO. It decades of support for gravita- dark matter consists of weakly MATTER continued on page 6 on for a long, long time.” is the first entry to be accompanied tional wave research, Rainer Weiss Reitze pointed out that the by dual plaques, in recognition of presented NSF Director France National Science Foundation the joint contribution of the LIGO Córdova with a photograph of (NSF) began providing funding labs, located over 3,000 kilome- Vannevar Bush at work cutting to Rainer Weiss to develop pro- ters apart. Each plaque includes aluminum on a milling machine. totypes for LIGO over forty years inscribed depictions of the gravi- Bush, explained Weiss, advised ago. Weiss shared the 2017 Nobel tational wave signals as detected at Franklin Roosevelt on scientific Prize in Physics with Kip Thorne the respective laboratories. matters, and was crucial to found- and Barry Barish. Construction of Michael Landry, Observatory ing the NSF. Weiss said that in the the LIGO sites began in 1995, and Head of the LIGO Hanford labo- book Science, the Endless Frontier, after running with the initial design ratory, noted with a laugh that the Bush noted reasons that govern- parameters from 2002 to 2005, Livingston facility is listed first on LIGO continued on page 3 Revised 07/16/18 2 • July 2018 Bend it like Bernoulli This Month in Physics History By Sophia Chen way. The International Football This summer, as World Cup Association Board specifies the fans cheer in front of TVs across circumference, weight, pressure, July 2, 1698: Thomas Savery Patents an Early Steam Engine the globe, take a look at the small and material. Before the design ever reaches the pitch, officials grey-and-white sphere rolling at s England hovered on the brink of the perform tests on a sample set the players’ feet. You may notice Industrial Revolution in the late 17th cen- of the balls to confirm they roll A that even though the rules of tury, a major challenge was how to remove excess straight. They even soak them the game haven’t changed—the water from the mines. This was typically done by in tanks of water to figure out ball has. mounting a series of buckets on a pulley system how much moisture the material wikimedia commons Adidas calls its latest ball re- driven by horses—a very slow and costly process.
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