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Greetings from the Chair —It is my pleasure to continue the tradition of thePhysics Departmental Newsletter established bymy predecessor, Professor Charles Baltay, in thesummer of 2001, which also marked the beginningof my term.

We are pleased to welcome several newfaculty to the department. Professor StevenGirvin, a noted condensed matter theorist, joinedus in July 2001. Steve was well known to all of usfor his breadth and depth of interest in variousareas of condensed matter physics, and when webecame aware that he was considering relocationfrom Indiana University, we moved aggressivelyto bring him here, fighting off competition fromsome worthy opponents. Steve has already propelled our already strong condensedmatter group to new heights. He also works closely with Applied Physics onproblems related to quantum information, especially with Michel Devoret, anotherrecent and marvelous addition to the Yale faculty in January 2002. In fact the onlything Steve does not know is the word “no,” and an obvious conflict of interestprevents me from rectifying the situation.

Another prized addition to the department will be Professor Pierre Hohenberg,who will switch from Deputy Provost to Adjunct Professor at the end of thisacademic year. Pierre, who is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, hasmade seminal contributions to condensed matter physics that have been recognizedby a string of honors too long to mention here. So I will limit myself to the latesttwo: the Planck Medal and the Onsager Prize. Both Pierre and the departmentlook forward to his return to the fold.

Next, in the area of atomic, molecular and optical physics, we have tenuredand successfully retained David DeMille. We are very excited by Dave’s ambitiousexperimental program that ranges from searching for the electron’s electric dipolemoment to quantum computation using molecules. Dave has already become anintegral part of our senior faculty, contributing vigorously to its present and future.

Witold Skiba joined our particle theory group as assistant professor, and weare already benefiting from his newly designed course on particle theory and hisinfluence on further recruitments. Andreas Heinz, who joined our nuclearexperimental program, will base his operations at the Wright Nuclear StructureLab and focus on heavy element spectroscopy.

The last year also marked the departure of Mark Kasevich to Stanford andthe retirement of Sam MacDowell. Fortunately, Sam will stay on as part of theresearch staff for a year and continue to teach. Our best wishes to both on theirnew pastures.

As we readied to go to press, we learned of the passing away of one of thestalwarts in the department, Vernon Hughes. His legendary accomplishmentsare discussed in an obituary later in this newsletter.

The department has developed and voted on its next Long Range Plan. Onceagain we hope to address emerging areas of interest without compromising ourcurrent strengths.

Yale Department of Physics Newsletter

Inside this Issue —

Spring 2003

2002 Nobel Prize ............................. 3

Rosenthal Memorial Lectures ....... 3

Faculty news ............................ 4, 6-10

Electronic classrooms ..................... 5

Quantum computing ....................... 7

Web site updates ........................... 10

Graduate student news .......... 11-12

Career counseling .......................... 12

Accelerator school ........................ 13

Leigh Page Lectures ....................... 13

Alumni news .................................... 14

Physics Olympics update .............. 15continued on page 2

Channel surfingduring physics class?

See page 5…

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Chair’s Message continued from page 1

Your comments, suggestions and news are most welcome!

Julia Downs, EditorPhysics NewsletterP.O. Box 209010New Haven, CT 06520-9010julia.downs@yale.edu

Photo Credits: Brookhaven National LaboratoryMedia & Communications Office (Davis)

University of Colorado at Boulder,Office of News Services (Cornell)

Michael Marsland (Bockelman,Hohenberg and Hughes)

Courtesy of Professor Iachello (Iachello)Stephen Irons (reception and picnic)Mark Caprio (Physics Olympics)Harold Shapiro (all others)

Newsletter Design: Elaine Piraino-Holevoet/PIROET

Thanks to: Diane AltschulerCon BeausangJo-Ann BonnettDaniele BucarStephen Irons

Newsletter published by the Department of Physics andthe Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

Editor: Julia DownsAssociation of Yale Alumni

Writer/compiler: Andrea Nagy

Contributing Writers: Robert AdairR. Shankar

Our graduate program is in the able hands of our registrar,Jo-Ann Bonnett, and our Director of Graduate Studies, ProfessorSteve Girvin. Steve is working on integrating our admissions withthose of sister departments Applied Physics and Astronomy. Openhouses for admitted students have become a part of therecruitment cycle. Prospective students get to spend a weekendat Yale mingling with current students, listening to presentationsfrom various groups, and touring the labs. We have seen a visibleincrease in the number of applications to our graduate programsand hope this will continue. We also plan to maintain our LaptopProgram, which awards to each incoming graduate student anetwork-ready laptop, loaded with useful software, and paves theway for rapid assimilation into research activity.

Professor Sean Barrett continues to be our dynamic Directorof Undergraduate Studies, aided by Linda Ford, the registrar. Seanis a key member of COUP, the Committee for the UndergraduateProgram, chaired by Professor Thomas Appelquist, and chargedwith thoroughly exploring our teaching mission. Several changeshave already been approved: requirements for graduation thatare less constraining, two parallel tracks for those aiming for post-graduate work in physics and those wishing to pursue careers inother areas where a thorough training in physics will serve as aspringboard, and finally four new courses open to students afterthe introductory sequence, related to astro-, geo-, bio-, and nano-physics. All this will take effect in fall 2003. We have alsothoroughly revamped the labs—changing both the write-ups toreflect the kind of things that we, the faculty, would have liked todo in their place, and purchasing a lot of new equipment fromdepartmental funds and with bright prospects for additionalmonies from the university and private sources like the CondeFund and the Paul Moore Fund. Using electronic feedback in theclassroom has become a reality in several introductory coursesand is described later in the newsletter.

Our website http://www.yale.edu/physics/ has gone througha major overhaul. Our special thanks to Professor Subir Sachdevfor bringing to this task his usual brand of energy and technicalwizardry. Sarah Bickman, one of our graduate students, hascreated a link (described later in this letter) that allows free flowof information between undergraduates, graduates and alumni.

Dr. Stephen Irons, our Director of Undergraduate Labs, has a linkedsite (http://www.yale.edu/physics/facilities/support/physics_demos/where you can browse the demonstrations from inertial balloonsto the Millikan Oil Drop experiment.

Those walking into the corridors in Sloane will see it greatlychanged: new carpets and attractive posters and portraits havereplaced the aging mailboxes and notice boards. Our tirelessbusiness manager Harley Pretty oversaw the transition from“peeling” to “appealing.”

We continue to strengthen ties with sister departments. Ajoint venture with Applied Physics has yielded a 1.2 milliondollar grant from the Keck Foundation, detailed later. The free-flow of research activity, graduate students, and pedagogycontinues between the two departments. We plan to makeappointments in Astrophysics in alliance with Astronomy,leveraging the Yale Center for Astronomy and Astrophysicsunder the directorship of Professor Meg Urry. Professor JohnWettlaufer of Geology and Geophysics will teach an upper levelcourse at the borderline of the two departments.

Our outreach efforts continue with the Yale Olympiadmasterminded by Professor Con Beausang and aided by manyfaculty and students. Professors Beausang and Peter Parker alsodesigned and taught the (sold out) college seminar titled“Introduction to Radiation and Nuclear Physics” for non-sciencemajors and a course for local and federal Emergency FirstResponse personnel. The seminar is teaching non-science majorsbackground information on basic nuclear physics, nuclearweapons, and medical physics for the post-September 11 era;the community course is offering practical information for bomband hazmat squads in the New Haven area.

It should be evident that this is a department that runs itself,with invaluable and spontaneous contributions from all its facultyand staff, but for which I might have dropped out of Chairmanship101. Many thanks to them and to you, our alumni, for yourcontinued interest in our affairs. Please stay in touch!

R. Shankar, ChairProfessor of Physics and

Applied Physics

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Rosenthal Lecture 2001The 28th annual Hanan RosenthalMemorial Lecture was delivered byEric Cornell on November 9, 2001.

Professor Cornell did not letthe fact that he had just a month tobone up on his Swedish, try out tailcoats, and learn to walk backwardsfrom the King of Sweden keep himfrom honoring his earlier promiseto give the Rosenthal lectures.

He described his Nobel Prizewinning work in his talk “Bose-Einstein Condensation: Science

within a Millionth of a Degree of Absolute Zero.” He explainedhow new techniques had to be invented and implemented to bringatoms down to a temperature low enough for condensation to takeplace and once it was achieved, to display that fact unambiguously.

The talk attracted a huge audience, including students andteachers from regional high schools, and a video link to anadjoining lecture hall had to be provided.

Rosenthal Lecture 2002The 29th annual Hanan Rosenthal Memorial Lecture wasdelivered by Mark G. Raizen on November 8, 2002. ProfessorRaizen spoke on “New Frontiers in Controlling the Motion ofMatter with Light: From Single Atoms to Neurons.”

He discussed recent experiments done by his group at theUniversity of Texas at Austin on the interactions and control ofmatter with light, especially the interface between quantummechanics and nonlinear dynamics. He described recentexperiments on atomic motion in a new system of “opticalbilliards,” and indicated some future directions for quantumdynamics and control in many-body systems. The talk concludedwith a discussion of ways in which weak light forces can beused to guide the direction of neuron growth.

Pennsylvania to continue experiments at the Homestake GoldMine with Professor Kenneth Lande. He has an affiliation withthe university as a research professor.

A member of the National Academy of Sciences and theAmerican Academy of Arts and Sciences, Mr. Davis has wonnumerous scientific awards, including the 1978 Cyrus B.Comstock Prize from the National Academy of Sciences; the 1988Tom W. Bonner Prize from the American Physical Society; the1992 W.K.H. Panofsky Prize, also from APS; the 1999 BrunoPontecorvo Prize from the Joint Institute for Nuclear Researchin Dubna, Russia; the 2000 Wolf Prize in Physics, which he sharedwith Masatoshi Koshiba, University of Tokyo, Japan; and the 2002National Medal of Science.

— from Brookhaven National Laboratory Office of Public Affairs

Yale Chemistry Alumnus Raymond Davis Wins Nobel Prize in Physics

Raymond Davis, Jr., ’42 PhD(physical chemistry), a retiredchemist at the US Departmentof Energy’s Brookhaven Na-tional Laboratory, won the2002 Nobel Prize in Physicsfor detecting solar neutrinos,ghostlike particles producedin the nuclear reactions thatpower the sun. Davis sharesthe prize with MasatoshiKoshiba of Japan and Ric-cardo Giacconi of the US.

“Neutrinos are fascinat-ing particles, so tiny and fastthat they can pass straight

through everything, even the earth itself, without even slowingdown,” said Mr. Davis. “When I began my work, I was intriguedby the idea of learning something new. The interesting thingabout doing new experiments is that you never know what theanswer is going to be!”

Mr. Davis was the first scientist to detect solar neutrinos,the signature of nuclear fusion reactions occurring in the coreof the sun. Devising a method to detect solar neutrinos basedon the theory that the elusive particles produce radioactive argonwhen they interact with a chlorine nucleus, Mr. Davisconstructed his first solar neutrino detector in 1961, 2,300 feetbelow ground in a limestone mine in Ohio. Building on thisexperience, he mounted a full-scale experiment 4,800 feetunderground, in the Homestake Gold Mine in South Dakota. Inresearch that spanned from 1967-1985, Mr. Davis consistentlyfound only one-third of the neutrinos that standard theoriespredicted. His results threw the field of astrophysics into anuproar, and for nearly three decades, physicists tried to resolvethe so-called “solar neutrino puzzle.”

Experiments in the 1990s using different detectors aroundthe world eventually confirmed the solar neutrino discrepancy.Mr. Davis’s lower-than-expected neutrino detection rate is nowaccepted by the international science community as evidencethat neutrinos have the ability to change from one of the threeknown neutrino forms into another. This characteristic, calledneutrino oscillation, implies that the neutrino has mass, aproperty that is not included in the current standard model ofelementary particles (in contrast, particles of light, called photons,have zero mass). Mr. Davis’s detector was sensitive to only oneform of the neutrino, so he observed less than the expectednumber of solar neutrinos.

Raymond Davis, Jr., earned a BS and an MS from theUniversity of Maryland in 1937 and 1940, respectively, before hewent on to Yale for a PhD. After his 1942-46 service in the USArmy Air Force and two years at Monsanto Chemical Company,he joined Brookhaven Lab’s Chemistry Department in 1948. Hereceived tenure in 1956 and was named senior chemist in 1964.

Mr. Davis retired from Brookhaven in 1984, but has anappointment in Brookhaven’s Chemistry Department as aresearch collaborator. In 1985, he joined the University of

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Faculty News — Honors and AwardsYoram Alhassid, professor of phys-ics, received the Alexander vonHumboldt Senior Scientist Award inApril 2002. The award is given bythe von Humboldt Foundation inGermany as “a lifelong tribute tothe past academic accomplish-ments” of “scholars with interna-tionally recognized academic quali-fications.” Award winners are in-vited to carry out research projectsof their own choice in Germany forperiods of between six months and

one year. Professor Alhassid was noted for his important contri-butions to many-body theory, and in particular for his work onthe maximum entropy approach, on the quantum Monte Carlocalculations, on chaotic phenomena in nuclei, and on the trans-port properties of mesoscopic samples.

Pierre C. Hohenberg, deputyprovost for science and technologyand adjunct professor of physicsand applied physics, received the2003 Lars Onsager Prize from theAmerican Physical Society.Professor Hohenberg received thehonor for research that extends overhis 40-year career, including workconducted at Bell Laboratories instatistical and condensed matterphysics. The society cited him forcontributions to the theory of

dynamic scaling close to critical points, the theory of patternformation in nonequilibrium systems, and density functionaltheory. The $15,000 prize was first presented in 1995 and annuallybeginning in 1997. It recognizes lifetime achievement andoutstanding research in theoretical statistical physics includingthe quantum fluids.

Francesco Iachello, J. W. GibbsProfessor of Physics, was awardedthe 2002 Lise Meitner Prize forNuclear Science from the EuropeanPhysical Society for “innovativeapplications of group theoreticalmethods to the understanding ofatomic nuclei.” Professor Iachello,a member of the Yale Universityfaculty since 1978, published aseries of papers (with Akito Arima)between 1974 and 1979 thatdeveloped the interactive bosonmodel of nuclei. The model has shaped the current understandingof a large class of nuclei. In his later efforts, he discovered asupersymmetric approach generalizing the earlier U(6) work, andintroduced a model of molecules, the vibron model, based on thedynamical group U(4). The model has formed the basis for

describing many phenomena in small and large molecules. Hedelivered the Lise Meitner Prize address at the 2002 meeting ofthe European Physical Society in Budapest, Hungary. ProfessorIachello was also honored this March at an international meetingon “Symmetries in Nuclear Structure,” in Erice, Sicily. The meetingwas organized to celebrate Professor Iachello’s career on theoccasion of his 60th birthday.

Nicholas Read, professor of physicsand applied physics, and colleagueshave received the 2002 Oliver E.Buckley Condensed Matter Prize fortheir outstanding theoretical orexperimental contributions tocondensed matter physics. Theprize was endowed in 1952 byAT&T Bell Laboratories (nowLucent Technologies) as a way ofrecognizing outstanding scientificwork. It is named in memory ofOliver E. Buckley, an influential

president of Bell Labs. The other Buckley Prize recipients areJainendra Jain of Pennsylvania State University, who began hiswork on this problem when he was a postdoctoral fellow at Yale,and Robert Willett of Lucent Technologies. Professor Read wasawarded the prize for his work on the fractional quantum Hall effect,in which electrons, confined to move in two dimensions, exhibitsurprising behaviors in their electrical conductivity. His work onthis problem spans nearly a decade, starting with a seminal paperin 1993. He is also a co-author with Professors Halpren (Harvard)and Lee (M.I.T.) of one of the most cited papers on this subject.

Subir Sachdev, professor of physicsand applied physics, has beenawarded a 2003 fellowship by theGuggenheim Foundation for hiswork on competing orders andcriticality in quantum matter.Professor Sachdev’s research hasfocused on the subject of condensedmatter theory in general andquantum phase transition inparticular. His Guggenheimproposal addresses the problem ofnewly discovered classes ofmaterials that do not easily fit into any of the standard paradigmsof solid state physics, such as cuprate high temperaturesuperconductors and other intermetallic compounds. He arguesthat such materials can be understood in a framework ofcompeting orderings, using a theory of quantum and thermalfluctuations in the vicinity of quantum phase transitions. Heis one of 184 winners—and among them only four physicists—from a pool of 3200 applicants. The purpose of the Guggenheimaward is to provide fellows with blocks of time in which theycan work with as much creative freedom as possible. ProfessorSachdev hopes to spend his fellowship time at the KavliInstitute of Physics in Santa Barbara.

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Yale Physics Pioneers Electronic Classrooms During Spring 2003 Semester

If you have ever seen “Who Wants to Be aMillionaire,” then you can picture the newelectronic classroom system that has justbeen installed in Sloane 59 and DaviesAuditorium. But instead of guessing theanswer to a trivia question, students in twoof the department’s courses now “vote” onthe solution to a physics problem.

With a grant of $12,300 from theuniversity, the Physics Department is thefirst at Yale to use wireless polling systemsas teaching aids. The technology gives bothprofessor and students instantaneousfeedback on student comprehension of alesson. It also allows a professor to keepstatistics on attendance and individual and class performancethroughout the semester.

The systems are beingpioneered during the spring2003 semester by ProfessorsCornelius Beausang in Physics151b (General Physics) andJohn Harris (at left) in Physics110b (Themes in ModernPhysics).

At the beginning of thesemester in Professor Harris’course, each student is givena transmitter that looks like afat orange magic marker withbuttons marked A through E.Professor Harris teaches from

a laptop that is connected to several receivers installed throughoutthe classroom.

During one Wednesday afternoon class, Professor Harrisreviews the concept of centripetal force by asking a multiple-choice question about the forces acting upon a person in anamusement park ride. Students have one minute to work theproblem and press a button on their transmitters correspondingto their answer.

As the minute ticks by, the screen atthe front of the classroom registers eachvote received by flashing a colored andnumbered block. After the allotted timeis up, the professor’s laptop produces abar chart showing student answers.Students see how others voted, and theythen defend their own answers orreconsider whether their reasoning mighthave been incorrect.

The hardware and software aremanufactured by H-ITT in Fayetteville,Ark. and were procured by Stephen Irons,lecturer and director of instructional labs,who wrote the grant proposal with help

from Professor Megan Urry.Professor Urry, who experimented with a non-electronic

version of the polling system, has found that with this interactivemethod students learn and retain far more. “From the first dayI tried it, I could see the promise. Students really sat up straightwhen confronted with the questions,” she said.

The instant feedback also enables Professor Urry to use classtime more efficiently: “I pose a question, I see whether they getit or not. Judging from the result, I can go to an easier concept,work the present concept, or move to a harder one. The classgets tailored to the students’ understanding.”

Adds Professor Harris, “The class is a joy to teach.”

Graph showing thedistribution of studentresponses to the conceptquestion.

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Faculty News — Hires and Promotions

David DeMille was promoted totenure from within the departmentin 2002. He came to Yale in 1997after teaching at Amherst Collegeand earning his PhD from the Uni-versity of California at Berkeley.His research focuses on atomicmolecular and optical physics.Among his projects is a study us-ing atomic physics to measure theelectron’s electric dipole moment.He is mounting an experiment thatwill push the level of observation

down several levels, and results so far indicate that he canachieve at least a 100-fold improvement in sensitivity to theelectron EDM within the next few years. If he sees it and makesthe first measurement, it will be an astonishing contribution.He is also working with Steve Girvin, Michel Devoret, DanielProber, and others in the development of a quantum computer.(See related article, page 7.) Professor DeMille is an active mem-ber of the Committee on the Undergraduate Program, which isworking to revise, improve, and modernize undergraduate teach-ing. “He is someone who was broadly regarded as very specialand very brilliant from almost the day he came here,” said Pro-fessor Thomas Appelquist. “The future of the department is go-ing to rely on people like David DeMille.” Department Chair R.Shankar agrees: “Dave has already become such an integral partof our present activities and future plans. His decision to re-main at Yale is a major boost to our department in general, andthe AMO group in particular.”

In fall 2001 Steven Girvin joinedthe department as professor anddirector of graduate studies.Professor Girvin is a theoreticalphysicist who studies the quantummechanics of large collections ofatoms, molecules, and electronsthat are found in superconductors,magnets, and transistors. He isparticularly interested in theengineering question of whether itis possible to build a quantumcomputer. He is collaborating with

Michel Devoret and Rob Schoelkopf in the Department of AppliedPhysics, who are constructing superconducting circuit elementsthat might someday form the basis for a quantum computer.Such a computer could in principle solve problems that areimpossible on ordinary computers. “In order to build a quantumcomputer it is necessary to create circuit devices which behavequantum mechanically (like individual atoms) despite the factthat they are macroscopic and consist of a very large number ofatoms,” explains Professor Girvin. “In addition to potentialpractical applications, this difficult challenge will help us betterunderstand the connections between the microscopic quantum

world and the macroscopic classical world of everydayexperience.” Prior to coming to Yale, Professor Girvin made anumber of seminal contributions to the theory of the quantumHall effect—a phenomenon associated with electrons trappedin certain two-dimensional semiconductors under the influenceof an applied magnetic field. He has also made importantcontributions to the theory of quantum phase transitions, whichhas broad applications to the properties of electronic materialsat very low temperatures. He earned his PhD from Princeton in1977 and came to Yale from the University of Indiana. “SteveGirvin is one of the premier theorists in the field of condensedmatter physics,” said Professor Subir Sachdev. “Yale already hada strong group in this area, but with the addition of Girvin, Ihave been told by many people that this group is ranked in thetop one or two in the world.” Department Chair RamamurtiShankar adds, “We all rely so much on Steve for his scholarship,citizenship, and collegial help that we cannot see how wemanaged before he came.”

In January 2003 Andreas Heinzjoined the department as assistantprofessor, leading the new field ofheavy element spectroscopy.Professor Heinz received his PhDfrom GSI Darmstadt in 1998, andhe has already at this early stageof his career carved out animpressive niche in the study ofheavy elements. He has held ahighly prestigious Fermi Fellow-ship at the Argonne NationalLaboratory. His work at ANL on thespectroscopy of nobelium was cited in the recent US Long RangePlan for Nuclear Physics as one of the worldwide landmarkachievements in nuclear structure in the last five years. Hehelped establish experimentally the unexpected and remarkablestability of nuclei of elements above Z=100 against hugecentrifugal forces. At Yale he will use one of the best instrumentsin the world for such research—the SASSYER. His work willprovide an entirely new thrust for WNSL. Professor Heinz isalso an enthusiastic teacher who gives clear, well-motivated talkswell adjusted to the level of his audience. “We are excited towelcome this very skilled experimentalist to our department,where he can contribute his expertise to teaching and researchat WNSL,” said Chairman R. Shankar.

Witold Skiba (photo, next page) joined the department in 2002as a new assistant professor after receiving his PhD from theMassachusetts Institute of Technology and completingpostdoctoral research at MIT and the University of California atSan Diego. His research focuses on theoretical particle physics,particularly phenomena that take place at or above theelectroweak scale. He is studying the question of what com-pletes the standard model of weak, electromagnetic, and stronginteractions, and is using supersymmetric theories to extend

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the standard model of gravity atthe quantum level. His recent pub-lications have proposed new mod-els of dynamical supersymmetrybreaking and communicatingsupersymmetry breaking viagauge, anomaly, and gaugino me-diations. According to colleagueThomas Appelquist, ProfessorSkiba was hired because he is“working on exciting problems atthe high energy frontier of thefield. He has also been examining

the possibility that new spatial dimensions might appear ataccessible energies.” In summer 2003 Professor Skiba will leada workshop on TeV-scale physics at the Aspen Center for Phys-ics. During his first semester at Yale he designed a graduatespecial topics course on physics beyond the standard model ofelectroweak interactions. “Professor Skiba brings much-neededyouth, vitality, and know-how to the particle theory group,”says R. Shankar, the department’s chair.

John Wettlaufer joined the Yalegeology department in January2002 with a joint appointment inphysics. He is associated with thecondensed matter theory group inthe department. He previously waswith the University of Washington,Seattle, where he received hisPh.D. in 1991. Professor Wettlauferstudies the dynamics andthermodynamics of ice. He hasshown how microscopic films ofunfrozen water that exist at icesurfaces to temperatures well below 0° C play a central role inphenomena as diverse as ozone-destroying chemistry in polarstratospheric clouds, frost heave in soils, thunderstormelectrification, and the redistribution of paleoclimate signals inthe earth’s great ice sheets. During his research career he hasspent a total of over a year on drifting sea ice in the Arctic Ocean.Professor Wettlaufer brings to the classroom an energetic andarticulate lecture style. He is teaching courses in geophysicalfluid dynamics, mathematical methods in geophysics, anddynamical climatology. “Professor Wettlaufer’s affiliation withthe physics department is a source of great satisfaction to all ofus, since he takes such an active interest and part in the wellbeing of the department,” says Chairman R. Shankar. “Hiswillingness to teach a course on the physics of geology is astriking example.” Professor Wettlaufer hopes that his researchand teaching will help forge links between geophysics,geochemistry, engineering, astronomy, mathematics and physicsthat do not presently exist in a traditional departmental structurebut that Yale is embracing with his arrival.

Quantum Computing Comes to YaleA four-year, $1.2 million award from the W.M. Keck Foundation ofLos Angeles will establish the grant-funded W.M. Keck FoundationCenter for Quantum Information Physics at Yale. Exploring thescience and technology necessary to build a quantum computer isan important goal of the new center to be established at Yale’s Facultyof Engineering and Department of Physics.

The project involves six Yale principal investigators, includingMichel Devoret, Daniel Prober and Robert Schoelkopf in condensedmatter experiment, Steven Girvin and A. Douglas Stone incondensed matter theory, and David DeMille in atomic andmolecular physics. Professor Devoret came to Yale this year tospearhead the University’s efforts in this area from the condensedmatter physics section of the French CEA (Atomic EnergyResearch Center), Saclay, where he was director of research.

A major goal of the project is to determine if a quantumcomputer can be built using “atom-like” circuits. A quantumcomputer differs from a classical computer in that its componentsbehave according to the laws of quantum mechanics rather thanthose of classical physics. The center will develop both the theoreticaland the practical aspects of quantum computing. The quest to builda quantum computer is based on the theory that such a computerwould be far superior to conventional computers in terms of memoryand security. The results of past studies have shown that a quantumcomputer would be a calculating device more powerful in principlethan any conventional computer that could ever be built.

“Although we still do not yet understand the range of problemsfor which a quantum computer is specially suited, there is everyreason to believe that such a machine would have a revolutionaryimpact on information technology,” said Professor Devoret.

The team will consider whether quantum information canbe stored and processed in solid-state and molecular systems.The team will also experimentally and theoretically addressquestions relating to noise in quantum systems and the effect ofthe measurement process. Another project involves developing anew molecular system for storing and processing quantuminformation, which would involve the first demonstration of ultra-cold arrays of polar molecules. The total project budget, includingthe W.M. Keck Foundation grant, is more than $4.8 million.

In addition to these specific goals, the researchers anticipateother significant contributions to condensed matter physics andatomic and molecular physics, which are areas that areparticularly strong at Yale.

Faculty News continued

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In Memoriam: FACULTY

Charles Bockelman, professoremeritus of physics and Yale’s firstdeputy provost for the sciences, diedon June 6, 2002, at age 79. ProfessorBockelman’s research focused onnuclear structure physics. In the late1950s he developed an importantcorrelation between neutron transferand neutron capture reactions, whichserved as a cornerstone of the then-emerging utilization of these reactionsfor the measurement of nuclearstructure. He also played a key roleduring the 1960s in the installation andmanagement of both the upgradedelectron linear accelerator and the Wright Nuclear Structure Laboratory’sMP tandem Van de Graff accelerator at Yale. Over the course of his careerhe published more than 50 scientific papers and articles.

Professor Bockelman taught both elementary and advanced courses in YaleCollege and occasional courses in the Graduate School. Describing him asan instructor who was “always coherent and clear,” Robert Adair, SterlingProfessor of Physics, notes that Professor Bockelman’s “work with hisgraduate students introducing them to the techniques and ethos of researchwas especially important to him.” Indeed, one grateful graduate student,Karl Wetzel, wrote in the acknowledgements to his dissertation, “ In sharinghis insights into the nucleus and its interactions, Professor CharlesBockelman has also conveyed his sense of importance in understandingthe interactions among people.”

His wisdom and intelligence in human affairs led him to positions of leadershipin the Yale administration. During 20 years in the provost’s office beginningin 1969, Professor Bockelman facilitated the construction of new buildings,the implementation of computer systems, getting new faculty settled, andmaintaining the programs of senior faculty. He returned to teaching in thePhysics Department in 1987 and served as director of undergraduate studiesin physics from 1990 until his retirement in 1992. During this time he focusedon converting the spectrograph he had installed in the 1960s to a large-scalescattering chamber for heavy ion studies.

Born in 1922 in San Francisco, Professor Bockelman grew up inMilwaukee, Wisconsin. He served for four years in the Army Air Corps inthe Pacific during World War II and went on to earn PhB and PhD degreesfrom the University of Wisconsin. He joined the Yale faculty in 1955 asan assistant professor.

Vernon W. Hughes, Sterling ProfessorEmeritus and Senior ResearchAssociate, died March 25, 2003, inNew Haven at the age of 81. He wasChairman of the Physics Departmentfrom 1961-1967, crucial years whenYale was transformed into a modernresearch university.

Professor Hughes began research inphysics in 1942 when he worked onradar at the MIT Radiation Labora-tory, and he remained active evenduring his terminal stay in the hos-pital, when he wrote recommenda-tion letters for a post-doc workingwith him. Thus he was a working physicist for 61 years.

He was born in Kankakee, Illinois, on May 28, 1921, and following thedeath of his father was raised in New York by his mother, a librarian atTeachers College of Columbia University. Entering Columbia as a pre-law student, he quickly gravitated to mathematics and physics. Afterwinning the Van Buren Math Prize, he graduated as a physics major inthree years and enrolled as a graduate student in Cal Tech in 1941. Thereis a picture of Professor Hughes atop Mt. San Gorgonio in California alongwith Pief Panofsky and two other Cal Tech grad students.

After receiving his MSc, he worked at MIT in a group directed by BurtonChance, with whom he would later coauthor a book on waveforms. Afterthe war he began research at Columbia under I. I. Rabi on nuclear elec-tric quadrupole moments using a molecular beam apparatus that he con-structed. He received his Ph.D. in 1950 and after two years as a post-docat Columbia and two years at the University of Pennsylvania, came toYale in 1954.

While much of Professor Hughes’ work was on the properties of atoms,he regarded atoms primarily as laboratories for the study of the funda-mentals of electromagnetism. Thus he concentrated on studies of thehelium atom, of positronium, and then—arguably his most unique con-tribution to physics—of muonium, the muon-electron atom that he wasthe first to identify in 1960. His following 40 years of experimentationon that atom verified to high precision that the muon is indeed a “heavyelectron,” gave us new avenues into the experimental study of quantumelectrodynamics, and created a tool to probe the highest energy scales ofelementary particle physics.

Professor Hughes was also an originator of the use of polarized electrons inhigh energy accelerators beginning in 1963, when he developed the firstpolarized source for the Stanford two-mile accelerator. That vision led tothe observation of parity non-conservation in deep inelastic electron scat-tering and in electron-positron scattering and to measurements of the spindependent structure of the proton. These observations demonstrated in-adequacies in the understanding of the relationship between the nature ofthe constituents of the proton and its spin.

Most recently Professor Hughes conceived of and led an experiment toimprove the measurement of magnetic moment of the muon by a largefactor. The deviation of the magnetic moment, g, from the elementaryDirac value of 2, in natural units, thus g-2, serves as a benchmark for thetesting of new ideas in particle physics.

At his death, Professor Hughes (at 81!) was a spokesman for two largeinternational groups, one working on a large muon g-2 experiment atBrookhaven National Laboratory and another engaged in a massive effortat CERN studying the problem of the nucleon spin constituents that hehad uncovered. Professor Hughes was elected to the National Academy ofSciences in 1967. In 1978 he was awarded the American Physical SocietyDavisson-Germer Prize in Atomic Physics and in 1990 the Tom R. BonnerPrize in Nuclear Physics.

Contributions toward a fellowship for graduate students in Hughes’ namemay be sent to Ramamurti Shankar, Chair of Physics Department. P.O.Box 208120, New Haven, CT 06520-8120.

—by Robert Adair

“He was never satisfied until he fully understoodwhatever phenomenon he studied. Hughes educateda generation of students who have become leadersin the international scientific community. He willbe much missed worldwide by all his friends andcollaborators, most especially by his colleagues atYale, who admired his endless supply of energy,drive and unyielding persistence.”

— D. Allan Bromley, Sterling Professor of the Sciences

9

Faculty News

Yoram Alhassid recently organized a two-weekworkshop at the Max Planck Institute on “Electronsin Zero-Dimensional Conductors: Beyond theSingle-Particle Picture” and a 10-week inter-disciplinary program at the Institute of NuclearTheory at the University of Washington, Seattle, on“Chaos and Interactions: From Nuclei to QuantumDots.” His research achievements in 2002 includedthe development of methods to derive statisticalproperties of nuclei at higher temperatures and onelucidation of the role of the exchange interactionin the statistical theory of quantum dots. He washonored as a fellow of the American Physical Societyat the APS annual meeting in April.

Thomas Appelquist began a new research projectexploring whether a natural explanation ofneutrino masses and mixing angles can be foundwithin the framework of dynamical electroweaksymmetry breaking. He continues to serve asChairman of the Board of the Aspen Center forPhysics and as a member of the NSF’s Mathematicaland Physical Sciences Advisory Committee. Healso continues to chair the department’s committeeto improve undergraduate physics education.

Charles Baltay coordinated and taught a collegecourse “Perspectives in Science,” a lecture anddiscussion course that highlights theinterdependence of the scientific disciplines andis designed for freshmen who have unusually strongbackgrounds in science and mathematics. Heinitiated and is leading the QUEST project, whichutilizes a very large area detector built for theSchmidt Telescope at the Palomar Observatory.The goals of the QUEST project are to studygravitational lensing of quasars and type IaSupernovae to determine cosmological parametersand the nature of Dark Energy in the universe.

Sean Barrett has begun a second term as thedepartment’s director of undergraduate studies.

His group has made a new discovery in the NMRof silicon. The result appears to be useful forresearch in quantum computation and also torequire some modification to the standard modelof NMR in solids.

Cornelius Beausang has developed a new courseon basic radiation physics for emergency workers,police, and firefighters in New Haven. He has alsodeveloped a new college seminar course onradiation physics intended to educate non-sciencemajors about basic nuclear physics for the post-September 11 world. He serves on the steeringcommittee for the Gamma Ray Energy TrackingArray, which will be the next major US gamma-ray spectrometer. The Stewardship ScienceAcademic Alliances Program has awarded him agrant of $500,000 to investigate the structure ofactinide nuclei and various aspects of the fissionprocess and yields.

Allan Bromley delivered 14 lectures during 2002,including the commencement address at TexasTech. He served on the Presidential Commissionon Science and Security, on the NAS Committeeon Presidential Appointments, and as a consultantto the Southern Governors’ Association. He hasjust completed an autobiography, A Life inPhysics, Engineering, and Public Policy.

Richard Casten is the director of the Wright NuclearStructure Laboratory (WNSL). His researchcurrently focuses on studying the first newparadigms of nuclear structure in decades, involvingempirical manifestations of the critical pointsymmetries E(5) and X(5). He also has derived anew first order phase transition separating prolateand oblate nuclei in the context of Landau Theory.His work is primarily experimental but with a strongtheoretical component as well. In 2002, aconference on “Mapping the Triangle” was held inhis honor in Jackson, Wyoming.

David DeMille published a paper classified as“highly cited” by the ISI outlining how ultracoldpolar molecules can be used as bits in a feasible-to-build, large-scale quantum computer. His grouphas completed a proof of principle for itsmeasurement of the electron’s electric dipolemoment, based on spectroscopy of PbOmolecules. He has published another articledescribing the first serious calculation of theintrinsic sensitivity of PbO to the electron EDM.

Colin Gay served as organizer of the New EnglandParticle Physics Summer Retreat and co-organizerof the Yale Physics Olympics. He taught thegraduate introduction to particle physics andsupervised graduate students and postdocs onCDF research.

Steven Girvin, in addition to serving as the newdirector of graduate studies, has collaborated withSubir Sachdev to start researching optical lattices,a new research area in atomic physics. His workon a general theory of quantum noise inmesoscopic detectors and amplifiers waspublished in 2002. He has also developed a newidea for a quantum bit readout using cavity QEDeffects and has been awarded grants for the studyof quantum computation and the physics ofquantum information.

John Harris continues to develop interactiveteaching methods in the Physics 110 course for non-science majors. (See article about electronicclassrooms, page 5.) He also continues his researchon the STAR experiment, which has reported newresults in eleven journal articles in 2002.

Andreas Heinz joined the department in time forthe Spring 2003 semester. His research focuseson the physics of atomic nuclei, especially innuclear structure, nuclear fission, nuclear fusion,

continued on page 10

Scenes from the Fall 2002 Departmental Picnic

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and the production of rare isotopes. He is especiallyinterested in heavy nuclei and the question of howheavy a nucleus can ultimately become and in thephysics that determines that limit.

Francesco Iachello has completed his study of thesymmetries of differential equations withdiscontinuous potential functions for applicationsto problems in physics and chemistry. He has alsointroduced a model of high-temperaturesuperconductors with s and d bosons, based onthe analogy with atomic nuclei.

Samuel MacDowell taught three sections ofadvanced general physics during 2002. Hecontinued his research on solar and atmosphericneutrinos and on massive neutrino mixing. All thisin addition to preparing for retirement!

Simon Mochrie has implemented a new fast CCD-based x-ray area detector for carrying out x-rayphoton correlation spectroscopy experiments.With the new camera he has characterized thedynamics of a polymeric “sponge phase” as well asthe dynamics of an asymmetric diblock copolymermelt. He has also continued supervising two PhDstudents and teaching theory of solids. In fall 2003he will teach a newly developed biophysics course.

Vincent Moncrief has continued to serve asdirector of undergraduate studies for the math/physics major. In his research he is developing lightcone and energy estimates for Einstein’s equations,and in his teaching he is preparing a specialresearch level course on Einstein’s equations andgeometrization. He participated in a number ofsummer workshops, including the Stanford AIMworkshop, the Cargese summer school, and theCaltech and Santa Barbara workshops onnumerical relativity.

Homer Neal continues research on threeexperiments, including BaBar, the Future LinearCollider, and the OPAL experiment at CERN. WithMike Zeller he has formed a new group for carryingout research on the Compact Muon Solenoiddetector at the Large Hadron Collider at the CERNlaboratory.

Peter Parker continues his study of nucleosynthesisin exploding stars using stable beam spectroscopyexperiments at the accelerator facilities here at Yale.He also continues to study direct radioactive-beammeasurements at facilities such as Oak Ridge andTRIUMF (in Vancouver). He is working with ConBeausang to develop a program to teach firstresponders in the New Haven area how to deal withnuclear radiation in an emergency.

Nicholas Read was awarded the Oliver E. BuckleyPrize of the American Physical Society in March2002. At the prize symposium and on three otheroccasions he delivered a talk on “Bosons, Fermions,and Half-Filled Landau Levels.” His researchcontinues to focus on supersymmetric nonlinearsigma models and fractional quantum Hall stateswith applications to cold trapped atoms. He enjoysteaching intensive introductory physics to someof Yale’s best undergraduates and serving on theMarshall/Rhodes selection committee.

Subir Sachdev continues his research oncompeting orders and quantum phase transitions

in the cuprate superconductors. Several leadingexperimental groups have tested key aspects of hisgroup’s predictions, and his research washighlighted in the Search and Discovery section ofPhysics Today. During 2002 he delivered 10 invitedtalks, including the F. A. Matsen Endowed Regentslecture on the Structure of Matter at the Universityof Texas at Austin.

Jack Sandweiss has been pursuing research in twodirections. One is the study of high energy heavyion physics using the STAR detector at theBrookhaven National Lab Relativistic Heavy IonCollider. The other is a search for strange quarkmatter in the cosmic radiation. This search willbe carried out with the Alpha MagneticSpectrometer, which is scheduled to be mountedon the International Space Station in 2006. Inaddition, he serves as the principal investigatorfor Yale’s high energy physics contracts with theUS Department of Energy.

Michael Schmidt has recently completed a three-year term as Director of Graduate Studies, as wellas teaching classical mechanics and supervisingthe work of one doctoral and two postdoctoralresearchers. He has published papers on b quarks,B mesons, and upsilons, based on his DOE-supported research. Recently submitted work onthe D

s-D+ mass difference demonstrates the new

abilities of the upgraded CDF detector.

Ramamurti Shankar along with collaborator G.Murthy has found an exact solution to the problemof chaotic quantum dots with interacting electrons.He delivered several lectures during 2002,including multiple presentations of “FQHE forDummies” in this country and in India. In October2002 he gave a talk for a general audience entitled“When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It:Yogi Berra’s Guide to the Quantum World” for theYale Graduate School Dean’s Lecture Series, “Inthe Company of Scholars.”

Witold Skiba has prepared a new graduate courseabout physics beyond the standard model ofelectroweak interactions. His current researchfocuses on constructing a new “little Higgs” theorywithout electroweak triplets. In summer 2003 hewill lead a workshop on TeV-scale physics at theAspen Center for Physics.

Jeffrey Snyder has published an article on “ALarge Area CCD Camera for the SchmideTelescope at the Venezuelan NationalAstronomical Observatory” and his currentresearch involves a large area survey for nearbysupernovae. He taught two courses, includingelectromagnetism and optics.

Charles Sommerfield is working on solving adifficult but important problem in M theory. Overthe past year he helped organize the particle theoryseminar and served as vice chair of the DannyHeineman prize committee of the AmericanPhysical Society. He taught four courses, includingstatistical physics and relativistic field theory.

Meg Urry has started two key projects as part ofthe Yale-Chile collaboration: one, a study of galaxyformation and evolution, the accretion history ofblack holes, and the galaxy-black hole connection;and the other, a study of the host galaxies ofsupermassive black holes. She is helping to

Faculty News continued from page 9

Web Site UpdatesCheck out the improved andreorganized Physics Departmentweb site at http://www.yale.edu/physics/. The web site received amakeover in summer 2001.

And if you are interested inseeing the resources for teachingat Yale, visit the new lecturedemonstration web site at http://www.yale.edu/physics/facilities/s u p p o r t / p h y s i c s _ d e m o s /physdemo.html. Developed bySteve Irons, Lecturer andDirector of Instructional Labs,this site allows faculty to browsethe demonstrations available fortopics from inertial balloons tothe Millikan oil drop, and thenreserve a demonstration for theirown class.

organize a conference on women in science on theoccasion of the centennial of Marie Curie’s firstNobel Prize. At the 2003 annual summer meetingof the American Astronomical Society, she will begiving an invited talk on “Grand Unification ofActive Galaxies.”

John Wettlaufer, who has a joint appointment withgeology and geophysics, will be teaching ageophysics course in the department as part of thesequence of new courses open to all who have takenthe introductory sequence. Professor Wettlauferjust joined Yale from the University of Washington.He has always had close ties to Physics and workson problems of common interest such as ice.

Tilo Wettig taught a course on mathematicalmethods in physics for first-year graduate studentsand advanced undergraduates. His research overthe past year focused on the application of thecolor-flavor transformation to lattice QCD. He hasalso continued to work on the QCDOC project, thedesign of a new generation massively parallelcomputer dedicated to lattice QCD applications,and he has started a project aimed at a betterunderstanding of the properties of the complexeigenvalues of the Dirac operator in the presenceof a chemical potential. He is also organizingYALELAT03: 13th Workshop on Lattice FieldTheory for the spring of 2003.

Michael Zeller has published articles on the decayof K+ - >mu+ nu e+ e- and K+ ->e+ nu e+ e- andRare K. His work in progress measures the Ke3decay branching ratio, and the properties of Ke4decays. In his 2004 budget message, President Bushrecommended construction of a project in 2006for which Mr. Zeller is a co-spokesman. Theexperiment would measure a fundamental timereversal violating parameter that could hold thesecret to why the Universe has such an excess ofmatter over antimatter.

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Fall 2002Amir Aazami (University of California at Berkeley); Marco Ascoli(University of Pisa); Yang Bai (University of Science and Technologyof China); Andrew Cahoon (University of Maryland); CatherineDeibel (Amherst College); Yanqun Dong (University of Science andTechnology of China); David Glenn (University of Toronto); Ke Han(Peking University); Jonathan Jerke (University of Washington);Angel Manzur (National Autonomous University of Mexico); MichaelMetcalfe (Trinity College, Dublin); Christopher Morling (MichiganState University); Dennis Murphree (Stanford University); StephenPowell (Oxford University); Jing Qian (Peking University); DavidRahmlow (California Institute of Technology); and Wade Rellergert(University of Missouri/Columbia).

PrizesThe 2002 Leigh Page Prizes for three incoming first-year graduatestudents were awarded to Yang Bai, Stephen Powell, and Jing Qian.

Fall 2001Ho-Chiang John Ai (Rutgers University); Anne Bauer (AmherstCollege); Grant Biedermann (University of Oklahoma); Lev Bishop(Oxford University); Samuel Flores (MIT); Zachary Harris(California Polytechnic State University); Kevin Koch (Truman StateUniversity); Deseree Meyer (Yale University); George Mias (YaleUniversity); Anuj Parikh (Simon Fraser University); Jessie Petricka(Carleton College); Elizabeth Ricard-McCutchan (WellesleyCollege); Jeffrey Satinover (Yale University); David Schuster (BrownUniversity); Ken Takase (MIT); Jun Wang (Wuhan University); JulieWyatt (MIT); and Fan Xiao (Wuhan University).

Correction: Our apologies to Yong Jiang, Wei Li, Mingchang Liu, Qian Wan,Zhenyu Han, Ruoxin Li, Fei Du, Yi Wei, and Haibin Zhang, whoseundergraduate university was listed incorrectly in the last newsletter. Theiralma mater is the University of Science and Technology of China.

Graduate Student News —

Entering graduate students:

Students and faculty alike enjoy the department’s daily tea at 3:30 in the physics lounge.

First-Year Graduate StudentLaptop Pilot ProgramIn 2001 the Physics Department began providing all enteringgraduate students with laptop computers and wireless networkaccess. The program was launched with seed funding throughvoluntary contributions from interested faculty, the department,and the Provost’s Office.

A substantial motivation for the program was to providefirst- and second-year students with computational resourcesthat could augment their coursework, such as easy access toMaple/Mathematica, Matlab, and other numerical tools. We wereable to provide the laptops again this year to entering graduatestudents with funding from the department, the Provost’s Office,and faculty contributions. We hope that the level of supportwill continue each year from these and other sources so that wecan continue this beneficial program.

A Popular Daily Ritual Continues

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Graduate Student Dissertations, Advisors, and Job Placements —

2001-2002Sotiria Batsouli, “Study of Light Hypernuclei Production in 11.5 A GeV/cAu-Pb Heavy Ion Collisions”; Jack Sandweiss; postdoctoral researchassociate, Columbia University.

Chiranjeeb Buragohain, “Quantum Antiferromagnets in One and Two Di-mensions”; Subir Sachdev; graduate student, Department of Computer Sci-ence, University of California at Santa Barbara.

Manuel Calderon De La Barca Sanchez, “Charged Hadron Spectra in Gold-on-Gold Collisions at a Centre-of-Mass Energy per Nucleon Pair of 130 GeV”;John Harris; postdoctoral fellow, Physics Department, Brookhaven NationalLaboratory.

Hansen Chen, “In Search of Illumination Invariants”; Peter Belheumer;Deutsche Bank, Singapore.

Jeffrey Russell Cooper, “Measurement of V(M1) Values in the CrossingRegion of Shears Band 1 in 197Pb and Interpretation in the Semi-classicalModel”; Reiner Kruecken; postdoctoral fellow, Lawrence Livermore NationalLaboratory.

Zhiyong Duan, “Studies on Phases of Gauge Theories”; Thomas Appelquist;Research Analyst, JP Morgan Chase, New York.

Dmitry Green, “Strongly Correlated States in Low Dimensions”; NicholasRead; McKinsey Management Consultants, Stamford, Connecticut.

Raj Kumar Jain, “Multiwavelength Observations of Black Hole and NeutronStar X-ray Binaries”; Charles Bailyn; Morgan Stanley, Tokyo.

Alexay A. Kozhevnikov, “Electron Dynamics and Coherence Effects inMesoscopic Hybrid Normal Metal-Superconductor Devices”; Daniel Prober;Lucent Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, New Jersey.

Susan Kurien, “Aniostropy and the Universal Properties of Turbulence”;Katepalli Sreenivasan; Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico.

Hui Li, “Dynamic Symmetry and Band Structure”; Dimitri Kusnezov; BearStearns, Manhattan.

John Rock Novak, “Nuclear Structure of the Odd-Neutron Radon Isotopes203, 205, 207Rn”; Cornelius Beausang; Financial Consultant, New York City.

Andrew Wing On Poon, “Optical Resonances of Two-DimensionalMicrocavities with Circular and Non-Circular Shapes”; Richard Chang;Assistant Professor, Electrical Engineering Department, Hong KongUniversity of Science and Technology.

Nathan Benjamin Rex, “Regular and Chaotic Orbit Gallium NitrideMicrocavity Lasers”; Richard Chang; Consultant, Mars Management,Stamford, Connecticut.

Andrew Michael Schaffer, “Quantitative Characterization of Species,Temperature, and Particles in Steady and Time-Varying Laminar Flamesby Optical Methods”; Marshall Long; Farley Capital, L.P., New York.

Alumni Career Counseling Network on the Web

What happens to Yalephysics majors aftergraduation? To find out,see the new physicsalumni network at http://research.yale.edu/cgi-bin/physics/physics_db.pl

Under the sponsorshipof the Physics Department,graduate student SarahBickman (right) has spentthe last nine months sur-veying all undergraduatephysics alumni, askingwhat jobs they have heldsince college and soliciting their participation as mentors. Theresult is a database of alumni in a variety of fields who arewilling to advise students and alumni about their careers.

“I had no idea how many careers are open to those of uswith a physics background,” said Ms. Bickman. “This databaseshows the range of options available to me when I complete mydegree.”

The project was begun in response to complaints fromundergraduates that they received little guidance on how touse their physics major outside of graduate study. The networkcan connect students to alumni in such careers as sciencejournalism, medicine, and patent law.

The network will initially be advertised to current studentsthrough posters in the physics building, but it is available toanyone. In the future, Ms. Bickman would like to expand thenetwork to help graduate students get in touch with physicsalumni from the graduate school who are doing postdoctoralresearch, consulting, or software development.

Graduate alumni have yet to be surveyed; if you areinterested in offering your services as a mentor, please send anemail to sarah.bickman@yale.edu

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Perlmutter and RobertsonGive Leigh Page LecturesThe 2001-2002 Leigh Page Prize Lecture series featured SaulPerlmutter of the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory speaking on darkenergy. Professor Perlmutter addressed the topic of “Supernovae,Dark Energy, and an Accelerating Universe,” suggesting that theuniverse will last forever and that its expansion will speed up in-definitely, and then “Dark Energy Challenges the Physicists,” ar-guing that some new, unidentified dark energy pervades all spaceand is accelerating the expansion of the universe. He concludedwith “Studying Dark Energy with Supernovae (the part of the storythat always gets left out of departmental colloquia).”

The 2002-2003 lecture series featured R. G. HamishRobertson of the University of Washington speaking on neutrinos.His first lecture, “A place in the Sun for the Neutrino”, reviewedthe solar neutrino problem, its resolution, and the resultingimplications for neutrino oscillation and mass, which dovetailneatly with experiments on atmospheric neutrinos and reactorantinutrinos. “If they have mass, why can’t you tell me what itis?” was followed by “Neutrinos: the Road Ahead” in whichProfessor Robertson described the remaining unknowns aboutthe neutrino and its role in the universe, and expressed optimismabout the potential for new discoveries.

Undergraduate Prizes for 2002The DeForest Pioneers Prize for distinguished creative achievementin physics by a senior physics major was awarded to Laura JudithFeiveson. The Howard L. Schultz Prize for an outstanding seniorin the Physics Department was awarded to Kenneth MacLean.

Accelerator School Held at YaleThe US Particle Accelerator School was held for the first timeat Yale June 10-21, 2002.

About 65 students attended from across the US and theworld, including Europe, South America, and the Far East. Thecourses were taught in Sloan and Gibbs Laboratories and wereintended for students who had already completed anundergraduate degree.

Two-week courses were offered on Accelerator Fundamentals,Accelerator Physics, Classical Mechanics and Electromagnetismin Accelerators and Beams, and Computational Methods inElectromagnetism.

One-week courses included Magnetic Systems: InsertionDevices; Accelerator Vacuum System Devices; Particle BeamOptics Using Lie Algebra Methods; Applications of SynchrotronRadiation in Materials Science; Medical Applications ofAccelerators and Beams; and Applications of MATLAB inAccelerator Physics and Engineering.

“The school was a stimulating success,” said ProfessorMichael Schmidt, organizer of this year’s school. “This was in nosmall part due to the support from Dean Sleight of the GraduateSchool, Jo-Ann Bonnett, Stephen Irons, and Harley Pretty of thePhysics Department and the indefatigable efforts of Marilyn Paul,who clearly has considerable experience running the USPASschools which are held at different sites from year to year.”

The US Particle Accelerator School conducts graduate andundergraduate level courses at leading universities across theUnited States twice per year, in January and June. The schoolis governed by a consortium of 11 national laboratories, 10 ofwhich are part of the Energy Research Office of the Departmentof Energy and one of which is an NSF laboratory.

Scenes from the Fall 2002 Departmental Reception

14

Michael Scott Armel ’94 MS is currently anadjunct professor of physics at Occidental Collegein the Los Angeles area. He received his PhD fromthe University of California at Berkeley, with aspecialty in particle astrophysics. He has recentlyfinished serving as host for the science and healthsections of the Reader’s Opinion Forums for theNew York Times on the web.

Aimé Fournier ’98 PhD is research associate atthe University of Maryland Department ofMeteorology, and a visitor to the National Centerfor Atmospheric Research in Boulder. In 2000-01he was awarded grants for research onmultiresolution adaptive spectral element solversfor atmospheric fluid dynamics and for multi-resolution climate modeling. He fondlyremembers the late Yale professor of geology andgeophysics Barry Saltzman (1931-2001), who“perfectly exemplified how a physicist shouldinvestigate climate change.”

Michael S. Lubell ’69 PhD is currently chairmanof the Department of Physics at City College ofNew York and director of public affairs for theAmerican Physical Society. His research focuseson photon-atom and photon-molecule interactions.

Elizabeth F. McCormack ’89 PhD is associate pro-fessor of physics at Bryn Mawr College. Her re-search focuses on photoionization,autoionization, predissociation, photodissocia-tion, ion spectroscopy, the dynamics of transientexcited states, the coupling between electronicand nuclear motion, and highly excited molecu-lar Rydberg states. In 2001 she served as a phys-ics curriculum consultant to a new science col-lege for women in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

Arthur P. Ramirez ’84 PhD, ’78 BS was identifiedby the Institute for Scientific Information in 2001as a Highly Cited Researcher. He serves as leader ofthe condensed matter and thermal physics groupat the Los Alamos National Laboratory, with recent

research on superconductivity in alkali-doped C60,colossal magnetoresistance, negative thermalexpansion materials, high-dielectric constantmaterials, and collective effects in magnets.

Naoki Saito ’94 PhD received the PresidentialEarly Career Award for Scientists and Engineersin a ceremony at the White House in October2000. She serves as associate professor in theDepartment of Mathematics at the University ofCalifornia at Davis. She was cited “for pioneeringwork on harmonic analysis and wavelet theory,with application to signal and image processing.”

Richard B. Setlow ’47 PhD is senior biophysicistat the Brookhaven National Lab. His researchexamines the biological effects of high energycosmic ray nuclei and the wavelengths in sunlightresponsible for malignant melanoma. In 2001 theEnvironmental Mutagen Society honored Setlowby publishing “A Richard B. Setlow Festschrift,”a collection of essays dedicated to “the father ofDNA repair” on the occasion of his 80th birthday.Setlow discovered that damage to DNA can bereversed by cutting out and replacing the defectivesection of a DNA strand.

Thomas E. Van Zandt ’55 PhD, ’51 BS retired fromthe National Oceanic and AtmosphericAdministration in 1999. He lives in Boulder,Colorado, where he continues to do research andco-author papers on radar methods for measuringatmospheric turbulence.

Sukeyasu (Steve) Yamamoto ’55 BS, ’59 PhD isnow director of the International House at theInstitute of Physical and Chemical Research(RIKEN) in Tokyo, an apartment complex forforeign scientists which makes use of his bi-cultural and bi-lingual background. He writes,“After I got my PhD in 1959 under Fred Steigertin nuclear physics using the old Pollard cyclotron,I changed my field, and joined Ralph Shutt’sbubble chamber group at Brookhaven. It was a

Alumni Notes —

In Memoriam: ALUMNI

Jack Wayne Ballou, who left the PhD program in 1940, died June 27, 2001,in Wilmington, Delaware. He received his doctorate in physics, summacum laude, from Johns Hopkins University and worked in the pioneeringresearch laboratory of the textile fibers department at DuPont Company.

William Cronk Elmore ’35 PhD died January 23, 2003, at the age of 93.From 1938 to 1974 he taught on the physics faculty at SwarthmoreCollege. During World War II, he was recruited to work on the ManhattanProject, where he played a major role in the development of electroniccircuits to handle the fast-pulse signals needed in the atomic bomb workand developed close associations with Robert Oppenheimer and EnricoFermi. He was an accomplished musician who played the saxophone,accordion, piano, organ, and recorder, as well as an enthusiastic farmer,craftsman, and inventor.

Charles A. Fenstermacher ’57 PhD died July 28, 2002, in Los Alamos, NewMexico. After his graduate studies, he joined the Los Alamos ScientificLaboratory, where his career included research in nuclear physics, laserscience, and fusion.

Joel Henkel ’61 MS died July 29, 2002, in Hanover, New Hampshire, at theage of 71. He earned a BA in physics from Princeton in 1952, an MS in

physics from Yale, and a doctorate in physics from the University ofNew Hampshire. His career included research at the Brookhaven Na-tional Laboratory in New York and work in electronic countermeasuresat Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio during the Korean War. Hewas also interested in quantum physics and philosophy and publisheda book, Mind from Matter.

Benjamin Lepson ’44 BS, ’44 MS died January 14, 2002, in TakomaPark, Maryland, at the age of 77. He earned a master’s degree in physicsfrom Yale at age 19 and a doctorate in mathematics from ColumbiaUniversity. After a postgraduate fellowship at the Institute for AdvancedStudy in Princeton, he worked as a civilian mathematician with theNavy from 1952 to 1990. At the Naval Research Lab in Washington, heheaded up the team that in 1958 sent up the Vanguard satellites. Amonghis final assignments was to consult with NATO about which technolo-gies to share with communist countries.

David W. Madsen ’69 PhD died December 28, 2002, in Worcester, Mas-sachusetts, at the age of 59. Following his graduate studies in nuclearphysics, he worked for Scientific Atlanta Corp., for Q.C. Optics Corp.,and as director of marketing for Exergen Corp.

great time for high energy physics with the AGSnear completion, and the 80-inch bubble chamberwhich I helped to build under construction. In1965 I moved to the University of Massachusettsin Amherst to start a bubble chamber groupfunded by the Atomic Energy Commission, andin 1970 joined the physics department at theUniversity of Tokyo, building up a high energyphysics group there. My group did a number ofbubble chamber and counter experiments at theKEK Proton Synchrotron. From 1992 to 2000, Itaught at Sophia University, a Jesuit Universityin Tokyo.”

The Sloane hallway with its new carpet.

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Physics Olympics Grows

The Yale Physics Olympics went from strength to strength in 2001and 2002. Now in its fifth year, the Olympics annually attracts150-200 high school students, plus their teachers, to the PhysicsDepartment for a day of physics and frolics.

The competition consists of five events or activities for teamsof students, four students per team. Recent events have included“That Sinking Feeling,” which asked students to determine thedensity of an unknown object using only two liquids of differentdensities, a 500 ml beaker, two 100 ml graduated cylinders, anda pencil, and “Bridging the Gap,” in which students competed toconstruct a bridge that would span the longest gap and at thesame time carry the heaviest mass, using only two pieces of paper,scissors, five centimeters of scotch tape, one index card, five paperclips, and a variety of masses.

The activities use low technology apparatus and are basedon fundamental physics principles, such as forces, waves,magnets, and electricity. The goal is not to intimidate the studentswith complicated experiments but instead to give them tasks thatthey can complete in 30 minutes with a limited knowledge ofphysics, a modicum of common sense, and a bit of teamwork.

Each activity takes place in a different location around thePhysics Department, showing the students as much as possible ofthe department and the university. Typically three activities takeplace outdoors near the Sloane Physics Laboratory and on the grassquadrangle outside the Gibbs Laboratory. The other two are heldin the freshman teaching laboratories in the Sloane Laboratory.

Last year’s event, thelargest Olympics so far,was attended by over 40teams from 35 highschools from Connecticut,New York, Rhode Island,and Massachusetts. Prizeswere awarded to the best-placed team in each eventas well as the best threeteams overall.

Organizers arecontemplating ways toexpand the competitionto a national level. Thiswould involve major

changes in logistics because the event would have to coverseveral days rather than just one.

Why put so much work into a high school sciencecompetition? “Educating young people is what professors aremeant to do. It is important to educate young people in physics,and it’s important to start in high school,” says Professor CorneliusBeausang, who organizes the competition each year.

“We need more people doing physics; it’s a nationally vitalsubject,” he adds. “The civilization we live in is controlled bydevices—from your coffeemaker to the space shuttle—which arerun by the principles of physics, and we need people whounderstand how these devices work. The number of young people

going into physics is declining, and weneed to change that.

“And it’s fun— I get a cool t-shirteach year.”

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Yale University Department of PhysicsP.O. Box 209010New Haven, CT 06520-9010

Return Service Requested

Nonprofit Org.U.S. PostageP A I DNew Haven, CTPermit No. 526

Graduate Students Entering Program: 2002-2003: 172001-2002: 18

Actively Enrolled Graduate Students: 2002-2003: 82

PhD Degrees Granted: 2001-2002: 15

MPhil Degrees Granted: 2001-2002: 8

MS Degrees Granted: 2001-2002: 10

BS and BA Degrees Granted: 2001-2002: 72002-2003: 13

Physics Department — Recent Statistics