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There has been a surge of interest in the United States recently in culturally relevant/responsive/sensitive teaching in physics and similar disciplines. Two brief examples: In his call for papers addressing race for The Physics Teacher, Gary White lists “culturally responsive teaching” as the first topic, and one of the two aims of a $4.9 million grant received by the American Association of Colleges and Universities is to “empower STEM faculty to adopt culturally sensitive pedagogies.” So the question is: What is culturally relevant physics teaching? How would we even know it if we saw it? I argue that a framework for culturally relevant pedagogy developed by Gloria Ladson-Billings is a useful model for university physics faculty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Numisheet 2005 Benchmark [sharp/mesh/hash_synonym]3 consisted of forming four different sheet materials in a two-stage process. The first stage consisted of forming channel sections in a channel draw die with variable penetration drawbeads. Material that flowed through the drawbeads into the channel sidewalls was actually prestrained by cyclic bending and unbending. The prestrained channel sidewall pieces were subsequently formed in a second stage which is described in another paper. This paper provides a description of the channel draw die tests, the testing and measurement procedures and also the experimental data that was recorded. © 2005 American Institute of Physics [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This talk provides a statistical overview of the supply side in physics and related fields. Data on current and historic trends are presented in selected fields at both the bachelor's and PhD levels. Several of the major factors driving enrollment patterns in higher education are discussed. This paper concludes with an examination of issues related to both supply and demand. The AIP Statistical Research Center has been collecting data on enrollments and degrees in physics for 40 years and they are the source for the physics data presented. The sources for the data on related fields are the National Science Foundation in the case of PhD data and the U.S. Department of Education for bachelor's level data. Finally, this paper includes data on the size of the bachelor's degree classes of 1999 and 2000. These data were not available when the talk was presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Qweak is a currently running experiment at the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility that uses parity-violating elastic electron-proton scattering to measure the weak charge of the proton (QPweak). This experiment is a sensitive test for physics beyond the Standard Model, as QPweak is well predicted in the Standard Model. Qweak will measure an expected ~200 ppb asymmetry to 4% and will be the first direct measurement of QPweak. The precision generated will allow the probing of certain classes of new physics up to 2.5 TeV. Longitudinally polarized electrons are scattered off a liquid hydrogen target and pass through a toroidal-field magnetic spectrometer. The 4% measurement requires 2500 hours of 85% polarized electron beam. In this paper, the design and status of the complete experiment including the details of the asymmetry measurements will be discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to the Department of Energy (DOE), there are approximately 110 operators maintaining more than 17,000 gas storage wells in over 415 underground storage facilities across the USA. In virtually every application, steel casing, cemented into place, serves to isolate the well from the underground formations. The process of cementing wellbore casing provides two major benefits: 1) cement prevents gas migration between the casing and formation; 2) cement transfers stress from the casing to the formation, increasing the effective strength and working pressure of the casing. Current cement evaluation techniques use an acoustic wave generated and received by a logging tool within the wellbore to detect cement placed outside the casing. These techniques rely on fluid in the casing to provide acoustic coupling between the logging tool and the casing and therefore are unable to operate in gas-filled boreholes. This paper details efforts to confirm the validity and applicability of the use of EMATs for evaluating cement in gas-filled boreholes. The methods and techniques proposed for the cement bond logging using EMATs are confirmed and validated based on the results obtained from the numerical modeling and experiments with physical cement models. Partial funding for this investigation was provided by the DOE and Gas Storage Technology Consortium. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an attempt to test the limits of the current interpretation of quantum mechanics, according to which microscopic systems are always in a superposition of states, A. Leggett has proposed the thesis of macrorealism, according to which quantum mechanical superpositions of macroscopically distinct states never occur. Leggett has also shown the basic features of some experimental tests that would decide definitively between quantum mechanics and macrorealism. In this paper I develop an interpretation of macrorealism from which the experimental results can be understood as examples of violations of the principle of induction in which macrorealism rests, opening the door for solving the tension between QM and macrorealism in terms of the backwards causation. According to this interpretation there is no need for appealing to any special role played by either observers or measurement apparatuses in order to explain what differentiates quantum systems from macroscopic ones, a difference that could now be defined partly in terms of their causal and temporal directionality. © 2006 American Institute of Physics [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nine different materials were selected for three 2005 Numisheet Benchmark studies. A set of standard material properties was measured using a common test method. Specification on the test method and procedure is described in this paper. The specific methods used in the determination of standard material properties, r-value, the forming limit curve and coefficient of friction are also provided. © 2005 American Institute of Physics [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the successful operation of the Fermilab superconducting accelerator three new higher energy accelerators were planned. They were the UNK in the Soviet Union, the LHC in Europe, and the SSC in the United States. All were expected to start producing physics about 1995. They did not. Why?. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The idea of a positron beam at Jefferson Lab goes back to the mid-1990s with the possibility of adding a materials science beamline. For the next decade, a few workshops were conducted to address the physics and associated beam requirements. As alternate venues, two other facilities have been investigated using ultrafast laser technology (in the US) and a conventional RF system (in Senegal). We will review the various historical timeline and subsequent outcomes of these workshops, in addition to presenting briefly the proposed two facilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a class of models in which the primordial metric fluctuations do not necessarily obey Gaussian statistics. These models are realizations of mechanisms in which non-Gaussianity is first generated by a light scalar field and then transferred into curvature fluctuations during or at the end of inflation. For this class of models we present generic results for the probability distribution functions of the metric perturbation at the end of inflation. It is stressed that finite volume effects can induce non trivial effects that we sketch. © 2006 American Institute of Physics [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The neutron-induced fission cross-section ratios relative to 235U has been measured for 240Pu, 243Am and natW in a wide energy range of incident neutrons from 1 MeV to 200 MeV at the GNEIS facility. The measurements were performed using the multiplate ionization chambers and time-of-flight techniques. The results obtained in this measurement are presented in comparison with the other data. © 2005 American Institute of Physics [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 2005 Chair of the American Physical Society Committee on the Status of Women in Physics describes the committee’s recent activities to recognize distinguished women physicists, improve the climate for women in physics, and provide leadership training for women in physics. The committee’s response to the Harvard University president’s suggestion of innate gender differences as regards women’s representation in math and science is also discussed, as well as some encouraging developments in the status of women in physics in the U.S. © 2005 American Institute of Physics [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a summary of some of the reports on progress in heavy quark physics presented at the Hadron 2003 conference. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mid-infrared gas laser technology promises to become a unique tool for research in strong-field relativistic physics. The degree to which physics is relativistic is determined by a ponderomotive potential. At a given intensity, a 10 μm wavelength CO[sub 2] laser reaches a 100 times higher ponderomotive potential than the 1 μm wavelength solid state lasers. Thus, we can expect a proportional increase in the throughput of such processes as laser acceleration, x-ray production, etc. These arguments have been confirmed in proof-of-principle Thomson scattering and laser acceleration experiments conducted at BNL and UCLA where the first terawatt-class CO[sub 2] lasers are in operation. Further more, proposals for the 100 TW, 100 fs CO[sub 2] lasers based on frequency-chirped pulse amplification have been conceived. Such lasers can produce physical effects equivalent to a hypothetical multi-petawatt solid state laser. Ultra-fast mid-infrared lasers will open new routes to the next generation electron and ion accelerators, ultra-bright monochromatic femtosecond x-ray and gamma sources, allow to attempt the study of Hawking-Unruh radiation, and explore relativistic aspects of laser-matter interactions. We review the present status and experiments with terawatt-class CO[sub 2] lasers, sub-petawatt projects, and prospective applications in strong-field science. © 2002 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]