Friday Flyer - December 7, 2018
Spotlight on the Southern Methodist University QuarkNet Center
Mentor Simon Dalley leads this group based at the SMU campus in Dallas, Texas. In 2018, this center's teachers met during the week of August 6 at SMU and spent much of their time building small wire chamber particle detectors with the help of Professors Ye and Liu from SMU's optoelectronics lab. Teachers also had the opportunity to share with each other ideas and lessons, including an E&M lab using modeling instruction, a demonstration of the photoelectric effect, and a project that included the construction of simple steam boats. The teachers are pictured below while hard at work building the wire chamber particle detectors.
News from QuarkNet Central
A reminder that the registration deadline has been extended to December 11 for 2019 Fermilab-based masterclass videoconferences, so please sign up soon if your center wants to participate! The registration link can be found in the latest IMC circular.
Physics Experiment Roundup
The LHC has officially ended its successful second run and is now shut down for two years for improvements and upgrades. The COSINE-100 experiment finds no evidence of dark matter, casting doubt on the DAMA/LIBRA experiment's claim to have found evidence of dark matter interacting in their detector. LIGO and Virgo announce the new detection of more gravitational waves.
Resources
MinutePhysics on time dilation, length contraction, and the "impossible" muon. Veritasium on the absurdity of detecting gravitational waves. And from Physics Today, learn about the aerodynamics of dandelion seeds.
Just for Fun
Need a gift for that special sciencey someone? Consider some "science fashion" that lies at the intersection of art and science. Lastly, hear the story of a proton about to collide at the LHC, as told by the proton itself!
QuarkNet Staff:
Mark Adams: adams@fnal.gov
Ken Cecire: kcecire@nd.edu
Shane Wood: swood5@nd.edu