UNC Physics undergraduate awarded Fulbright fellowship

Alex Hill, BS Physics 2011, has begun a Fulbright fellowship in Saint Petersburg, Russia. He will be studying at the Saint Petersburg State Politechnical University and doing research at the Petersburg Institute of Nuclear Physics in Gatchina. While at UNC Alex worked at the Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory with Prof. Hugon Karwowski on the spectroscopy of 232-Th.

Dr. Charles Briscoe honored by alma mater

Emeritus faculty member Dr. Charles "Vic" Briscoe has won the Distinguished Alumni of the Year award from King College.

UNC Physics graduate student named for a Toohig Fellowship

Graduate student John Cesaratto has been named to a Toohig Fellowship in accelerator science at the LHC. The Fellowships are in honor of the late Dr. Timothy Toohig, "a physicist and Jesuit priest, who devoted his life to promoting accelerator science and increasing understanding, communication and collaboration among scientists of all nations and religions."

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Dr. Yue Wu awarded Kenan Distinguished Professorship

Dr. Yue Wu has been awarded a Kenan Distinguished Professorship. Congratulations Yue!

Commencement Speech by Congressman Price

We were honored by a visit from our local Congressman, David Price, to our departmental commencement ceremony on May 8, 2011. Congressman Price delivered our commencement address and handed out diplomas to our 2011 graduates. A written version of the Congressman's talk is available here. Please view the photographs of the ceremony, and the reception that followed in Phillips 277.

Research by Sheila Kannappan and Mark Norris featured in Endeavors

Recent research by professor Sheila Kannappan and postdoc Mark Norris answers questions about the structure and composition of ultra-compact dwarfs. Their paper, "The Ubiquity and Dual Nature of Ultra-Compact Dwarfs," has been accepted for publication by Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society and is available on Kannappan's website. This research is also featured in UNC's Endeavors magazine.

Rene Lopez receives Early Career award from DOE

Rene Lopez, an Assistant Professor in the UNC Physics and Astronomy Department, has been selected for a Department of Energy Early Career Award - one of 65 awarded out of about 1,150 applicants. Rene's award was for "Bio-Inspired Electro-Photonic Structure for Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells."

Graduate student wins award from American Association of Physicists in Medicine

Graduate student Mike Hadsell has won one of the "Best in Physics" awards to be given at the annual American Association of Physicists in Medicine meeting in Vancouver. He was selected based on his abstract entitled: "Pilot Study for the Development of Clinical Microbeam Radiation Therapy Using a Carbon Nanotube Field Emission Micro-CT Scanner." His co-authors are: J Zhang, G Cao, E Schreiber, J Lu , S Chang, O Zhou, from Physics and Radiation Oncology at UNC. There are 15 such awards given at the meeting, 5 each from the areas of Imaging, Therapy, and joint imaging/therapy physics.

Laurie McNeil honored for distinguished service

Laurie McNeil

Laurie McNeil, professor and former chair of the department of physics and astronomy, has received the 2011 William F. Little Award for distinguished service from UNC’s College of Arts and Sciences. The College established the award in 2009 to recognize the distinguished service of the late UNC chemist and leader William Little, and to honor a faculty or staff member who has followed in his footsteps by serving the College "with extraordinary distinction." The recipient is selected by the dean and senior associate deans.

You may read more about Laurie's award on the College of Arts & Sciences site, or view the news article in the Daily TarHeel.

Physics Students Present at UNC Undergraduate Research Symposium

Lisa Nash with Provost Bruce Carney Click for larger version

Nine undergraduate students participated in this year's UNC Undergraduate Research Symposium. Lenny Evans gave a talk on "Analysis of Statistical Methods For Setting Limits On WIMP Parameters," and eight students presented posters:

• Sneha Gadi "Supercooled Water and Thermal Conductivity"
• John Hardin "Detection and Analysis of Photofission Asymmetries"
• Laura Havener "Development of GEM Detectors for OLYMPUS and Analysis of BLAST Experimental Results"
• Alexander Hill "Nuclear Resonance Fluorescence on ²³²Th"
• Michael Jones "Compton Scattering from ⁶Li” "
• Lisa Nash "Development of Novel Neutron Detection Techniques"
• Benjamin Ryan "Theoretical Limits of ²³⁸U NRF Detection in Cargo Containers"
• James Walker "Backgrounds in Neutron Detector Array"

Graduate student wins top poster prize at American Astronomical Society meeting

At the January 2011 annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Seattle, UNC Chapel Hill graduate student Amanda Moffett won one of the coveted Chambliss Astronomy Achievement Awards for her poster presentation on "Extended UV Disks in Low-Mass E/S0 Galaxies and Their Relation to Disk Building." Amanda's research has revealed unexpected complexity in the interpretation of ultraviolet light from young, massive stars in the extreme outer reaches of galaxy disks: the optically dim, extended UV or "XUV" disks discovered by NASA's GALEX mission are more common in stereotypically dead galaxies (remnants of violent galaxy mergers) than in actively growing ones (like our own spiral galaxy, the Milky Way). However, an intriguing population of remnant galaxies that may be regenerating spiral structure shows a low frequency of XUV disks, consistent with the frequency seen in normal spirals. Amanda's work has been submitted to the Astrophysical Journal Letters with adviser Sheila Kannappan and collaborators Andrew Baker and Seppo Laine.

Jon Engel named a Fellow of the APS

Prof. Jon Engel has been named a Fellow of the American Physical Society "For his important contributions to our understanding of the underlying physics and importance of nuclear double-beta decay." Congratulations Jon!

Otto Zhou elected to AIMBE College of Fellows

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Otto Zhou has been elected to the College of Fellows of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering. The College of Fellows consists of "...1,000 individuals who are the outstanding bioengineers in academia, industry and government... Fellows are nominated each year by their peers and represent the top 2% of the medical and biological engineering community." Congratulations Otto!

Sheila Kannappan interviewed by News and Observer

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Work by Sheila Kannappan and colleagues has been featured in a recent story in the News and Observer, "Shedding light on Dark Matter" http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/11/08/788589/shedding-light-on-dark-matter.html.

Undergraduates present at Fall Meeting of Division of Nuclear Physics of APS

Eight undergraduate students from the Department of Physics and Astronomy will present posters this week at the Fall Meeting of the Division of Nuclear Physics of APS in Santa Fe, NM. The goal of the Conference Experience for Undergraduatesis to provide a "capstone" conference experience for students who have conducted research in nuclear physics, by providing them the opportunity to present their results to the larger professional community and to one another. Additionally, it enables the students to converse with faculty and senior scientists from graduate institutions about graduate school opportunities.

• Andrew Collins "Performance of Object-Oriented Real-Time Control and Acquisition Software." (work done at the Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory (TUNL))
• Laura Havener "Development of GEM Detectors for OLYMPUS and Analysis of BLAST Results." (work done at MIT)
• Alex Hill "Nuclear Resonance Fluorescence on ²³²Th." (work done at TUNL)
• Rebecca Holmes "Microphonics in Germanium Detectors for MAJORANA." (work done at Los Alamos National Laboratory)
• Michael Jones "Neutron Elastic and Inelastic Scattering Cross Sections for Light and Heavy Nuclei in the 1~20 MeV Region in GEANT4.9.3." (work done at TUNL)
• Lisa Nash "Response of Large NaI Detectors to Energetic Gamma Rays." (work done at TUNL)
• Ben Ryan "Feasibility of Detection of ²³⁸U in Shipping Containers using NRF." (work done at TUNL)
• James Walker "Background Simulations in Neutron Detector Array." (work done at TUNL)

Projects related to students activities at Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory were supported by the grant to UNC from the Academic Research Initiative of the US Department of Homeland Security.

Sheila Kannappan receives NSF CAREER award

Sheila Kannappan has been awarded a National Science Foundation CAREER award for "Galaxy Evolution in the Cosmic Web: RESOLVEing the Missing and Invisible". This is the national Science Foundation's most prestigious early-career award and one of just seven that were awarded in 2010. The RESOLVE survey will use the SOAR telescope to take a census of nearby galaxies in an effort to trace the evolution of structure in the nearby universe.

Laura Mersini-Houghton to appear on episode of BBC's Horizon

Cosmologist Laura Mersini-Houghton was featured on the BBC Horizon series in an episode entitled "What Happened Before the Big Bang". Laura will also appear in a National Geographic documentary to air in February.

Four ENPA graduate students give presentations at April APS Conference

Four graduate students from the Experimental Nuclear and Particle Astrophysics group gave presentations at the 2010 April APS conference held February 13-17, 2010 in Washington, DC. Padraic Finnerty presented "Astroparticle and Nuclear Physics with a Customized Low- Background Broad Energy Germanium Detector." Jacquie Strain gave a talk entitled "Sample Preparation and Gamma-Assay Measurements at the Low-Background Counting Facility at the Kimballton Underground Research Facility." Sean MacMullin presented "Differential Cross Section Measurements for Elastic and Inelastic Scattering of Neutrons from Neon." Graham Giovanetti presented "Development of a Data- Acquisition System for a Low-Background BEGe Detector." Thomas (TJ) Corona gave a talk entitled "Characterizing electron optics in the KATRIN experiment."

ENPA graduate student wins DOE Office of Science Graduate Fellowship (DOE SCGF)

Graham Giovanetti of the Experimental Nuclear and Particle Astrophysics group has been selected to receive the the Department of Energy Office of Science Graduate Fellowship (DOE SCGF) award. The program supports "outstanding students to pursue graduate training in basic research in areas of physics, biology, chemistry, mathematics, engineering, computational sciences, and environmental sciences".

Physics Graduate Student named Paul C. Hardin Fellow

Physics graduate student Seth Hopper has been named a Paul C. Hardin Dissertation Fellow with the Royster Society of Fellows for academic year 2010-2011. Seth's PhD dissertation research involves study of extreme mass ratio binary black hole systems, gravitational radiation, and the gravitational self force.

Graduate Students present posters in Washington, DC

Three UNC Physics graduate students presented posters at the conference of grantees of the Academic Research Initiative of the Dept. of Homeland Security held in Washington DC this week. Samantha Hammond presented her work on nuclear resonance fluorescence in 238U, David Ticehurst on development of neutron detectors, and Jeromy Tompkins on the anisotropies in (gamma,n) reaction on 235,238U. They were also co-authors on a number of other posters and presentations by TUNL scientists.

Undergraduate Student awarded Goldwater Scholarship

Len Takahashi Evans (Lenny), a junior majoring in physics and mathematics, has been awarded the prestigious Goldwater Scholarship. The announcement can be found online at http://www.act.org/goldwater/sch-2010.html.

Eugen Merzbacher named Outstanding Referee

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The editors of Physical Review and Physical Review Letters have chosen Eugen Merzbacher as an "Outstanding Referee" for 2010.

Laurie McNeil honored with award for Advancement of Women

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Laurie McNeil received the 2010 University Award for the Advancement of Women in recognition of her contributions to the advancement of women at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. You may read more about Laurie's award in the University Gazette.

Book by professor Paul Frampton adopted by Scientific American Book Club

A book, published in September 2009 by the World Scientific Publishing Company entitled "Did Time Begin? Will Time End? Maybe the Big Bang Never Occurred," and written by Rubin Professor of Physics Paul Frampton, was recently adopted by the Scientific American Book Club.

Physics major inducted into Phi Beta Kappa

Adam Anthony Holmes, a junior majoring in physics and math, has been inducted into Phi Beta Kappa. Only juniors and seniors who have at least a 3.85 grade point average are eligible for membership. Nationally less than 1% of college seniors are invited to join. Congratulations Adam!

Professor Yue Wu elected to Fellowship in American Physical Society

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Prof. Yue Wu has been elected to Fellowship in the American Physical Society "For pioneering NMR studies of structures and dynamics of bulk metallic glasses, and of nanotubular materials including their interactions with guest molecules".

Symposium on Horizons in Astronomy and Physics Education for high school physics teachers: Dec 29-30

The UNC-BEST program invites North Carolina physics (and other) teachers to a symposium on current advances in physics, astronomy, and the teaching of these subjects in secondary schools. The symposium will feature talks by leaders in the field about astronomy and physics research, the application of physics in a variety of contexts, and physics and astronomy pedagogy.

The symposium will take place Dec 29-30, 2009 on the UNC-CH campus. For further information, please visit http://www.physics.unc.edu/~mcneil/Symposium.htm.

Retired professor Eugen Merzbacher honored for his service to physics in the Southeast

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Eugen Merzbacher, a Kenan Professor of Physics Emeritus at UNC, has been honored for his long-term excellence in physics leadership by the southeastern section of the American Physics Society (APS).

Merzbacher received the Francis G. Slack Service Award at the society's meeting Nov. 11-13 in Atlanta.

The Francis G. Slack Award was created by the Southeastern Section of the American Physical Society to honor Excellence in Service to Physics in the Southeast. The award is named for Francis G. Slack, a distinguished Vanderbilt University scientist who was a charter member of the Southeastern Section and who contributed significantly to its development. The award recognizes those who have worked unselfishly to a) bring about significant new research facilities in the region, b) significantly strengthen and raise the stature of particular departments of physics in the region, c) provide significant leadership and work to strengthen and build the Southeastern Section of the American Physical Society, Sigma Pi Sigma, the Society of Physics Students and other regional organizations, d) develop physics consortia of universities and/or research institutions that have benefited the region and the nation, and e) carry out other service and administrative activities such as organizing major conferences held in the region, international exchanges, public outreach to K-12 and so forth.
Visit aps.org to read more about the award.

Graduate student attends astronomy conference

Graduate student Brad Barlow will be attending a conference entitled "The Fourth Meeting on Hot Subdwarf Stars and Related Objects" to be held July 19 to July 24, 2009 in Shanghai, China. While there, Brad will give a presentation entitled "The large-amplitude pulsations of the sdBV CS 1246" (click to view abstract) discussing his research performed here in the astronomy group. Additional information about the conference may be found on the Conference website.

Graduate student wins fellowship

Graduate student Kristen Alexander has been awarded the Hartley Corporation Fellowship from Sigma Delta Epsilon/Graduate Women in Science. Kristen Alexander is a student of Prof. Rene Lopez, and is spending the summer doing research at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing. Congratulations, Kristen!

Graduate students give presentations at conference

Two UNC graduate students from the nuclear physics group participated in the 3rd International Conference on "Collective Motion in Nuclei under Extreme Conditions" (COMEX 3) held June 2 - 5, 2009 on Mackinac Island, MI. Samantha Hammond gave a presentation entitled "Properties of Excited States Above 3 MeV in 238U," and Jeromy Tompkins presented a poster on "Investigation of 48Ca(gamma,n) Reaction."

Yueh Lee wins research award in radiology

Adjunct Assistant Professor Yueh Lee won the basic science research award at the 2009 BRIC-Radiology Symposium sponsored by the Biomedical Research Imaging Center. This is the 3rd time he won the award. The title of his talk was "Prospective Cardiac Gated Mouse Imaging with Carbon Nanotube Micro-Computed Tomography," work conducted with co-authors Guohua Cao (Research Assistant Professor), Laurel Burk (graduate student), and Professors Jianping Lu and Otto Zhou. Congratulations, Yueh!

Physics major's research project selected for display

Physics major Kevin Macon presented his research at UNC-CH's 10th Annual Celebration of Undergraduate Research on April 24, 2009, and his poster was selected as one of four posters to be displayed at the Undergraduate Library. Kevin's project entitled "A Network Analysis of Roll Call Voting in the United Nations General Assembly" was conducted under the guidance of Prof. Peter Mucha of the Mathematics Dept. You can see Kevin's poster and the other winners on display in the main entrance area of the Undergraduate Library just across from the circulation desk. The posters will be there until the end of May, after which they will be displayed on a rotating basis in the display case on the 2nd floor of the library throughout the summer and the next academic year. Congratulations, Kevin!

Three decades of leaders

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At a party held May 8 to commemorate the end of Laurie McNeil's term as Department Chair, six future, current, and former Chairs assembled for a photo. From left to right they are Art Champagne (2009-), Laurie McNeil (2004-2009), Bruce Carney (1999-2004), Tom Clegg (1989-1999), Sang-il Choi (1982-1989), and Eugen Merzbacher (1977-1982).

Physics major is finalist in engineering design competition

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Frances Low, who received her BS in physics in May 2009, has been selected as a finalist in the student design competition at the RESNA (Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology Society of North America) conference to be held in New Orleans in June. Frances will demonstrate her design in the Exhibit Hall, and if selected as a winner she will give a presentation in a special platform session.

Frances' entry, which she developed in the BMME 840 "Rehabilitation Engineering Design" class taught by Prof. Richard Goldberg, consists of a custom tricycle brake system that allows a teenage girl with reduced motor control to brake her tricycle easily and independently, which was difficult before because she had trouble using the conventional brake levers on the tricycle. Therefore, the custom brake system allows her to activate the brakes using a rotational hand motion and incorporates mechanical advantage to allow her to brake more easily using less strength. Frances plans to study Mechanical Engineering next year at NCSU to prepare for a career in developing robotic vehicles for space exploration. Congratulations, Frances!

Graduating senior admitted to Perimeter Scholars International program

Physics major Jonathan Toledo, who receives his degree in May 2009, has been admitted to the Perimeter Scholars International program at the Perimeter Institute, a premier theoretical physics institute in Waterloo, Canada. This is a concentrated Masters-level course for exceptional students who wish to become researchers in theoretical physics. The 25 members of the inaugural class of Scholars were selected on the basis of their potential as researchers in theoretical physics and on academic achievement. Jonathan was previously the recipient of a Goldwater Scholarship. Congratulations, Jonathan!

"Nanodays" highlights nanoscience research

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Nanodays, a science outreach event focusing on nanosience and nanotechnology, was held in Chapman Hall on March 28th. The event in Chapman, organized by the Dept of Physics and Astronomy and the Institute for Advanced Materials, coordinated with other Nanodays events happening at the Morehead Planetarium and Science center as well as the Museum of Life and Science in Durham. Nanodays was advertised in the local community, public schools, and on campus. Over 50 visitors attended including parents, children of all ages, science teachers in local public schools, as well as several UNC undergrads. Visitors enjoyed hands-on nanoscience activities in the foyer of Chapman Hall and tours of the Nanoscience Research Labs and CHANL. Undergraduate and graduate students showed visitors live experimental demos and CHANL staff helped kids don clean room suits. Many emails were sent by attendees in the days following expressing their enthusiasm and excitement.

Additional photos of the event may be found at http://www.physics.unc.edu/~falvo/Nanodays2009/Nanodays2009.

Laurie McNeil receives Mary Turner Lane Award

Dr. Laurie McNeil has been selected as the 2009 recipient of the Mary Turner Lane Award from the Association for Women Faculty and Professionals. The award was presented to her April 29, 2009, at the Association's annual banquet.

According to the Association, the annual award recognizes one woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the lives of women on the UNC-Chapel Hill campus. "'Outstanding contribution' is interpreted broadly, touching all areas of the lives of women (students, faculty, staff, administrators) on campus. It includes, but is not limited to, achievements that enhance women's lives through the following: scholarship, teaching, leadership, health services, social services, political activism, professional advancement, program development, and staff support.

"The award, established in 1986, is named to honor Mary Turner Lane, founding director of the Curriculum in Women's Studies and the first recipient of the award."

Congratulations Laurie!

You may also wish to read the UNC University Gazette article regarding Laurie's award.

Graduate student wins DOE fellowship

First-year graduate student Matthew Buckner of the nuclear physics group has been awarded a four-year Stewardship Science Fellowship from the Department of Energy. This program is designed "to help exceptional graduate students earn their PhDs in areas of interest to stewardship science, such as high-energy density physics, low-energy nuclear science, or properties of materials under extreme conditions." The fellowships covers tuition and fees and provides a stipend and an opportunity to complete a practicum at a national DOE laboratory. Congratulations, Matthew!

Sheila Kannappan and Gerald Cecil win James Moeser Award

Astronomy professors Sheila Kannappan and Gerald Cecil are this year's recipients of the James Moeser Award from the University Research Council (URC). Each year one proposal to the URC is selected to receive this award, named for UNC's former Chancellor. The award consists of double funding ($10k rather than $5k) for a proposal submitted to the URC's Small Grants Program. The winning proposal is entitled "Image Slicer for the RESOLVE Survey" and is described thusly: "We propose to build a custom image slicer add-on for the Goodman Spectrograph on the SOAR Telescope. This component will allow us to map the internal motions of galaxies in two dimensions, an essential capability for understanding a new class of galaxies we have uncovered in Phase I of the RESOLVE Survey, an unprecedented survey of the cosmic web being conducted by faculty and students at UNC (Science PI Sheila Kannappan, Instrumentation PI Gerald Cecil)." Congratulations, Sheila and Gerald!

Graduate student wins SPIE scholarship

Fourth-year graduate student Kristen Alexander has been awarded a 2009 SPIE Scholarship in Optical Science and Engineering. Kristen is engaged in research on surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy with Prof. Rene Lopez. Congratulations, Kristen!

Graduate student wins two research fellowships

Astronomy graduate student Amanda Moffett has been awarded two Graduate Research Fellowships: a prestigious three-year NASA Harriet Jenkins Fellowship and a North Carolina Space Grant Fellowship. Amanda is in her second year and is working on galaxy evolution and instrumentation with Profs. Sheila Kannappan and Gerald Cecil. Double congratulations Amanda!

Three physics majors inducted into Phi Beta Kappa

Physics majors Jennifer Dixon, Alice Robinson and John Stevens were inducted into the national honor society Phi Beta Kappa on April 7, 2009. Only juniors and seniors who have at least a 3.85 grade point average are eligible for membership. Nationally less than 1% of college seniors are invited to join. We are very proud of these outstanding young physicists!

Two graduate students win NSF fellowships

Two Physics & Astronomy graduate students have been awarded Graduate Research Fellowships from the National Science Foundation. These prestigious fellowships provide full support for graduate study for three years. Emily Ray, a second-year graduate student working with Prof. Rene Lopez, has recently presented her MS project on visible evanescent wave enhancement with far-field detection using metamaterials, and will pursue the development of a superlens microscopy system for her PhD project, aided by the support from NSF. Amy Colon, a first-year student in the astronomy group, plans to study star formation in galaxies and galaxy evolution with Profs. Sheila Kannappan and Gerald Cecil. Congratulations, Emily and Amy!

Duane Deardorff receives teaching award

Dr. Duane Deardorff, our Director of Undergraduate Laboratories, has been awarded a 2009 SUTASA award. SUTASA are the only teaching and staff awards funded, nominated, and selected entirely by undergraduate students. The nominees are evaluated on their demonstration of excellence in undergraduate teaching, the creation of a dynamic intellectual environment, and their success in positively affecting a broad range of students both inside and outside of the classroom. Congratulations, Duane!

Poster by department members wins award at SPIE Medical Imaging conference

The poster "Design and characterization of a portable field emission micro-focus x-ray tube for micro-CT" by Peng Wang, Shabana Sultana, Guohua Cao and Xiomara Calderon-Colon has won an award for best poster at the 2009 SPIE Medical Imaging conference held in Orlando, FL. Sultana and Calderon-Colon are current graduate students in Materials Science at UNC, Wang received his PhD in Physics from UNC recently, and Cao is a Research Assistant Professor in our department. All of them work in the research group of Prof. Otto Zhou. Congratulations to these outstanding scientists!

Physics major Jonathan Toledo featured in Arts & Sciences article about students "too good to be true"

The magazine "Carolina Arts & Sciences" issue for Spring 2009 has an article about senior undergraduates who seem "too good to be true," but whose amazing accomplishments are real. Physics major Jonathan Toledo is one of them. You can read the article here.

Recent graduate Kwan Skinner awarded Carolina Postdoctoral Fellowship for Faculty Diversity

Kwan Skinner, a Durham native who received his undergraduate degree in Physics and his PhD in Materials Science from UNC, has been awarded a fellowship from the Carolina Postdoctoral Program for Faculty Diversity. The program is designed to develop scholars from underrepresented groups for possible tenure track appointments at the UNC-Chapel Hill or at other research universities. Dr. Fred Hall has held a similar appointment in the Physics & Astronomy Department since Fall 2007.

Dr. Skinner's research, which he conducts in collaboration with Prof. Sean Washburn, is focused on the construction of nanowire arrays directly onto commercially available silicon chips using electrochemical deposition as the fabrication route. Electrochemistry is a fast and cost-effective method that permits the deposition of metal and semiconducting species onto arbitrary conducting substrates. When the substrate contains a periodic and porous substructure, the deposited metal will preferentially fill the pores of the electrode. Dr. Skinner has fabricated arrays composed of various materials including metals, semiconductors and conducting polymers for applications ranging from magnetically actuable probes for bio-sensing to electrical elements for nanoscale circuits. However, the time-consuming necessity of removing the nanowires from their host substrate before they can be used in a device limits their usefulness, so Dr. Skinner's direct-construction techniques promise a considerable advance in the field.

Dr. Skinner will use his postdoctoral period to create further academic connections with researchers in the scientific community at neighboring universities and through academic conferences. He will also take part in the K-12 educational activities of the nanoscience group. When he is not engaged in scientific work or educational outreach, he enjoys doing anything related to food, especially watching the Food Network and tinkering in the kitchen.

Paul Frampton publishes book for general audience

Professor Paul Frampton's book, "Did Time Begin? Will Time End?" will be published in Spring 2009 by World Scientific Publishing. The book is intended for the general public and for young people considering careers in scientific research.

Physics major studies abroad in Beijing

Gresham Fedora, a senior physics major, is spending the Spring 2009 semester in Beijing with help from a grant from the Leonard G. and Rozelia S. Herring Study Abroad Award Fund.

Leonard Herring, a 1948 Carolina graduate, and his wife, Rozelia, of North Wilkesboro, established this fund in 2005. It provides scholarships for students with demonstrated financial need and academic merit to support participation in semester or year-long study abroad programs. Gresham is participating in a program operated by CET Academic Programs.

Graduate students chosen for NSF East Asia summer program

Three physics graduate students have been accepted into the National Science Foundation's East Asia Pacific Summer Institute (EAPSI) for summer 2009. This program provides U.S. graduate students with first-hand research experiences in Asia through which they gain an introduction to the science, science policy, and scientific infrastructure as well as the society, culture and language of the location of the summer experience. Brantley West will spend the summer at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, working with Dr. Christian Kloc of the School of Materials Science and Engineering. They will grow single crystals of organic semiconductor materials and examine their optical properties. Brant intends to engage in his PhD dissertation research under the joint supervision of Prof. Laurie McNeil (Physics and Astronomy) and Prof. Andrew Moran (Chemistry), using ultrafast optical spectroscopy to study the electronic states of organic semiconductors. Emily Ray will go to Yokohama National University in Japan to work with Dr. Toshihiko Baba in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. She will develop negative refractive index materials made of photonic crystals, for slow light devices and demultiplexers. Kristen Alexander will visit the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing to work with Dr. Hongxing Xu. She will do single-molecule Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering (SERS) experiments and will fabricate substrates for the experiments using the high-throughput methods she has developed at UNC. Both Emily and Kristen are engaged in dissertation research with Prof. Rene Lopez (Physics & Astronomy).

Noyce scholarships available for students who plan to become physics teachers

Scholarships of up to $15,000 per year are available to junior and senior physics majors who plan to become physics teachers. For more information about the scholarships, see http://www.phystec.org/noyce/index.php. The application deadline for 2009 scholarships is Feb. 27, 2009. For information about UNC's program to prepare high school physics teachers, see the UNC-BEST webpage.

Physics major named NASA Student Ambassador

Sophomore physics major Rebecca Holmes has been named a NASA International Year of Astronomy 2009 Student Ambassador. The position includes an award of $2700. NASA has selected 52 Student Ambassadors from around the country and given them the mission of planning and promoting International Year of Astronomy 2009 activities on university campuses. Rebecca is one of the smaller number among the 52 who were also selected to attend the opening ceremonies in Paris in January 2009. Rebecca works as a student educator at the Morehead Planetarium and Science Center, and she also works with Prof. Dan Reichart's PROMPT group studying gamma-ray bursts with robotic telescopes. Watch for International Year of Astronomy events on campus next year!

Nuclear physics students give talks at APS Division of Nuclear Physics and Southeastern Section meetings

Two nuclear physics graduate students will give presentations at the Oct. 23-26, 2008 meeting of the APS Division of Nuclear Physics in Oakland, CA. Samantha Hammond will present "Nuclear Resonance Fluorescence from 238U;" she is a co-author of two other contributions. Tim Daniels will speak on "Refinement of Global Phase-Shift Analysis for p+3He Elastic Scattering Using Spin-Correlation Coefficients." Two other students, Chris Angell and Charles Arnold, are co-authors of other presentations that will be given at the meeting.

8 students and a postdoc from the nuclear physics group will present talks or posters at the 75th annual meeting of the Southeastern Section of the APS at North Carolina State University during Oct. 30-Nov. 1, 2008. Graduate student Johnny Cesaratto will give an invited talk entitled "A New ECR Ion Source for Nuclear Astrophysics." In addition, contributed talks will be given by graduate students Tim Daniels (Experience with the UNC Polarized 3He Target), Jeromy Tompkins (An Investigation of the 48Ca(gamma,n) Cross Section between 9.5 and 15.3 MeV), Charles Arnold (Measurement of the Total Cross-Section for the 9Be(gamma,alpha)\alpha reaction), David Ticehurst (Modeling and Design of a Gadolinium Based Neutron Detector), Alex Couture (Measurement of the 2H(n,np)n Cross Section in the SCRE Configuration), and postdoc Michael Akashi-Ronquest (The DEAP/CLEAN dark matter search). In addition, poster presentations will be given by graduate student Matthew Buckner (Pulsed Proton Beam from an ECR Ion Source) and undergraduate Lenny Evans (Spatial Reconstruction of Co-60 Radiation Sources Using Goodness-of-Fit Tests on Spectra Obtained from an HPGe Detector).

Three Physics undergraduate students to present at APS meeting, Oct 23 - 26

Three physics undergraduate students have received travel awards to present posters at the APS Division of Nuclear Physics meeting in Oakland October 23-26, 2008. The students, Lenny Evans, Alex Long, and Kevin Macon will present work related to studies on ultra- low radioactivity materials they have performed with Prof. Henning and collaborators at TUNL. Their work provides valuable information for experiments that will directly search for dark matter and study nature's most elusive particle -- the neutrino. The grants were awarded via the Conference Experience for Undergraduates (CEU) program funded by the DOE and NSF.

Symposium on the past and future of the department to take place Oct. 10

On Friday, October 10, 2008 the Physics & Astronomy Department will hold a symposium entitled "Physics and Astronomy at UNC-CH: Where We Came From, Where We Are Going." The event will feature presentations by some of our emeritus professors about the department, its people, and its research in the mid-20th century, paired with presentations from our young assistant professors about the exciting new scientific developments we can expect in the 21st century. This will be an opportunity to recall some of the most significant events and personalities in the UNC-CH Physics & Astronomy Department in the past half-century, and to glimpse the future of the department in the form of our dynamic young faculty. The program can be found at http://www.physics.unc.edu/~mcneil/pastfuturesymposium.htm. The presentations will take place in 211 Chapman Hall. It will be a festive occasion for long-time members and friends of the department to meet with friends from earlier days, and for younger people to learn more about the origins of the department that they occupy today. We hope to see you there.

Paul Frampton presents closing plenary lecture at cosmology conference

Paul Frampton will present the closing plenary talk at the COSMO-08 conference on August 29 at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He will present the results from his paper about dark matter black holes (DMBHs), in which he uses maximization of entropy to provide a statistical mechanics argument that DMBHs provide about ninety-nine percent of entropy from some one percent of dark matter.

Paul Frampton publishes third edition of field theory book

The third edition of "Gauge Field Theories" by Paul Frampton has been published by Wiley-VCH. The first two editions appeared in 1986 and 2000.

Postdoc Guohua Cao receives award for research excellence

Guohua Cao, a postdoc working with Prof. Otto Zhou, has received a 2008 Postdoctoral Award for Research Excellence from the UNC-CH Office of Postdoctoral Affairs. The awards of $1000 are given in recognition of the research promise demonstrated by individual postdoctoral scholars and are designed to assist postdoctoral scholars in their continued professional development by supporting the recipients in conference travel, purchasing books, lab materials, or engaging in other scholarly activities that directly enhance the individual's professional growth. Dr. Cao, who received his PhD in Chemistry from Brown University, is developing a micro-computed tomography scanner for in vivo imaging of small animal cancer models. The system is based on the carbon nanotube field emission x-ray technology developed in the Zhou lab. He leads the system design and electronics aspects of the project and supervises several undergraduates.

Bruce Carney elected Chair of AURA Board

Astronomy professor Bruce Carney has been elected Chair of the Board of Directors of AURA (Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy), which manages the Hubble Space Telescope and three national ground-based observatories (NOAO, NSO, and Gemini). He was also elected Chair of the Member Representatives group that elects the Board of Directors and recommends to the board members of the management councils that oversee the observatories. At UNC, Prof. Carney also serves as Senior Associate Dean for the Natural Sciences and Mathematics in the College of Arts & Sciences.

Two grad students win dissertation fellowships

Graduate student Leslie Prochaska has been awarded the Linda Dykstra Science Dissertation Fellowship by the Graduate School and made a member of the Royster Society of Fellows, an award recognizing her "exceptional scholarship, leadership abilities, and capability for contributing to the Society." The Fellows meet regularly with senior faculty for interdisciplinary academic enrichment, and professional and leadership development. They also act as ambassadors for graduate education within and beyond the University. Leslie is a student of Jim Rose.

Brian Collins has been awarded a Dissertation Completion Fellowship by the Graduate School, based upon the quality of the research he is conducting and the progress he has made toward completion of his degree. Brian is a student of Frank Tsui.

The Department of Physics & Astronomy is very proud of these outstanding students, and congratulates them on their achievements.

Hugon Karwowski wins Johnston Teaching Excellence Award

Prof. Hugon Karwowski has received a 2008 Johnston Award for Teaching Excellence. Nominations for this award come from Johnston Scholars, recipients of UNC-Chapel Hill's premier need-based scholarships. Every year approximately 70 entering freshmen are chosen to be Johnston Scholars, based on outstanding high school records and leadership potential. The citation for Prof. Karwowski's award reads as follows:

Professor Karwowski's devotion to teaching undergraduates can best be described as "fanatical." Despite a distinguished career as a nuclear physicist, he is best known by students as an exemplary professor, consistently described as "considerate," "extremely approachable," "always available," "humorous," "bright," and even "crazy."

Questions are "expected, not encouraged" in Dr. Karwowski's courses. He teaches by helping students think through ideas, rather than simply lecturing. He eschews examples from the textbook. Instead, he develops his own clever means of illustrating physics concepts which are "memorable as well as pedagogically sound," using examples which include beavers, toys, sleds, and other scenarios rarely found in an introductory physics course.

One specific example quoted by a former student: "He challenged us regularly in class to tackle design problems that integrated all our undergraduate knowledge and applied it to creating a feasible solution. One such problem that I particularly remember was posed to us on Valentine's Day. He challenged us to design a system that could monitor the heart rate and the amount of blood drips per minute of an individual whose heart was pierced by Cupid's arrow. The problem initially seemed to have no relevance with electronics, but once our class began to think and come up with new ideas, we were able to apply our electronics knowledge to come up with an innovative solution. Several problems like these not only made the materials learnt in class digestible, but also helped me retain the information and observe how the classroom knowledge can be applied in practice."

Dr. Karwowski is extremely dedicated to helping students succeed outside of class as well, spending "hours upon hours with students in office hours and with review sessions," sending multiple e-mails per day, and offering advice on everything from grad schools to building a distortion-free speaker system. Even in his larger classes, he knows everyone's name and regularly greets students from previous semesters. According to one student, "all 50 people [in his class] would vouch for his being approachable."

He is widely known for working nights and weekends; one student sent him an e-mail Friday night, and in his prompt response, he offered an impromptu help session that Saturday evening. According to the chair of the Physics and Astronomy Department, "he never says he has something more important to do than help a student understand a physics concept...This is contagious!"

Professor Karwowski's tremendous efforts to impart his passion for physics and to ensure students learn clearly set him apart among faculty. As one interviewed student said: "He is far and away the best professor I have ever had at Carolina...Make sure he wins an award!"

Three graduate students from the nuclear group to give talks at APS Spring Meeting

Three graduate students from the nuclear physics group will give talks at the APS Spring meeting in St. Louis in April. Padraic Finnerty will talk on "Systematic study of cosmogenic activation with low background Ge spectroscopy at the Kimballton Underground Research Facility", Samantah Hammond will present her work on "Search for dipole states in 235,238U," and Chris Angell will talk on "Gamma strength function for p-process nucleosynthesis calculations".

UNC graduate Rachel Rosen wins Graduate Dean's Distinguished Dissertation Award

Rachel Rosen, who recently completed her PhD under the supervision of Prof. Chris Clemens, has received the 2008 Graduate Dean's Distinguished Dissertation Award for Mathematical and Physical Sciences and Engineering. Recipients of this award, which was recently established by the UNC Graduate School, are selected for their originality, scholarly excellence, methodological sophistication and significant contribution to the discipline. In order to recognize timely completion of doctoral training, preference is given to candidates who complete their doctoral training in a timely manner (i.e., 6 years or less in most disciplines). The title of Dr. Rosen's dissertation is "A Non-radial Oscillation Model for Radio Pulsars." We congratulate her on her significant achievement.

Six physics majors inducted into Phi Beta Kappa

Six physics majors were inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa national academic honor society in March 2008. Only juniors and seniors who have at least a 3.85 grade point average are eligible for membership. Nationally less than 1% of college seniors are invited to join. The picture shows (left to right) Sheel Shah, Joshua Schwartz, Alan Liu, Jonathan Toledo, and Alex Mellnik. Not shown is Nicholas Cook, who is studying abroad at Oxford University this year. We are very proud of these outstanding young physicists!

Sean Washburn named Outstanding Referee

Professor Sean Washburn has been named an Outstanding Referee by the American Physical Society (APS), one of only 534 of the 42,000 active referees for the physics journals published by the APS. This is the first year of this very selective award, and the physicists chosen are truly exceptional in their contributions to the physics community by their hard work and careful attention to the peer review process. The efforts of the honorees in peer review not only keep the standards of the journals at a high level, but in many cases also help authors to improve the quality and readability of their articles-even those that are not published by APS. The basis for choosing the honorees was the quality, number and timeliness of their reports. The names of this year's honorees are listed at http://publish.aps.org/OutstandingReferees, and will be printed in each APS journal. Prof. Washburn is to be congratulated and thanked for his outstanding service to the physics community.

Paul Frampton's research on black holes discussed in New Scientist

Graduate student Brian Collins wins award at conference

Graduate student Guang Yang wins Radiological Society prize

Guang Yang, a physics graduate student working under the supervision of Prof. Otto Zhou, has won the RSNA Trainee Research Prize from the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) at its 2007 meeting. This meeting is the world's largest professional meeting on medical science and technology. It hosts more than 60,000 attendees from around the world every year. The RSNA Trainee Research Prizes are given for the best paper or poster in each subspecialty presented by a resident/physics trainee, fellow or medical student at the RSNA meeting. The Research Trainee Prize consists of $1000 and a certificate.

Guang Yang' paper, "Novel Gantry-free Digital Breast Tomosynthesis (DBT) System Using a Stationary Multibeam Field Emission X-ray Source Array Based on Carbon Nanotubes," describes an interdisciplinary study in which the authors developed a novel multibeam field emission x-ray source array based on carbon nanotubes, and built a digital breast tomosynthesis system (Argus) for breast imaging. Argus is the first stationary tomosynthesis system for clinical diagnostic imaging. Compared to its clinical counterparts, the Argus system can provide diagnostic images with similar quality, but the total imaging time is reduced by factor of 10 to 100. This research result shows great potential for clinical applications.

The research was supported by the National Cancer Institute and UNC's Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center.

The co-authors of this paper are: Guang Yang, Ramya Rajama, Guohua Cao, Shabana Sultana, David Lalush, Jianping Lu, and Otto Zhou.

Physics department alum serves as technical expert to North Korea disarmament negotiations

Kevin Veal, who received his PhD from our department in 1998 (Profs. Ludwig and Karwowski were his advisors), has worked at Los Alamos National Laboratory since 1999. He currently serves as the leading US DOE technical expert to the Six-Party talks seeking an end to North Korea's nuclear weapons program. The six parties, which also include North Korea, China, South Korea, Russia, and Japan, have held sporadic talks over the past four years aimed at disabling the North's nuclear facilities. Last week the US-led delegation of nuclear experts conducted a site survey of North Korea's Yongbyon nuclear facility and engaged in technical discussions on the scope and feasibility for disablement actions there. Kevin can be seen at the left in the picture accompanying Sung Kim, the chief Korea expert for the U.S. State Department. The photo is courtesy of China's Xinhua news agency.

Three physics students receive research and funding from the Office of Undergraduate Research

Three physics majors received funding from the Office of Undergraduate Research to support their research. Two of these received travel awards to present their research results at conferences. Lauren Hartle, who is working with Prof. Richard Superfine on "Electrospun Substrates for Cell Growth," will present her work at the 2007 ACC Meeting of the Minds at UVA. Nora Tramm, a student of Prof. Paul Tiesinga working on "Interneuron Diversity" attended the Neuroscience Conference 2006 in Atlanta GA and reported on her research. Shibani Dogra, who is working with Prof. Darin Knapp in the Dept. of Psychiatry, received research support for his study of "Ethanol and Cytokines effect on brain function and behavior."

Physics department alum becomes Division Director at NASA

Jon A. Morse, who received his Ph.D. in astrophysics from our department in 1992, has been selected as director of the Astrophysics Division of NASA's Science Mission Directorate, effective April 2.

Morse's career to date spans more than 15 years in the academic, private and federal arenas, including a recent 1-year assignment to the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Executive Office of the President. He was senior astrophysicist in the Laboratory for Observational Cosmology at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., arriving in 2005 from the Arizona State University where he had been an Associate Professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy. He has extensive science, technical and program management experience, and has authored or co-authored over 60 publications and dozens of scientific and technical white papers and conference proceedings.

NASA's Astrophysics Division coordinates the space missions and related research to study the origin and evolution of planets, stars and galaxies, including such exotic phenomena as exploding supernovae, neutron stars and black holes. With its $1.5B annual budget, the Division's work increases our understanding of the nature of the universe and the fundamental laws of space, time, and energy.