Archived Newsletters

Winter 2008 Newsletter

DMP Newsletter

In This Issue

Dates to Remember

February 5, 2008 (Tuesday): Deadline for submitting nominations for APS Officers.

A Note from the Chair

In our last newsletter I talked about the strong Congressional and Administration support for basic research. The support is still there, but unfortunately due to budget constraints and political wrangling this has not been reflected in the current budget. I noted in that newsletter that our community’s previous budget success highlighted the positive effects of contacting your congressional representatives, but that it’s just as important now to continue these efforts.

So I would like to encourage you to participate in contacting your Congressional representatives at the March meeting. And this includes everyone working or studying in the U.S.; these are your representatives even if you are not a U.S. citizen, and it really helps to contact your representatives. So please participate—it only takes a few minutes of your time, and it’s important for the health of the physics community.

Looking forward to seeing you in New Orleans,

Jeff Lynn, Chair
Division of Materials Physics

March Meeting: DMP Sponsored Symposia & Special Events

Session D3: Materials Physics in the Fast Lane
Monday, March 10, 2008, 2:30 p.m. - 5:30 p.m.
Morial Convention Center - RO1 - RO2
Chair: Brian Schwartz, City University of New York

  • D3.00001: The Art and Materials Physics of the Motorcycle: Charles M. Falco
  • D3.00002: Materials at 200 mph: Making NASCAR Faster and Safer: Diandra Leslie-Pelecky
  • D3.00003: Sox and Drugs: Baseball, Steroids and Physics: Roger Tobin
  • D3.00004: Zero CTE Glass in the Hubble Space Telescope: John Wood
  • D3.00005: The Materials Science of Superheroes: James Kakalios

Session E1 APS Prize and Award Session
Monday, March 10, 2008, 5:45 p.m.
Morial Convention Center - 206
Chair: Arthur Bienenstock, Stanford University

Session H4: Selected Applications Using Materials Science
Tuesday, March 11, 2008, 8:00 a.m. - 11:00 a.m.
Morial Convention Center - 206
Chair: Yvan Bruynseraede, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven

  • H4.00001: Integrated Functionality: Nanosensors: Jozef T. Devreese
  • H4.00002: Multiferroics: Ultimate Memory Device: James F. Scott
  • H4.00003: Nanodevice sensors measured with rf- and microwave reflectometry: Per Delsing
  • H4.00004: Detection of Explosive Materials: William Trogler
  • H4.00005: Materials Informatics: Using machine learning techniques with large amounts of ab-initio computed or experimental data: Gerbrand Ceder

Session J1: Buckley, Pake, McGroddy Prizes
Tuesday, March 11, 2008, 11:15 a.m. - 2:15 p.m.
Morial Convention Center - La Louisiane AB
Chair: Allen Goldman, University of Minnesota

  • J1.00001: Oliver E. Buckley Prize: Why are we so excited about carbon nanostructures?: Mildred Dresselhaus
  • J1.00002: George E. Pake Prize: Science and the Energy Security Challenge: The Example of Solid State Lighting: Julia Phillips
  • J1.00003: James C. McGroddy Prize: Superconductivity in alkali-metal doped Carbon-60: Arthur Hebard
  • J1.00004: James C. McGroddy Prize: What Was New About C60: Robert Haddon
  • J1.00005: James C. McGroddy Prize: The p-and d-electron superconductors - Struggle to find higher-Tc superconductors: Jun Akimitsu

DMP/DCMP/DCOMP/DCP New Fellows and Awards Reception
Tuesday, March 11, 2008, 5:30 p.m.- 7:00 p.m.
New Orleans Marriott, Mardi Gras Ballroom DE

Session M39: DMP Business Meeting
Tuesday, March 11, 2008, 7:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
New Orleans Marriott, - Audubon Room
Chair: Jeff Lynn, NIST Center for Neutron Research

Student Lunch with the Experts
Wednesday, March 12, 1:00 p.m. – 2:30 p.m.
Convention Center

Session U1: Isakson Prize, Adler Award, Nicholson Medal
Thursday, March 13, 2008, 8:00 a.m. - 11:00 a.m.
Morial Convention Center - La Louisiane AB
Chair: David Pine, New York University

  • U1.00001: TBD: Mitchell Feigenbaum
  • U1.00002: Frank Isakson Prize: Using ultrafast to probe the slow: Joseph Orenstein
  • U1.00003: Frank Isakson Prize: Optical Probes of -Conjugated Polymers: Z. Valy Vardeny
  • U1.00004: David Adler Lectureship Award: Lattice instabilities and ferroelectricity in complex oxides: Karin M. Rabe
  • U1.00005: Nicholson Medal: Simulational Physics in a Shrinking World: David Landau

Session V1: Recent Advances in Soft Complex Materials Using Neutron Scattering
Thursday March 13, 11:15 a.m. - 2:15 p.m.
Morial Convention Center - 206
Chair: Alan J. Hurd, Los Alamos National Laboratory

  • V1.00001: Neutron and X-ray Characterization of Nanostructured Polymeric Materials: Thomas Russell
  • V1.00002: Beyond Wrinkles: Stress and Fold Localization in Thin Elastic Membranes: Luka Pocivavsek
  • V1.00003: Complex Protein Structures by Neutron Scattering: Jenny Glusker
  • V1.00004: Observation of a Fragile-to-Strong Dynamic Crossover Phenomenon in Confined Water and Its Relation to the Existence of a Liquid-Liquid Critical Point in Supercooled Water: Sow-Hsin Chen
  • V1.00005: Phase Behavior of Block Copolymer/Inorganic Nanoparticle Composites: Pappannan Thiyagarajan

March Meeting: Tutorials

Pre-registration only — NO ON-SITE REGISTRATION

Sunday, March 9
New Orleans Marriott Hotel, 555 Canal Street

Eight half-day tutorials will be presented. Interested individuals can select one tutorial from the morning, and one from the afternoon schedule. You must pre-register for tutorials - you will not be able to register on-site for tutorials. Register for the tutorials at the time you register for the March Meeting.

Fee: $100 for each Tutorial — $40 Students
Pre-meeting registration only — no registration on-site.

Tutorial Program Chair: David Jiles, Wolfson Centre for Magnetics, Cardiff University, Cardiff, UK

  • Tutorial #1 8:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.: Basics of Density Functional Theory, Static and Time-Dependent
  • Tutorial #2 8:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.: Spintronics
  • Tutorial #3 8:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.: Fundamentals of Quantum Entanglement
  • Tutorial #4 8:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.: Advances in Neutron Scattering
  • Tutorial #5 1:30 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.: Will Carbon Replace Silicon? The Future of Graphitic Electronics
  • Tutorial #6 1:30 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.: Nanomagnetism: Manufacture, Physics, Devices, and Modeling
  • Tutorial #7 1:30 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.: Quantum Noise, Quantum Limited Measurements, and Conditional Quantum Evolution
  • Tutorial #8 1:30 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.: Ethics Education

March Meeting: Student Lunch with the Experts

“The Students Lunch with the Experts” will again be featured at the APS March Meeting on Wednesday, March from 1:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m. in the Convention Center. This year the DMP will sponsor 5 tables at this event, featuring the following experts and their specialty:

  1. Laura Greene, University of Illinois: Superconductivity
  2. Dan Dahlberg, University of Minnesota: Magnetism - Transport and Microscopy
  3. Sam Bader, Argonne National Labs: Nanomagnetism
  4. Stuart Wolf, University of Virginia: Spintronics - Is it the "Holy Grail" for Electronics Beyond Moore's Law?
  5. Suni K. Sinha, UCSD: Synchrotron and Neutrons

Participating students will receive a complimentary box lunch and will take part in an informal discussion with an expert on a topic of interest. All of the topics and “experts” for the available tables, including tables sponsored by other APS units, will be listed on the APS March Meeting web page. Sign-up will take place beginning on Monday, March 10, at 1:00 p.m. at the APS registration desk, and will be on a first-come, first-served basis, with attendance limited to eight students per topic. Please encourage your students to take part in this interesting event.

March Meeting: Student Membership Recruitment

Current plans call for a special booth at the APS meeting where anyone can join the APS or APS units – including the Division of Materials Physics. Please encourage your students to take advantage of this booth to affiliate with the APS and especially with the DMP. For undergraduate and graduate students in the US, Canada, and Mexico, the APS offers a free one-year Trial Student Membership to first-time applicants. Three units (like DMP!) can also be added for free. After the initial year, students may retain membership at a special low rate. 

As we build our DMP membership base, we increase the visibility of the materials physics presence as a vibrant part of APS. We also strengthen the impact of our numerous outreach efforts, such as those to Washington and to other materials-related societies. Instructions on how to become a regular (i.e. non-student!) member of DMP can be found at the DMP web Page.

Call for Awards and Fellowship Nominations

The deadline for APS Fellowship nominations made through DMP is February 08, 2008. Please keep diversity in mind in making these nominations, as we have had a dearth of nominees in underrepresented groups in recent years.

Nominations for the Adler Lectureship Award and the McGroddy Prize for New Materials will be due on or about July 1, 2008. Please see the honors page for the further information about the deadlines and nomination requirements.

Outreach and Public Policy

DMP supports APS membership in the Federation of Materials Societies (FMS). See the FMS website at http://www.materialsocieties.org for very useful information about policy and funding in the full range of materials sciences. In addition, the following websites contain important information of interest to materials physicists:

DMP Executive Committee

The Executive Committee Officers for 2008-2009 year, who begin their terms immediately following the March meeting in New Orleans, are:

Chair: Ivan K. Schuller, University of California, San Diego (03/08 - 02/09)

Chair-Elect: R. Ramesh, University of California, Berkeley (03/08 - 02/09)

*Vice Chair: Robert Nemanich, Arizona State University (03/08 - 02/09)

Past Chair: Jeffrey W. Lynn, NIST Center for Neutron Research (03/08 - 02/09)

*Secretary/Treasurer: Chris Palmstrøm, University of California, Santa Barbara (03/08 - 02/11)

Councillor: Leonard C. Feldman, Vanderbilt University (01/05 - 12/08)

Members-at-Large:

  • *Julie A. Borchers, NIST Center for Neutron Research (03/08 - 02/11)
  • *Dan Dessau, University of Colorado at Boulder (03/08 - 02/11)
  • Laura H. Greene, University of Illinois (03/07 - 02/10)
  • Franz J. Himpsel, University of Wisconsin (03/07 - 02/10)
  • Frances M. Ross, IBM - T.J. Watson Research Center (03/06 - 02/09)
  • John M. Tranquada, Brookhaven National Laboratory (03/06 - 02/09)

*Newly elected

About 24% of DMP members voted in the recent election, in line with participation in recent years (since the launching of the web ballot), though down slightly.

DMP thanks David Vanderbilt, who will be stepping down as Past Chair after 4 years of service; Ted Einstein, who ends two terms as Secretary/Treasurer; and David Cahill and Steven Louie, who leave positions as Members-at-Large. Their terms will end at the close of the March Meeting in New Orleans.

Award and Prize Winners

David Adler Lectureship Award
Karin Rabe, Rutgers University
Citation: For research, writings and presentations on the theory of structural phase transitions and for the application of first-principles electronic structure methods to the understanding of technologically important phenomena in ferroelectrics.

James C. McGroddy Prize for New Materials:
Arthur F. Hebard, University of Florida
Jun Akimitsu, Aoyama-Gakuin University
Robert C. Haddon, University of California, Riverside
Citation: For the discovery of high temperature superconductivity in non-oxide systems.

Fellows nominated by DMP:
John Budai , Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Citation: For seminal materials physics contributions to the structure and synthesis of quasicrystals, nanocrystals formed by ion-implantation, and epitaxial high-temperature superconductors using advanced synchrotron x-ray techniques.

Martin Greven, Stanford University
Citation: For establishing a stellar record in growth and perfection of high quality crystals of oxide superconductors, which have permitted both his inelastic neutron and X-ray scattering experiments, and a host of other experiments (STM, ARPES, and optical measurements) by his collaborators which led to a number of important advances in the field.

Yves Idzerda, Montana State University
Citation: For his outstanding contributions to the development and application of soft x-ray spectroscopies to the study of magnetic systems.

Jisoon Ihm, Seoul National University
Citation: For his fundamental contributions to the theory of solids, surfaces and nanostructures, especially his development of the momentum-space formalism for total energy of solids.

Howard Katz, John Hopkins University
Citation: For introducing designed organic materials as active platforms in electronic and optical devices including transistors and electro-optic modulators, innovations in synthesis and device design, and serving the physical science community through society leadership, editorship, and government outreach.

Jennifer Lewis, University of Illinois
Citation: For seminal contributions to the fields of colloidal science and directed assembly of materials.

Rodolfo Miranda, Universidad Autónoma Madrid
Citation: For his contributions to surface and thin film magnetism, including new methods of epitaxial growth using surfactants or controlling the morphology at the atomic scale, the identification and characterization of model systems for magnetism in low dimensions, and the observation of magic heights in metallic islands.

Peter Searson, John Hopkins University
Citation: For advances in the fundamental physics associated with growth at the solid/liquid interface and pioneering work in multifunctional metallic nanowires.

Chih-Kang Shih, University of Texas
Citation: For his original and innovative contributions to the understanding of growth and properties of quantum nanostructures, in particular his pioneering contributions to quantum growth of metal thin films and optical coherence in semiconductor quantum dots.

Nicola Spaldin, University of California, Santa Barbara
Citation: For her development and implementation of new computational and theoretical tools for computing the properties of complex solids and their application to the rational design and understanding of new multifunctional materials, and for her profound and diverse contributions to Physics education.

Stephen Streiffer, Argonne National Laboratory
Citation: For experimental studies of ferroelectric thin film physics, that have established the relationships between epitaxial strain, ferroelectric phase transition behavior and domain structure, and size effects, and for advancing the fundamental understanding of complex oxide thin film microstructure.

Dimitri Vvedensky, Imperial College, London
Citation: For original, sustained, and diverse theoretical contributions toward understanding the morphological evolution of epitaxial thin films.

Xiaoxing Xi, Pennsylvania State University
Citation: For his extensive and seminal contributions to the science and applications of thin film materials including high temperature superconductors, ferroelectrics, and magnesium diboride.

APS General Elections

The APS Nominating Committee seeks nominations for the following open senior leadership positions:

  • Vice President
  • General Councillors (2)
  • Chair, Nominating Committee
  • Members, Nominating Committee (2)
  • Vice Chair, Panel on Public Affairs (POPA) Members, POPA (5)

It is important that we participate (and volunteer for service) in the nomination process.

You may nominate candidates online at: http://www.aps.org/about/governance/election/nomination.cfm . It is helpful to provide as much background information as possible, particularly a CV or link to existing information on the web. Your own summary and recommendation statement is also helpful. Nominations and attachments can also be sent to governance@aps.org.

The deadline for the submission of nominations is February 5, 2008.

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