Report
Report From the Spring 2017 Meeting of the OSAPS at Eastern Michigan State University
The OSAPS 2017 Spring Meeting had the theme “Computational Physics” and was held at Eastern Michigan University (EMU) on May 5-6 2017. The theme of the meeting was manifest in the topics of the invited presentations, which covered networks, avalanches, metal alloys for the auto industry, and integrating computation into physics curricula. A total of 96 people registered for the meeting and 57 presentations were given.
Dr. Steve Pernecky, Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at EMU, started the meeting with brief welcoming remarks just before the first plenary session. Prof. Mark Newman from the University of Michigan presented “The Statistical Physics of Networks,” introducing us to fundamental network concepts, showing examples of social, ecological, and biochemical networks, and how one characterizes such networks. Prof. Danny Caballero from Michigan State University presented “How might Physics Education Research facilitate the coming computational revolution?”, describing his work on integrating computation into physics courses and shared some initial results from a national survey on practices in physics departments to include computation. The first plenary session was followed by a poster session in which 27 posters were presented, and then by the dinner banquet, held in McKenny Hall. Dr. Bita Ghaffari from the Ford Motor Company presented “Computational Physics in the Auto Industry” after the banquet, describing her journey from atomic physicist working on Bose-Einstein condensates to industrial physicist using density functional theory to predict the properties of metal alloys needed in the auto industry. The post-presentation discussion especially highlighted the skills that physics students need to make a successful entry to industrial employment.
The meeting continued on Saturday morning, May 6, with six contributed sessions, consisting of 25 presentations. The meeting concluded with the second plenary session. The first talk of this session was given by Prof. Karin Dahmen from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Her presentation, “Universal Slip Statistics: From Nanocrystals to Earthquakes?” described how conceptually simple mean field models can be used to describe a wide range of phenomena, including stress-induced material deformation and the size distribution of avalanches and earthquakes. Prof. Kelly Roos from Bradley University presented “Integrating Computational Activities into Undergraduate Physics Courses”, describing his work to integrate computation into his courses, as well as his work with the Partnership to Integrate Computation in Undergraduate Physics (PICUP) to develop a network of instructors to generate instructional materials for use across the entire range of physics curricula.
Two additional events took place on Saturday afternoon after the formal close of the meeting. First, Prof. Roos ran a PICUP workshop (11 participants) to highlight the materials that have been generated to date and also led workshop participants through a foundational example of computing the trajectory of a ball dropping without, and then with, drag. Second, Prof. Natthi Sharma of EMU led an Optics Lab Tour (3 participants) to demonstrate the advanced experiments to quantify dipole scattering, polarization phenomena, and laser modes.
The Local Organizing Committee for the OSAPS 2017 Spring Meeting consisted of Profs. Eric Paradis, Dave Pawlowski, Jon Skuza, and Ernie Behringer (chair). Students Brandon Laycock, Brendan Pickard, and Ryan Walker provided much-needed help during the meeting. The EMU Office of the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences (CAS) provided significant support by providing convenient spaces for the sessions at no cost. The financial summary of the meeting follows.