In an effort to engage more students in science we are seeking to develop regionally relevant classroom activities and community-based participatory research projects. With a grant from the NSF we were able to purchase a pXRF that we use in both undergraduate STEM majors’ and future HS teachers’ curricula. The pXRF provides the ability to conduct in-situ measurements. These field analyses allow for rapid screening, for example, of heavy metal contamination within public parks and brownfield sites. Participating students receive safety training prior to use of equipment. They gain experience with using a modern analytical technique, hypothesis testing, field and analytical methods, data analysis, interpretation, and oral and written dissemination of results. Research Methods is an introduction for future teachers to the tools and mathematics that scientists use to solve scientific problems, and the communication of that work. Students independently design and carry out: (1) a brief home inquiry, (2) a preliminary laboratory inquiry from which they could build a HS lesson, (3) a survey involving human subjects, and (4) an extension of their laboratory inquiry. The pXRF allows exciting integration of AP physics 2 content (i.e. gamma radiation, quantized energy levels) into a variety of STEM instructional projects.

Physics is a notoriously challenging subject that plays a critical and ubiquitous role in our lives. Undergraduate educators thus need new approaches that will encourage college students to study physics.

We have addressed this need through the development of a novel undergraduate physics course and associated textbook that cover the principles, practice, and application of prominent biomedical imaging techniques (i.e., light microscopy and medical imaging) and explore their extensive connections to physics. We chose to focus on imaging because it is a powerful, ubiquitous scientific tool that has strong foundational ties to physics. Imaging also arises frequently in everyday life, so students are interested in the topic and appreciate its importance.

The physical foundations of imaging can be established using approaches that range from purely conceptual to highly theoretical. We use a combined conceptual and theoretical approach that is enthusiastically received by students majoring in all STEM disciplines. This success suggests that other institutions also would profit from offering a course focused on biomedical imaging. Here we describe the course content, including highly popular hands-on activities, to help pave the way for other educators who are interested in teaching a similar course.

This project examines how undergraduate research students deal with times when they feel little progress is being made. What kinds of things cause students to get stuck in their research?  What steps do they take to get “unstuck”? We consider two types of approaches when it comes to progression of the research plan: internal and external. Self-directed, internal learning is related to metacognition, which is typically defined as thinking about thinking, or more accurately, the process of reflecting on and directing one’s own thinking. The external approach involves aid from other people, such as a labmate or a research advisor.  We conducted 10 interviews with students doing summer research projects. During the interviews, students discussed their thought processes and approaches while doing research. We will discuss themes that emerge from this data regarding obstacles and how students try to overcome them. Ultimately, the research should help students identify obstacles in their research and find productive ways to overcome them.

Solar films are one of the best devices for increasing the energy efficiency of a window by decreasing the radiative heat load. Solar films are made by coating a thin polyethylene terephthalate (PET) film with an optically active layer that blocks ultraviolet radiation. Unlike other solutions, solar films have the advantage as they can be retrofitted onto existing windows without the need for costly window replacements. 

This preliminary study investigated the feasibility of modeling complex window/solar film systems with Comsol multiphysics. The solar films that we chose to model are made by Eastman Performance Films LLC. We chose their LLumar architectural window film designed to block >99% of UV radiation while transmitting 89% of visible light. To incorporate this kind of solar film in our model we had to research the physical constants. These constants include finding the density, thermal conductivity, electrical conductivity, relative permittivity, relative permeability, and heat capacity at constant pressure. 

After successfully modeling the solar film, future avenues of research include ways to optimize existing systems as well as investigate new combinations of geometries and materials to increase the efficiency of these windows.

I present on an upper division undergraduate course I created: "Physics & Public Policy." I teach about the role of physicists in influencing, reforming and/or creating public policies. Topics include electrical energy, nuclear power, nuclear weapons, and climate change. Because of the real-world impact of these topics on people's well-being, I teach ethical frameworks and how they may be applied to policy questions. For many students, it is their first exposure to ethical theory and to thinking critically about the role of scientists in society. I also include a Service Learning component in the course, wherein students volunteer with a local non-profit that helps low income residents with their electricity bills. Through discussions, reflective writing, and class presentations, they explore how their service relates to the rest of the course content. I present my teaching methods and results and discuss possibilities for exposing more students in physics courses to ethical & societal thinking and to Service Learning, as ways to prepare them to engage with pressing local and global problems.

In this work we present how to visualize different pure states and (“superposition”) states in a 2-state quantum system with designing different dices in shape and color/number. Later we will expand the method in order to be able to represent a 3-state, 4-state quantum system. This approach can be used as a new technique to help comprehending the meaning of a “sates” for those who are interested to learn quantum system.

This is the story of how serendipity, persistence, and a modeling approach lead to an accurate radius of the Earth. An unusual photograph through a telescope of two distant San Francisco bridges, one close, one far, shows the curvature of the Earth. The more distant bridge is clearly lower in the water of SF Bay than a Flat-Earth calculation would indicate. Three models deliver successively better results. Measurements on this photo, bridge dimensions, and a calculation results in an estimate of the radius of the Earth surprisingly accurate!

The NASA HOEE Starshade Challenge is intended for Undergraduate Students in Engineering and Physics/Astronomy and promotes various skills they've learned throughout their college career. Students have the opportunity to showcase their level of mastery in their degree and learn to problem solve and think critically to design and produce an ultra-low mass Starshade. Carefully, a Starshade can be constructed and positioned to block only the bright star's light but allow exoplanet light to reach the telescope, helping NASA Scientists characterize exoplanets further. Using elements of engineering and physics students will contribute to a developing project in this once an a lifetime challenge.

Game theory with discourse analysis as a means to undersstand the role of minority groups—example global warming in news and Google Ads. Game theory is an effectibe way to describe the actions of rational individuals. Critical discourse analysis is a means to describe power relations starting with discourse data. Taking a critical dicourse analysis to construct a game matrix can be attentively noting what payoffs people in the discourse sample seek and how these are influenced by others and selecting Dawkins memes from available codes. The example is discourse on global warming in Google ads and Google news. This will show how this type of analysis is an to understanding minority groups, Critical race theorists suppose that blacks make progress when a non-black group also benefits, which is rational behavior. Popper made rationality a key part of social science. The Pareto optimum outcome of the example game is if globally large enough group of people demand climate justice.

Physicists usually have a clear idea what a science experiment or astronomical observation is, and physicists with different paradigms (different ideas about the nature of quantum measurement for example), can often collaborate and agree on results. Students in classroom may have difficulty understanding why somethings are science and others pseudoscience or metaphysics. Popper's demarcation will be be described in detail, and how it is useful to label things like, climate denial, creationism and ufology. Popper's extension of demarcation to social science is not well known but it will be demonstrated useful in describing quantitative and qualitative or quantittative P.E.R. research. A method of combing qualitative and quantitative data in a theory will be given.