REUP- and RET-FOM/SILL

Research Experiences for Undergraduates and Teachers in Physics - Focus on Minorities

Southern University Illinois Edwardsville

Summer, 2001 and 2002

Projects, students and teachers in 2001:

2001

Projects, students and teachers in 2002:

Proposals, pictures and papers from this summer's group.

Participants below:

1. William Hall from Univ. of Arkansas at Little Rock, worked on quantum hall effect with Prof. Lenore Horner.

2. Barthemaeus Owen from SIUE, worked with Prof. Leah O'Brien on gas spectroscopy.

3. Tyrone Walker from SIUE, worked part of the summer with Prof. Brad Cross, giving feedback and proposing improvements to the NSF-funded Mid America earthquake website under development at SIUE. Due to personal circumstances he took a higher paying engineering internship at a local company

4. Julie Smith from Univ. of Northern Colorado worked briefly (about a week) on the CosRayHS project with Julia Thompson and Dave Kraus. She worked on oscilloscope skills and functioning of a photomultiplier.

The aim of the CosRayHS project is to study cosmic ray rates as a function of shower separation, first with two detectors into the same computer and then with two detectors into different computers, communicating time stamp information via GPS technology. If successful, this will establish a prototype for individual detectors at participating area high schools.

5. Matt Surmeier from SIUE, worked with Prof. David Kaplan in collaboration with Washington University, on a project to study effectiveness of fiber optic detectors. Demonstrated mear-Poisson behavior in the fibers, and was asked to give a talk on his work to the Washington Universilty cosmic ray group.

6. Lenka Raska from SIUE, worked with Prof. Julia Thompson and Dave Kraus on commissioning of a small two-element scintillator telescope to be used for detection of cosmic rays. The group developed a consistent model incorporating measurements from both 2001 and 2002, and both a larger thicker array and smaller thinner array, indicating that primary particles are accompanied by delta rays made in the atmosphere. This result affects the interpretation of dat from the proposed high school cosmic ray detector network.

7. Jeannette Gindler , high school physics teacher, Collinsville, worked on the CosRayHS project with Julia Thompson and Dave Kraus, under the auspices of the "QUARKNET" program. Ms. Gindler completed her work with this group June 14; she developed some interesting presentations concerning Rutherford scattering, combining various materials freely available on the web.

8. Warren Hemmer , high school physics teacher at Carrollton High School, also worked on the CosRayHS project, under QUARKNET auspices. His final report is not yet available.

9. Natasha Collymore, REUP-FOM Program Assistant and Program.

Mentoring and Tutoring

In June (10,11, and preparation) and July (19) we participated in a mockup of a planned outreach trip to Capetown and Johannesburg, South Africa

These were the only mentoring activities in this summer, due to the fact that most students were only part-time in the program, and therefore a restriction of activities generally.

General Schedule:

Our aim was, as for the Pitt program, for a full time student to spend on average 25-35 hrs in research, 5-10 hrs in research reporting and conferences, 5 hrs in mentoring/tutoring/outreach, 5-10 hrs in outside academic work, and 5-10 hrs in other group activities, for a total of 45-55 hrs/week, with the exact composition varying somewhat from week to week. Students who were part time in the program, aimed for 25-30 hrs/week, with 20-25 research hours, and 5-10 hrs/week of other program activities.

Our general schedule was:

Monday morning: Conferences

Tuesday Lunch: Vocabulary, NYTimes Science,...

Weds General GRE 10:30-11:30am and Electromagnestism 2-3pm

Thurs Physics GRE 10:30-11:30am , Quantum Mechanics 2-3pm

Friday Lunch: Focussed Discussion/Speaker/Field Trip

Academic work (with Natasha supporting):

A sample of activities and dates follows:

  • May 29 (Wednesday). lunch. Students introduce their projects. NYTimes Science (Bell labs high Tc data too similar in different publications?);new vocabulary: gate signal, dark current, cyclotron orbits, thermopower, hydrostatic pressure, pulse shape, undulation, ephemeral, ostensible, ostentatious, detritus, torpor,temperate glacier, Cerenkov radiation, heuristic, induction.

  • May 31-June 2. jt trip to Pittsburgh.

  • June 3 (Mon.). Research proposals due; advisors attend conferences with advisors, jt, and Natasha.

  • June 4. lunch Intake quiz and discussion; new vocabulary: innocuous, missive, palindrome, effete, empirical, eulogy, grandiloquent, subliminal, disingenuous, disinterested, ingenious, inchoate, perfidious, sacrosanct, sadistic, quiescent, tenuous, opprobium

  • June 6. Intake quiz and discussion; practice sessions with hands on activities for South African mockup planned June 10.

  • June 7 (Friday). lunch. Hubble telescope from NYTimes. Student presentations based on intake quiz.

  • June 10 (Monday) lunch with Jeremy Dodd, of Columbia University, discussing the ATLAS experiment at the LHC (Large Hadron Collider) at CERN in Geneva Switzerland. "Exploratorium" and hands on activities in afternoon.

  • June 14. (Friday) student presenatations based on input quiz. new vocabulary words: expenditure, atrocity, catalyst, desolate, vogue, counterintuitive, pallette (armor near armpit), congruent, maunder, toil, blight, abate. (Jeannette Gindler's last day).

  • June 18. (Tuesday) new vocabulary: affect, effect, perspicuity (easy to see through), perspicacious, discreet, discrete, peruse, perturb, vernal, zany, dispersion, impulse, inalienable, contiguous, impecunious, efulgent, diffidence, contrary, froward

  • June 21. (Friday) Art Braundmeier, development and measurement of coatings for astronaut sun visor helmets; Barthemeaus does converging lens problem from quiz.

  • June 25. (Tuesday) Notes on e-bubbles distributed (in preparation for visit by W. Willis next week). new vocabulary: peremtory,intransigent,eloquence,elocution locution, loquacious, eloign (seclude oneself), indignant, deranged, furnace, mesoderm, kilter (usual condition), pyrexia (abnormal high body temperature), syllogism (major premise, minor premise, conclusion)

  • June 28 (Friday) Students will discuss their research projects informally at lunch.

  • July 2 (Tuesday) Midterm presentations 10:00-noon. Lunch discussion by W. Willis (high energy physicist, head of American contingent at ATLAS (one of two major experiments at CERN Large Hadron Collider). Discussion probably concerning his work with e-bubbles as a particle detection technique.

  • July 19 Upward Students will be attending our Exploratorium[Peck Hall 3312] from 9:00am-11:00am Then we will have lunch and the hands on experiments[Peck Hall 2405, 2410, 2414]: Optics/Waves,Collisions, and Electric Circuits from 11:00am - 1:00pm
  • Visit University of Missouri St. Louis Surface Science Lab 2:30pm
  • Municipal Opera in Forest Park around 7pm REU students can also visit the Science Center and/or the Zoo which are near the UMSL campus.

  • Final presentations Thursday August 1st.

  • Final Papers Due Friday Aug 2nd.

    • Housing and Housekeeping Details

    On site tudents lived in shared university apartments. Minimal kitchen dishes and cooking utensils are provided, along with a food allowance. The SIUE chapter ran from May 27 through August 1, 2002.

    Outcome

    The students agreed that they had gained technically from the summer, and one student who had experienced other REU sites said he had gained most from this one due to the individual attention he had received here. However, the high demands of the program, compounded by health and family problems of some students, the part-time status of some students, and difficulties with timely expense payments, stressed all participants.

    Cuts in the Illinois education budget have impacted funds for extra-mural programs such as this particularly strongly. This program will not be continued at SIUE beyond 2002.

     This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 9987904 Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expresed in this amterial are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the national Science Foundation. Last Modified by J.A. Thompson, Oct. 19, 2002.