NSF renews IceCube maintenance and operations contract

The National Science Foundation announced on March 30, 2016 that it has renewed a cooperative agreement with the University of Wisconsin–Madison to operate IceCube. The five-year, $35 million award entails the continued operation and management of the observatory located at NSF’s Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station. In 2013, the IceCube Collaboration reported the first detection of high-energy cosmic neutrinos, opening a new astronomical vista on the universe and on some of its most violent phenomena.

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Energy – Physics 115 Summer 2016

Title:
Energy
Course Number:
115
Instructor:
Jeffrey Schmidt
Student Type:
Undergraduate
Course Description:
A one-semester introduction, focusing on a central concept: energy, energy sources, and the environment. Gives students the necessary physics background to form opinions on energy questions. The physical laws of thermodynamics, electricity, and magnetism, and nuclear physics in connection with energy related topics such as: thermal pollution, fossil power, fission and fusion, nuclear power, and solar power. Two lectures and one discussion per week.
Prerequisites:
Completion of QR-A. High school algebra and geometry. Not open to students who have taken Physics 103, 201, 207, or 247
Lecture Place and Time:
MTWR 10:20-11:10am, 2103 Chamberlin Hall

Lauren Laufman-Wollitzer Awarded WISE Grant

Undergraduate student Lauren Laufman-Wollitzer received a $4,000 grant from the UW Housing WISE (women in science and engineering) learning community to work in Prof. Cary Forest’s lab to further the understanding of shock formation, propagation, and dissipation in astrophysical plasmas. Lauren will build a compact toroid injector to accomplish the experiments.

Physics Majors Invited to Join Phi Beta Kappa

Five Physics majors have been invited to join Phi Beta Kappa, the nation’s oldest and most prestigious honor society http://pbk.wisc.edu/. Students are invited to join on the basis of demonstrated achievement in breadth and depth of study in the liberal arts. The Wisconsin Chapter traditionally invites no more than three or four percent of the University’s bachelor’s degree candidates to join.

Our honorees are:

Zachary Briesemeister
Leah Fulmer
William Milner
Colin Wahl
Ruifeng Xie

Please congratulate them!