APS NewsA P S N E W S9

Quantum Computing, MEMs, Spintronics Mark 1998 L.A. March Meeting

Months to GoMonths to Go

JUNE 1998 THE AMERICAN PHYSICAL SOCIETY VOLUME 7, NO 6Try the enhanced APS News-online: [http://www.aps.org/apsnews]

More than 5000 physicistsconverged on the Los Angeles

Convention Center in Los Angeles, Cali-fornia, 16-20 March, for the Society’sannual March Meeting. Approximately4500 technical papers were presented,mostly on topics in condensed matterand materials physics, as well as relatedfields, making it one of the largest phys-ics meetings ever. APS subunits

represented at the meeting includedbiological physics, chemical physics,condensed matter physics, fluid dy-namics, high polymer physics, andmaterials physics.

Among the technical highlights werepapers on quantum computing (seepage 4), an emerging applied physicsfield based on spin-dependent phe-nomena, dubbed “spintronics” (seepage 4), and microelectomechanicalsystems (MEMs) (see page 5). Nontech-nical highlights included a speciallecture by Ernest Moniz, Under Secre-tary of the Department of Energy(DOE), providing an overview of thecurrent national funding priorities andimpact on DOE research programs (seepage 4), as well as talks on physics,stockpile stewardship, new technolo-gies for energy conservation, andpreparing physics graduate students forcareers outside the academic IvoryTower.

The traditional ceremonial session forthe bestowal of prizes and awards washeld Monday evening, followed by areception hosted by APS PresidentAndrew Sessler (Lawrence BerkeleyLaboratory). Eleven APS prizes andawards were presented, and the win-ners gave lectures on their respective

award-winning topics atvarious sessions through-out the week. Citations andbrief biographical summa-ries of the recipientsappeared in the March1998 issue of APS News.

Vortex Crystals. Manyfluids in nature move prin-cipally in two dimensions;one example is the GreatRed Spot of Jupiter, thehurricane-like tempest onthe giant planet. The math-ematical equationsdescribing ideal, frictionlessversions of these two-di-mensional fluids areidentical to those govern-ing the movement ofcharged particles trappedin a strong magnetic field.Exploiting this connection,Fred Driscoll and his col-leagues at the University ofCalifornia, San Diego haverecently built an apparatusthat for the first time allowsa full spatial imaging of theflow of electrons trappedin a magnetic field. Thedensity of electric charge

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Fran Atkinson of the APS Membership Department stood readyto help members at the March Meeting in Los Angeles.

A preview of the APS A CENTURY OF PHYSICS timeline wallchart was popular with March Meeting attendees.

The APS Committee on Careers and ProfessionalDevelopment (see page 8) sponsored the first

workshop to kickoff a Career and ProfessionalDevelopment Liaison (CPDL) Program on March 15, 1998at the APS meeting in Los Angeles. Over 50 participantsattended the inaugural workshop, includingrepresentatives from 35 academic physics departmentsplus several industries and government laboratories. Thepurpose of the workshop was to initiate the CPD LiaisonProgram and to initiate a dialog with a small group ofinterested departments on how such an APS programcould be most useful. Diandra Leslie-Pelecky, Universityof Nebraska, and Barrett Ripin, Associate Executive Officerof the APS organized the Workshop.

A motivation behind the establishment of the CPDLprogram is to assist faculty members by providing goodcareer/employment information, a resource of ‘good prac-tices’ that have proven useful in other departments,suggestions on how to set up student internships andfoster closer ties with physics related industry, and de-velop other ways that physics departments could helpprepare students for a diversity of career options. “De-spite our good intentions, we sometimes can’t provide allof the information our students need,” complained onedepartment chair attending the workshop. The CPDLmodel varies greatly. It can range from a faculty memberwho makes career activities his or her passion after retire-ment, an active faculty member, or, in some cases, astudent-driven initiative. Regardless of which model isfollowed, there are two essential elements - continuityand commitment.

Experts in physics career issues presented statisticalinformation and featured innovative programs designedto assist students and faculty in planning and executingjob searches at the Workshop. Barrett Ripin started theWorkshop by describing the motivation and purpose of

APS Career and Professional Development LiaisonProgram Launched

the CPD Liaison Program as recommended by the APSTask Force on Careers and Professional Development andthe newly established APS Committee on Careers and Pro-fessional Development. Roman Czujko of AIP providedthe current statistics on employment among physics gradu-ates and was followed by Sherrie Preische of APS, whosummarized the findings of a recent e-mail survey of APSjunior members regarding their hopes and experienceswith the job market (see February 1998 APS News).

A panel discussion about models for internship programsfeatured Peter Wolff (MIT), Len Brillson (Ohio State, formerlyXerox Corp) and Mark Holtz (Texas Tech) describing pro-grams that provide students with an opportunity to workclosely with industry as part of their graduate experience.Speakers described the programs, discussed the mechanicsof establishing internships and answered questions fromthe audience. Peter Abbamonte (graduate student fromUIUC) provided a graduate student perspective with hisdescription of the student-initiated career programs at theUniversity of Illinois. Although not on the formal program,Carol Livermore and Philip Fisher, physics graduate studentsat Harvard University, offered additional suggestions on howstudents can take matters into their own hands. BrianSchwartz of Brooklyn College discussed offering course workon job preparedness. Schwarz also described a NSF-fundedprogram to develop courses that teach students about re-sume writing, interview preparedness and researching thejob market.

The difficulty faculty encounter in advising studentsabout career paths other than their own was highlightedby the last section of talks. Len Brillson offered his per-spective on the differences between academia and industrybased on his career at Xerox prior to becoming a facultymember at The Ohio State University. John Lowell ofApplied Materials, Inc. provided a similar perspective ashe discussed his perception of differences between in-

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Inside�NEWSMassey Adopts “Old Style” Approach toMorehouse Presidency ................................ 2

A typical day’s activities for physicist Walter Massey.

IN BRIEF ........................................................ 2CIFS petitions for Chinese scientists; Ohio Sec-tion holds spring meeting.

Proposed Amendments to APS Constitutionto Allow Electronic Balloting ...................... 3

A Century of Physics .................................... 31925-1934: The Language of the Atom

Contributions of 20th Century Women toPhysics ......................................................... 3

An on-line archive featuring contributions of20th Century women to physics.

Task Force for Prizes and Awards Report .. 5APS prizes and awards are highly regarded bythe scientific community.

By-law Revision for Thesis Awards ............. 5

Task Force on Academic Tenure Formed ... 7This task force will grapple with the active andsometimes acrimonious debate on the need forchange in the academic tenure system.

Some Simple Rules of Writing .................... 7Barbara Levi, Physics Today, tells of MissOttenberg’s rules, plus more.

Zero Gravity .................................................. 7How to Give a Better Talk

APS Career and Professional DevelopmentCommittee Receives Final Approval ........... 8

The former committee on Application in Phys-ics has a new name and a new mission.

FIAP Jobs Engine ........................................ 8FIAP has established an on-line job search engine.

Merzbacher Appointed as Consultant forAPS Centennial ............................................. 9

Four Corners Section Holds First Meeting .. 9The fledgling APS Four Corners Section held itsfirst annual meeting at the University of NewMexico, April 3-4.

APS Northwest Section is Established ....... 9The Northwest Section, the APS’ seventh section,includes members from Oregon, Washington,Idaho, Montana, Alaska and Western Canada.

MARCH APS MEETINGSQuantum Computing .................................... 4

DOE Priorities to Meet NewNational Goals .............................................. 4

Ernest Moniz, Deputy Under Secretary of DOE,speaks out.

“Spintronics” Hold Potential for FutureElectronic Devices ........................................ 4

Spin-dependent phenomena may be used forvery high performance electronics.

MEMS Could Pave the Way forAtomic-Scale Assembly ............................... 5

Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) couldprovide the key to manufacturing atomic scale,self-assembling devices.

OPINIONAPS Views ..................................................... 6

Andrew Sessler and Francis Slakey on makingscience a national priority.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR ........................... 6

Announcements ......................................... 11

The Back Page ................................. 12Frank Franz offers his perspective on how tofix academic tenure.

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APS News June 1998

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IN BRIEFAPS NewsCoden: ANWSEN ISSN: 1058-8132Series II, Vol. 7, No.6 June 1998© 1998 The American Physical Society

Editor: Barrett H. RipinNewswriter: Jennifer OuelletteProduction: Elizabeth Buchan-Higgins

Kim ParsonsAlicia Y. Chang

Coordinator: Amy Halsted

APS News (ISSN: 1058-8132) is published 11X yearly, monthly,except the August/September issue, by The American Physi-cal Society, One Physics Ellipse, College Park, MD 20740-3844, (301) 209-3200. It contains news of the Society and ofits Divisions, Topical Groups, Sections and Forums; advanceinformation on meetings of the Society; and reports to theSociety by its committees and task forces, as well as opinions.

Letters to the editor are welcomed from the membership.Letters must be signed and should include an address anddaytime telephone number. The APS reserves the right toselect and to edit for length or clarity. All correspondenceregarding APS News should be directed to: Editor, APS News,One Physics Ellipse, College Park, MD 20749-3844, E-mail:letters@aps.org.

Subscriptions: APS News is an on-membership publica-tion delivered by Periodical Mail. Members residing abroadmay receive airfreight delivery for a fee of $20. Nonmem-bers: Subscription rates are: domestic $160; Canada, Mexico,Central and South America, and Caribbean $180; Air FreightEurope, Asia, Africa and Oceania $210.

Subscription orders, renewals and address changesshould be addressed as follows: For APS Members—Membership Department, The American Physical Soci-ety, One Physics Ellipse, College Park, MD 20740-3844,membership@aps.org. For Nonmembers—Circulationand Fulfillment Division, American Institute of Physics,500 Sunnyside Blvd., Woodbury, NY 11797. Allow atleast 6 weeks advance notice. For address changes, pleasesend both the old and new addresses, and, if possible,include a mailing label from a recent issue. Requestsfrom subscribers for missing issues will be honored with-out charge only if received within 6 months of the issue’sactual date of publication.

Periodical Postage Paid at College Park, MD and at additionalmailing offices. Postmaster: Send address changes to APSNews, Membership Department, The American Physical Soci-ety, One Physics Ellipse, College Park, MD 20740-3844.

APS COUNCIL 1998

PresidentAndrew M. Sessler, Lawrence Berkeley LaboratoryPresident-ElectJerome Friedman, Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyVice-PresidentJames S. Langer, University of California, Santa BarbaraExecutive OfficerJudy R. Franz, University of Alabama, Huntsville (on leave)TreasurerThomas McIlrath, University of Maryland (on leave)Editor-in-ChiefMartin Blume, Brookhaven National LaboratoryPast-PresidentD. Allan Bromley, Yale University

General CouncillorsDaniel Auerbach, Beverly Berger, Virginia Brown, Jennifer Cohen,Charles Duke, S. James Gates, Donald Hamann, William Happer,Cynthia McIntyre, Helen Quinn, Roberto Peccei, Paul Peercy, SusanSeestrom, Virginia Trimble, Ronald Walsworth, Sau Lan Wu

Chair, Nominating CommitteeWick C. Haxton

Chair, Panel on Public AffairsRuth H. Howes

Division and Forum CouncillorsSteven Holt (Astrophysics), Eric Heller, Gordon Dunn (Atomic,Molecular and Optical), Robert Callender (Biological), StephenLeone (Chemical), Joe D. Thompson, David Aspnes, ArthurHebard, Zachary Fisk (Condensed Matter), Warren Pickett (Com-putational), Guenter Ahlers (Fluid Dynamics), James Wynne(Forum on Education), Gloria Lubkin (Forum on History ofPhysics), Matt Richter (Forum on Industrial & Applied Phys-ics), Myriam Sarachik (Forum on International Physics),Dietrich Schroeer (Forum on Physics and Society), AndrewLovinger (High Polymer), Daniel Grischkowsky (Laser Science),Howard Birnbaum (Materials), John Schiffer, John D. Walecka(Nuclear), Henry Frisch, George Trilling (Particles and Fields),Robert Siemann (Physics of Beams), Roy Gould, William Kruer(Plasma)

ADVISORS

Sectional RepresentativesTBA, New England; William Standish, New York; Perry P. Yaney,Ohio; Joseph Hamilton, Southeastern; Stephen Baker, Texas

Representatives from Other SocietiesThomas O’Kuma, AAPT; Marc Brodsky, AIP

Staff RepresentativesBarrett Ripin, Associate Executive Officer; Irving Lerch, Direc-tor of International Affairs; Robert L. Park, Director, PublicInformation; Michael Lubell, Director, Public Affairs; StanleyBrown, Administrative Editor; Reid Terwilliger, Director ofEditorial Office Services; Michael Stephens, Controller andAssistant Treasurer

APS Committee Sponsors PetitionThe APS Committee on International Freedom of Scientists (CIFS) hasjointly sponsored a petition on behalf of 18 physicists and other scientistsin the People’s Republic of China, who have been imprisoned or mysteri-ously “disappeared” because of their exercise of freedom of expression.Signature drives were held at both the March and April APS general meet-ings. Among the physicists listed were Zhu Xiangzhong, whose releasehas not been confirmed despite the expiration of his prison term, and LuYangua, a graduate student at Lanzhou University detained in 1992, whois believed to have been secretly tried and sentenced. Co-sponsors of thepetition include the AAAS Committee on Scientific Freedom and Respon-sibility, the New York Academy of Science’s Committee on the HumanRights of Scientists, and the Committee of Concerned Scientists. The peti-tion is also endorsed by the Academic Freedom Committee of HumanRights Watch.

Ohio Section holds its Annual Spring MeetingThe APS Ohio Section held its annual spring meeting, May 1-2, at BallState University in Muncie, Indiana, in conjunction with the Indiana andSouthern Ohio Sections of the American Association of Physics Teachers.The program featured five invited speakers. Leon Lederman, directoremeritus of Fermilab, addressed current issues in K-12 physics education.Philip Sadler of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, discussedseveral common misconceptions in physics. Mark Trodden of Case West-ern University summarized the status and future of particle cosmology.Speaking on the topic of the “Mars Direct” was Robert Zubrin, presidentand founder of Pioneer Astronautics, a space-exploration R&D firm. Fi-nally, Alfred Hubler of the University of Illinois described a special featureof his introductor physics courses called “CYBERPROF” — a Web-basedhomework grading system.

Upgrading campus computers,creating interdisciplinary courses,

and serving burgers and fries in thecafeteria to better interact with thestudent body are just some of a typicalday’s activities for physicist WalterMassey. A former APS vice president,Massey left a prestigious position atthe University of California Systemnearly three years ago to becomepresident of Morehouse College, thenation’s only historically black, liberalarts college for men, claiming hisdesire to return to his alma mater anda presidency that fosters relationshipswith students.

Massey’s interest in science dates backto his childhood in Hattiesburg, Missis-sippi. The young Massey was quite keenon mathematics in high school, and atthe age of 16, he enrolled in a Ford Foun-dation program for early admission ofqualified young black men to Morehouse.There, he was introduced to the world ofscience by one of his early professors andmentors, Henry McBay, a nationally rec-ognized figure within the black scientificcommunity who taught a required intro-ductory chemistry course. But it was hisfirst physics instructor, S.H. Christensen,who influenced his decision to make phys-ics his career. “It was cleaner, with nomessy labs or chemicals, and there was astronger mathematics component,” saysMassey of his choice of profession.

Massey earned a bachelor’s degree inboth physics and mathematics in 1958.That same year, his mother, Essie, an el-ementary school teacher whom he creditswith teaching him the value of educa-tion, also earned a bachelor’s degree ineducation, from Jackson State University.Massey says he was intrigued by physicsbecause it combined mathematical prob-lem-solving with understanding thephysical world. He pursued graduate stud-

Massey Adopts “Old Style” Approach to Morehouse Presidencyies at Washington University in St. Louis,Missouri, completing his Ph.D. in physicsin 1966, specializing in analyzing the prop-erties of quantum solids and liquids atvery low temperatures.

Eventually he landed at Brown Uni-versity as professor of physics and deanof the undergraduate college, a periodhe describes as one of the happiest ofhis career, largely because of the sub-stantial contact he had with bothstudents and faculty. Prestigious posi-tions as director of Argonne NationalLaboratory, vice president of research atthe University of Chicago, director of theNational Science Foundation, and vicepresident of the University of Californiafollowed, and while Massey continued toexcel, he missed the close interactionswith students and faculty. This was amajor factor in his decision to leave theUniversity of California and assume thepresidency of Morehouse, his almamater, in 1995. “Part of returning wasto make a statement that Morehouseand schools like this are able to attractpeople from major universities,” hesays. “It was not an easy decision, butit was the right one. Now that I’m back,I know that.”

Massey takes his commitments to thestudent body and faculty seriously. Heset up an elected Faculty Council toallow faculty members to take part inpolicy decisions. He holds regular meet-ings with the Student GovernmentAssociation officers and has begun aseries of “Presidential Chats,” in whichcommunity and business leaders takepart in informal talks with students. Healso teaches from time to time, draw-ing on his national administrativeexperience to lead a seminar last yearon science and technology policy. Toencourage more interaction betweenstudents and faculty, he tore down the

cafeteria wall separating the two din-ing areas. Nor is Massey above servingburgers, fries and pasta in the cafeteriahimself.

In keeping with the Morehouse tradi-tion of cultivating future world leaders,Massey is raising money to establish aLeadership Center, which will offer semi-nars and classes on leadership, and willbe accessible to students attending thefive other members of the Atlanta Uni-versity Center, a consortium of historicallyblack colleges. And, in addition to bulk-ing up programs in African-American andinternational studies, he and the provost,John Hopps, a physicist and his collegeroommate, have established interdiscipli-nary programs in neuroscience andmaterials science through partnershipswith other colleges and universities,among them Georgia Tech, Princeton, andBrown University.

Massey has also been instrumentalin preparing the institution for the 21stcentury. The college is completing a$4.5 million investment in technology,installing fiber optic cable networkscampus-wide so that even the dormsare now wired for computers. A stan-dardized computer base has beencreated, with major hardware and soft-ware upgrades for the institution’sadministrative computer systems forsuch functions as registration and finan-cial aid. A new Office of InformationTechnology was established to managethe computer operations and to set uptraining courses for students, faculty andstaff. And the new Office of EducationalTechnology works with faculty on waysto incorporate computer technologyinto their courses for instructional pur-poses.

Massey’s broad background has cer-tainly given him some advantages inmeeting the challenges of his new po-sition. “I’ve had the opportunity tolearn a great deal, not just about ad-ministration, but about many of theissues affecting higher education, andI’ve seen them from a number of per-

spectives, whichcertainly helpsme deal withthose issueshere,” he says. Anissue of particularconcern to Masseythese days is thepossible diminish-ment or dis-mantling of affirmative action policiesat many state schools.

For example, California recentlypassed Proposition 209, which elimi-nated all affirmative action in the state,and the U.C. System’s Board of Regentsvoted to discontinue all forms of pref-erential treatment — two measures thatMassey believes will make it difficult tomaintain diversity in the U.C. system.His suspicions have been borne outby the fact that minority enrollments atthe University of California have sig-nificantly decreased following thepassage of Proposition 209.

“I think this starts from a wrong as-sumption that being admitted to collegeis a reward for achieving high gradesand high test scores,” says Massey ofthe decision, which he vigorously op-posed. “But we used all kinds ofdifferent criteria for admitting studentsto U.C. And when we looked at theevidence, there was no great disparitybetween what the minority students didin terms of careers and graduate schoolwhen they left the U.C. system and whatthe white students did.” In fact, hepoints out that under the new rulesmany black and Hispanic students withexcellent GPAs and high test scoreswere nevertheless denied admission,despite their achievements. In the shortterm, of course, colleges likeMorehouse are benefiting as studentsdenied admission to public-college cam-puses in California and Texas seek moreappealing alternatives. In fact, Califor-nia is Morehouse’s second-largestfeeder state, following its home stateof Georgia.

MEMBER IN THE Spotlight

June 1998 APS News

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A Century of PhysicsA Century of Physics

1925-1934: The Language of the Atomby Hans Christian von Baeyer

The Roaring Twenties were a boisterous era of prosperity, fast cars, jazz, popular radio, and illegal drinking. Before they ended in 1929with the crash of the stock market that triggered the Great Depression, thetwenties produced such human and technological accomplishments asthe invention of television and the jet engine, andthe first transatlantic solo flight by CharlesLindbergh in 1927. Out of range of public clamor,this exhilarating atmosphere also produced whatmight be called the greatest achievement in thehistory of physics: the development of quantummechanics. Frustrated by the inconsistencies of thepatchwork quantum theory pioneered by Einsteinand Bohr, the 23 year old German physicist WernerHeisenberg (right) set out to start from scratch. Inthe summer of 1925 he decided that atoms shouldbe described without assuming anything aboutimmeasurable quantities such as the positions and speeds of electronsinside atoms. Instead, he arranged the measurable quantities, such asthe discrete frequencies of light emitted by the atom, in arrays of numbersnot unlike spreadsheets. By manipulating these spreadsheets, whichmathematicians call matrices, Heisenberg was able to recover the successesof the older quantum theory, without encountering its contradictions.

Heisenberg�s matrices give the right answers, but convey no visualimage of the interior of the atom. In the winter of 1925-26 the Austrianphysicist Erwin Schrödinger succeeded in finding a more intuitivelyappealing description. In this approach, de Broglie�s waves are solutionsof an equation which came to be called the Schrödinger equation. Discretecolors of light emitted by glowing matter are due to the fact that electronwaves confined in an atom have specific frequencies, just as sound wavesinside a flute can only resonate with discrete frequencies.

The culmination of the story of the birth of the new theory came withSchrödinger�s amazing proof, in March 1926, that his and Heisenberg�sformulations, which appeared so different, are actually mathematicallyequivalent. Henceforth quantum mechanics, in either guise, replacedNewtonian mechanics as the correct description of atomic particles. Itincorporates wave/particle duality and substitutes probability for certaintyin dealing with the building blocks of matter. It broke with classical physicseven more radically than Special and General Relativity � but for threequarters of a century it has passed all experimental tests.

Editor’s Note: A CENTURY OF PHYSICS, a dramatic illustrated timeline wallchartof over a hundred entries on eleven large posters is intended for high schools andcolleges. Each poster covers about a decade and is introduced by a thumbnail essay toprovide a glimpse of the historical and scientific context of the time.

In July, APS News will feature the fifth introductory essay:1935-1945: Physics in WWII.

In commemoration of the APS Centennial, Nina Byers, working with the APSCommittee on the Status of Women in Physics, has established an on-line archivefeaturing the many contributions of 20th Century women to physics. It has beenfunded by the APS, UCLA, NIST, a private philanthropist and a grant from theAlfred P. Sloan Foundation. The site currently contains approximately 50 cita-tions, many of which are hyperlinked into other databases, including EncyclopediaBrittanica Online, which has incorporated archive pages for more than a dozenfamous physicists, including Marie Curie, Irene Joliet Curie, Lise Meitner, Chien-Shiung Wu, Jocelyn Bell Burnell, Dorothy Hodgkin, Kathleen Lonsdale, and MariaGoeppert Mayer. The site has proven popular: between October 29, 1997 andNovember 6, 1997, close to 1000 visitors logged into the archive from all overthe world, and the number continues to rise steadily, according to Byers (Univer-sity of California, Los Angeles). The content and direction of the archive isadministered by an archive steering committee.

Along with the citations, the archive staff has also compiled a collection ofprimary materials unavailable to most researchers, providing insight into thelives and careers of selected women physicists, as well as key data unavailablein conventional reference books. Also in development are a series of historicalessays, the first set focusing on the gender discrimination encountered by womenin Germany between 1890 and 1940. Subsequent essays will seek to place suchissues into proper historical context, detailing German industrialization, the riseof Nazism, and the development of nuclear physics, among other events.

In terms of eventual disposition, Byers reports that the UCLA Library hasindicated interest in acquiring the archive in both digital form and as archivaldocuments as part of its permanent collection, ensuring continued access to theinformation via the World Wide Web. Thus, a visitor to the archive will haveaccess not only to the information stored therein, but to related materials in theentire University of California library system. �It is advantageous because theUCLA library staff is first rate, their standards are very high, and because theirparticipation in our work toward completion will greatly improve the quality ofthe archive,� said Byers. Already under discussion are plans to design andconstruct an object-oriented database for the organization of the archive, greatlyimproving its search and retrieval capabilities.

Contributions of 20th Century Women to Physics

Werner Heisenberg

Members to Vote on ProposedAmendments to APS Constitution toAllow Electronic Balloting

At its April meeting, the APS Council approved several amendments to theConstitution, which will appear on the election ballot this summer for APSmembers to vote on their adoption. The amendments are presented here tothe membership, and comments are invited. These should be sent by e-mail(halsted@aps.org), regular mail, or fax (301-209-0865) to Amy Halsted at APSHeadquarters. Please respond by September 4. The amendments under con-sideration are necessary to permit electronic ballots in future membership-wideelections and for proposed Constitutional amendments. The rationale for elec-tronic balloting is increased voter participation, lower expenses, and gentlerenvironmental impact because paper ballots would not need to be mailed toevery member. Confidentiality and accuracy of electronic ballots would beassured. For the forseeable future, members preferring to vote on a paperballot would retain that option. The entire Constitution can be viewed on theAPS Home Page or in the latest issue of the APS Directory. New text appearsin bold italics; text to be deleted appears in strikeout.

ARTICLE VI - EXECUTIVE BOARD AND COMMITTEES

2. Nominating Committee. - …The Chairperson-Elect shall be electedannually by ballots cast electronically or by mail mail ballots as describedin Article VII.5…

ARTICLE VII - ELECTION AND TENURE OF COUNCILLORS,OFFICERS, AND ELECTED COMMITTEE MEMBERS

2. Ballot. - The Vice-President, Chairperson-Elect of the NominatingCommittee, and Councillors shall be elected by ballots cast electronicallyor by mail mail ballots as hereinafter provided.

5. Election Mail Ballot. - The election ballot shall contain the names of at leasttwo candidates for each vacancy to be filled, clearly separated according to category:ViceÿPresident, ChairÿElect of the Nominating Committee, and General Councillors.Copies of the election ballot shall be mailed provided to all members of the Societyby mail or electronically at least five weeks prior to the Elections Meeting of Coun-cil. No ballot shall be counted unless unambiguously filled out marked by a qualifiedvoter, cast electronically or sent in a sealed envelope bearing the voter’s name, andreceived at a specified location address not later than the specified deadline date…

ARTICLE XIII - AMENDMENTS

No part of the Constitution shall be amended or annulled except by a vote of themembership by ballots cast electronically or by mail ballot…The text of the pro-posed amendment shall be published in a publication of the Society before ballotsare distributed mailed…The Executive Officer shall distribute the ballot and a copyof the proposed amendments to all members of the Society and shall specify alocation an address to which the ballots are to be sent and a deadline date not lessthan five weeks later than the date of the distribution of the ballot. No ballot shall becounted unless unambiguously filled out marked by a qualified voter, cast elec-tronically or sent in a sealed envelope bearing the voter’s name, and received at aspecified location address not later than the specified deadline date…

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in such flows is directly analogous to the density of vortices, the whirlpool-likeeddies that can exist in a fluid. This approach has enabled them to study phe-nomena such as the formation of “vortex crystals,” repeating patterns of vorticesthat can stay frozen in place in the fluid.

Eberhardt Bodenschatz of Cornell University reported on another new methodthat enables physicists to track in detail for the first time the accelerations of aparticle moving through flows with atmospheric-level turbulence. He describedhow a light-sensitive diode measured the movements of a particle jiggling througha fluid at up to 200 times the acceleration of gravity. For a preview of upcomingexperiments, the group has installed a “silicon-strip detector” used in high-en-ergy physics to make up to 100,000 measurements per second of multiple particlesin the fluid, the better to study how particles that are initially close together moveapart in a very turbulent flow such as a volcanic eruption.

Weird Behavior in Quantum Dots. Interesting things happen when par-ticles are confined in a tiny box. Researchers at MIT, led by Raymond Ashoori,make themselves such a box, a quantum dot, out of semiconductors: a layer ofgallium arsenide between layers of aluminum gallium arsenide. On top of thissandwich sits a metal gate electrode which feeds electrons into the dot andcontrols the arrival or departure of electrons one at a time. Building up from justone electron, the MIT physicists collect a puddle of electrons and observe howthe arrival of each newcomer must overcome (with the help of an increasingvoltage) the mutual repulsion (“Coulomb blockade”) of those already in place.

For small dots (0.2 microns across) a graph of charge-vs-voltage would looklike a staircase. Such an effect is at the heart of single-electron transistors (SET),which act as sensitive detectors of electrical charge (just as superconductingquantum interference devices — SQUIDS — are sensitive detectors of magneticflux). For larger dots (1 micron across) the MIT scientists were astonished toobserve an unexpected and mysterious pairing: for each stepwise voltage in-crease not one but two electrons were able to join the puddle. The pairing hasnot yet been explained but might have something to do with the electrons’spins. For medium-sized dots (0.5 microns) the physics gets even weirder: thepairing occurs only for every fourth or fifth electron. The goal now is to under-stand how small puddles coalesce into larger puddles and how the pairing comesabout.

Magnetic Refrigeration. In a new type of refrigerator, physicists haveexploited the fact that the rare earth element gadolinium (Gd) has a large“magnetocaloric effect”: applying a magnetic field to a chunk of gadolinium

1998 March Meeting Highlights (continued from page 1)

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Scientists at the Naval ResearchLaboratory are researching

characteristics of several spin-dependentphenomena in the hope of eventuallyexploiting such effects to develop newtypes of devices and circuits for very high-performance electronics and sensors(“spintronics”). The technology project issponsored by the U.S. Defense AdvancedResearch Projects Agency (DARPA). Onenear-term goal is the development of atotally nonvolatile, very high-density, high-speed, low-power, low-cost memorydevice that has the potential forsignificantly exceeding the performanceof traditional semiconductor-basedmemories, and may represent one of themajor technologies for the 21st century.

“Ultimately spintronics may provide thetechnology for much more than memo-ries and sensors and may become asubiquitous as semiconductor electronicsin the next century,” said NRL’s Stuart Wolf,who spoke at the APS March Meeting in

Los Angeles. Wolf described two such ef-fects: giant magnetoresistance (GMR), inwhich the electrical resistance that elec-trons experience in a multilayered materialcan be substantially changed by the mag-netic field within the material, andspin-dependent tunneling, in which anelectron can move through a normallyimpenetrable barrier if it has the right spinvalue.

The movement of an electron in a cir-cuit can also be manipulated by propertiesother than its charge. One example is spin,which according to Wolf, the simplestdevice using spin-dependent effects is asandwich with two magnetic layers sur-rounding a nonmagnetic metal orinsulator. If the two magnetic layers aredifferent, then the magnetization direc-tion of one can be rotated with respectto the other and this leads to the utiliza-tion of these structures as sensor elements(for example for read head sensors) andfor memory elements that may ultimately

rival the semiconductor memories thatnow dominate commercial computers. Re-cently, IBM introduced GMR sensors intothe read head of the newest generationof its hard disk products.

IBM, Motorola and Honeywell all haveresearch teams attempting to develop arobust technology to use these devicesto produce very high density memoryproducts — comparable to dynamic ran-dom access memory — at speedsapproaching those obtainable in static ran-dom access memory (SRAM), with fewermasking steps and lower power.Honeywell has already demonstrated afully functional 16-kbit GMR memory, builtwith underlying electronics that can with-stand the high radiation environment ofsatellites required, and Wolf hopes thetechnology will be in place for Gbit memo-ries early in the 21st century. IBMestimates that their devices will scale todensities greater than 50 Gbit.

Wolf also described spin injection de-

vices, in which the spin of an electroncan modify the properties of a materialinto which it is injected. The “spin transis-tor” invented in the early 1990s is such adevice. The desired spins are injected intoa normal metal by passing a current fromthe magnetic metal to the normal metal.The spin-injected current induces a localimbalance in the spin-up/spin-down ra-tio, which can be detected by a nearbymagnetic film.

If the detector film is magnetized inthe same direction as the injector, the im-balance can relax by current flowing fromthe normal material into the collector.However, if the films are magnetized anti-aligned, the relaxation of the imbalanceoccurs by a current flowing from the col-lector into the normal metal. Thus thedirection of the current (and subsequentvoltage) depends on the direction thatthe detector is magnetized relative to theinjector. This “bi-polar” device can bemade into memory and logic devices.

“Spintronics” Hold Potential for Future Electronic Devices

Quantum computers are hypotheticalmachines that would exploit the

superposition principle of quantummechanics to perform an immensenumber of calculations in parallel. Certaincalculations in particular, such asfactorization of a very large number,could be done much faster on a quantumcomputer than on a conventional classicalcomputer. At the APS March Meeting,several physicists discussed the latestefforts towards building a practicalquantum computer, a device that usesquantum particles (such as ions orphotons) to represent the 0s and 1s (thebinary digits, or “bits”) employed incomputations. Unlike ordinary bits,quantum bits (or “qubits”) can represent0 and 1 simultaneously.

According to Richard Hughes of LosAlamos National Laboratory, the quan-tum mechanical concepts on which thetechnology is based were first applied tocomputation by Paul Benioff, RichardFeynman, and others in the early 1980’s.

The idea was based on the observationthat ordinary, classical, computers followdefinite histories in the course of any com-putation. If one could have a quantummechanical machine capable of follow-ing many histories at the same time, andassociate a different computation witheach history, one would have a way ofdoing many calculations in parallel. Thenext major development came in 1994when concrete quantum algorithms werefound for solving such interesting prob-lems as factorization. This transformed thesubject from a curiosity to one with po-tential for real applications.

Many schemes have since been pro-posed for building a real quantumcomputer. Although primitive devices havealready been built, a likely scheme for anadvanced design would be to trap a stringof ions with electromagnetic fields and thenuse laser beams to manipulate the ions’quantum states and carry out calculations,according to Peter Zoller of the Universityof Innsbruck, a theorist who co-authored

this proposal in 1995. Depending on thecomputation to be performed, a precisesequence of laser pulses is applied to theions, which are excited and de-excited inan intricate dance that can only be de-scribed in terms of coexisting histories.

Some experimental progress has beenmade towards realizing this scheme. Hav-ing cooled and trapped a string of 5 ions,Hughes and several LANL colleagues havedemonstrated that they can point a laserbeam at an ion without disturbing its neigh-bors (the closest of which are 20 micronsaway). Jeff Kimble of Caltech has beenexperimenting with an alternate approachin which the qubits are photons trappedbetween a pair of mirrors.

However, the performance of any realquantum machine will be limited bydecoherence, which is a by-product ofthe same superposition principle that leadsto the possibility of quantum computa-tion in the first place. A classical computercan be halted and inspected in the midstof a computation. A quantum computa-

Quantum Computing Holds Promise of Parallel Calculationstion, by contrast, must be allowed to pro-ceed to completion before any read outis performed. The problem is that it isnear impossible to prevent accidentalread-out.

Decoherence in the ion trap computerarises from two sources: spontaneous emis-sion of radiation, and vibrations of the ions.The estimated theoretical decoherence ina proposed machine based on arrays ofions driven by precise sequences of laserpulses is surprisingly quite low, and of dif-ferent origin depending on the size of thecomputer. Small-sized computers will mostlikely be limited by spontaneous emissionin which the ions radiate light randomlyinto the surroundings, while larger com-puters suffer more from vibrations of theions, which produce tiny electric fields thatdisrupt each others dynamical behavior.

“Although present-day technical diffi-culties in building quantum computers areenormously daunting, we know of no fun-damental principle of physics standing inthe way,” Zoller concluded.

The nation’s currenteconomic prosperity is

leading to an emergingbipartisan consensus in favor ofinvesting in scientific researchand development, according toErnest Moniz, Deputy UnderSecretary of the U.S.Department of Energy (DOE).Moniz gave an unscheduledpresentation at the APS MarchMeeting detailing the agency’s new role inmeeting the myriad of economic, scientificand technological challenges currently facingthe nation.

Moniz identified four primary nationalgoals that underlie federal support for scien-tific research and education: prosperity, health,national security, and environmental steward-ship. While security and health concernsfueled much of federal investment in sci-ence and technology during the post-WorldWar II period, emphasis has shifted todayto maintaining economic prosperity and pre-serving the environment. Security concernsremain, but the prevailing issue today ishow to control the existing stockpile ofnuclear weapons and materials, through suchinitiatives as the Comprehensive Test BanTreaty. “The paradigm is entirely different,”said Moniz of the DOE’s role in this newenvironment. “We are now in a regime wherethe focus is on supporting a safe, reliable and

DOE Adjusts Mission Priorities to Meet New National Goalsshrinking stockpile through theconstruction of a new set of sci-ence facilities to achieve a newkind of scientific understanding.”

The DOE is also involvedin activities supporting thehealth sector, where there is agrowing intersection betweenthe physical and life sciences.Moniz cited the DOE’s in-volvement in the Human

Genome Project and its support of micro-bial genomics research as evidence of theagency’s leadership in this area. And en-ergy-related R&D is a strong focus for bothenvironmental and economic initiatives.

Regarding national prosperity, Monizconsiders sustaining innovation as critical,particularly as the private sector restructuresand lowers its investment in R&D. “Thequestion is, what is the government’s rolein helping sustain innovation?” he said,maintaining that a healthy business envi-ronment, while important for stimulatinginnovation in the private sector, is equallyimportant for stimulating government in-vestment in science and technology. “TheAdministration’s posture, it is fair to say,is that this is the time to invest,” saidMoniz. “We have had several years ofeconomic growth, we’ve reached a bal-anced budget, and our economy iscurrently out-performing the rest of the

world. This is not a time to relax, but torefocus on investments for the future.”

As evidence of the Administration’s in-terest, Moniz cited such presidentialinvestment initiatives as the Environmen-tal Research Fund, the TransportationFund for America, and especially the $31billion Research Fund for America, an ini-tiative which proposes an 8% increase ininvestment spending from 1998 to 1999.The nearly $1.5 billion proposed increasein R&D spending includes $338 millionfor energy technology R&D, especially re-lated to climate change; $420 million fordefense programs largely tied to scien-tific instrumentation programs connectedwith stockpile stewardship; and nearly$250 million in scientific energy research,roughly half of which is allocated for nextyear’s proposed construction of the mega-watt Neutron Spallation Source at OakRidge National Laboratory.

“The DOE has a unique responsibilityfor building and operating large sciencefacilities, which serve many thousands ofuniversity and industrial scientists,” saidMoniz, citing technology and resource part-nership programs as other DOE activitiesbenefitting academia and industry. In termsof future facilities, 1999 will witness thecompletion of the Relativistic Heavy IonCollider at Brookhaven, as well as the So-lar Neutrino Observatory in Ontario and

the beginning of the Princeton’s National(Spherical Jorus) Experiment (NSTE).

In the field of particle physics, the B-factory at SLAC will become operationalwithin the next couple of years, enablingstudies of B meson decay change, CP vio-lation and particle asymmetry. At the sametime, Fermilab will complete its Main In-jector, increasing luminosities sufficiently tostudy the top quark regime in great detail,possibly leading to the discovery of theHiggs boson. It will remain the premierhigh energy physics facility for the nextseveral years until the middle of the nextdecade with the completion of the LargeHadron Collider at CERN, representing aten-year DOE investment of $450 million.This, said Moniz, “will hopefully establishthe beginning of what will prove to be asustained international collaborative efforton large facilities.”

Moniz concluded his presentation byreiterating his enthusiasm about the cur-rent scientific capabilities and opportunities,saying he was “encouraged” by the emerg-ing bipartisan consensus in Congress oninvestment in science and technology.However, he stressed that the federal bud-get environment remains difficult and thescientific community must continue to beinvolved in these discussions on the Hill.“Now is the time to invest and build upour scientific infrastructure,” he said.

Ernest Moniz

June 1998 APS News

5

APS prizes and awards are highlyregarded by the sc ient i f ic

community and represent a widerange of disciplines, according to areport of the Task Force on APSPrizes and Awards delivered to theAPS Executive Board in February.The report also states that there isa good match between the set ofawards and the needs of the physicscommunity. Nonetheless, the reportalso recommended steps intendedto broaden the criteria for suchhonors to encourage morenominations, and suggested thatnew proposals for pr izes andawards should be accepted only ifthey wi l l benef i t the overal lport fol io wi thout over lappingexisting prizes and awards.

Chaired by Mildred Dresselhausof the Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology, the task force wascharged with three major tasks: as-sessing the various prizes andawards to determine whether allsectors of the physics communitywere represented; providing adviceto the APS Executive Board onwhether to accept funding for ad-di t ional pr izes and awards, i foffered; and considering whetherexist ing cri teria for prizes andawards should be broadened toencourage more nominations. Nu-merous other topics were alsoconsidered during the group’s de-l iberat ions, including theestablishment of minimum mon-etary amounts, policy on multiplerecipients, and under which condi-tions an individual may receivemore than one prize or award.

The task force suggested numer-ous criteria for consideration ofproposals for any new prizes orawards. These include whethersuch honor covers a major field ofinterest, whether a prize already ex-is ts for this area, whether theproposal includes provisions fortravel and expenses for recipients

Task Force for Prizes and Awards Issues Reportto attend the meeting at which theprize or award is presented, andwhether it provides for a generalreview after a specific period of timeto determine the continued rel-evance of the subject area andaward.

With regard to broadening thecriteria to encourage more nomina-tions, the task force encouragedequal access to all prizes and awardsin its report, without limitations onnationality or geographical location,or even APS membership. In fact, itwas felt that the APS should requireunits with an interest in the disci-pline associated with the honor toreview the suitability of its descrip-t ion to el iminate unnecessaryrestrictions. The review should becompleted and submitted in writtenformat within the next two years,according to the task force recom-mendations. To further encouragebreadth, se lect ion commit teesshould discuss pre-eminent candi-dates for poss ible futurenomination after selecting the cur-rent year’s recipient. These potentialcandidates include foreign, minor-ity and women candidates, as wellas those previously nominatedwhose nomination has expired.

The task force made severalother recommendations upon con-s ider ing anci l lary topics . Forexample, it was recommended thatindividual APS units be responsiblefor oversight of thesis awards, us-ing the present model employed bythe Division of Atomic, Molecularand Optical Physics to select awardrecipients.

In addition, the task force recom-mended that all stipends for majorprizes — currently ranging from$5000 to $10,000 — should beraised to $10,000 within the nextfive years. This recommendation iscurrently under review by the APS.

With regard to multiple recipi-ents, single recipients should still be

encouraged, unless sufficient justi-fication is submitted to the APSExecutive Board for awarding anhonor to multiple individuals. Tothis end, selection committees arestrongly encouraged to recognizeonly prime contributors to largeteam collaborative works, especiallythose involving more than one in-stitution. “Only those who havemade unique, original and indis-pensable contributions should benamed as prize or award recipients,”the task force concluded in its re-port. Furthermore, one individualshould not receive more than onemajor APS prize for the same work,although a past award recipientwould not be ineligible for subse-quent recognition for a major prizeif it is demonstrated that the workhas been extended significantly.

Finally, funds associated witheach prize and award should beavailable to cover travel expensesfor recipients to attend the meetingat which they will be honored. Manyprizes and awards already followthis procedure, but henceforth the

task force recommended that thoseawards which do not specifically in-clude such a pol icy should bestructured to do so, unless otherarrangements are stipulated. How-ever, uni ts may choose to payrecipient travel expenses directlyrather than charging the prize oraward fund. The task force reportconcluded with recommendationsthat the APS continue its practice ofnot charging overhead for adminis-tration of the prize and awardsprogram; and that a standing over-sight committee is not necessary tooversee this program, although atask force should be appointed ev-ery five years to review policyissues.

The other members of the APSTask Force on Prizes and Awards areRonald Davidson, Princeton Univer-sity; Katharine Gebbie, NationalInstitute of Standards and Technol-ogy; Wick Haxton, University ofWashington; Rolf Landauer, IBM/T.J.Watson Research laboratory; JohnRowell, John Rowell, Inc.; and FrankSciulli, Columbia University.

MEMS Could Pave the Way for Atomic-Scale Assembly

Microelectromechanical systems(MEMS) could provide the key

to manufacturing atomic-scale, self-assembling devices of the sortpresently observed only in nature’scomplex living organisms. Often builtwith the same materials andlithographic techniques used inmaking integrated circuits, micron-sized MEMS motors, pumps,resonators, actuators, and sensorshave been developed in the lab butnot yet much deployed in marketabledevices.

However, this may be changingsoon. Michael Roukes of Caltech leadsan effort focused on creating and ex-ploring the properties of simplenano-electromechanical devices(NEMS), which have already provenuseful in improving MRI sensitivity andwireless communications. The latterwill most likely be crucial to futurespace exploration. At the APS MarchMeeting in Los Angeles, he specificallydescribed the effort to coax small sus-pended columns of silicon intovibrations at GHz frequencies, mak-ing them into possible radio wavetransmitters.

Using lithography and etchingtechniques, he has fabricated a10x10x100-nm suspended beam of

silicon which oscillates at an estimatedfrequency of 7 GHz (although no de-tector can yet “hear” the vibrations).Such a resonator will eventually beused in microwave signal processing(for modulating or filtering signals).The speed and stability of nanoscopicsilicon arms might even facilitate theadvent of some new kind of Babbage-type computer in which mechanicallevers once again serve as processingor memory elements. Silicon struc-tures in this size regime will also beused as cantilever probes in magneticresonance force microscopy — thegoal being atomic-resolution NMR im-aging — and as calorimeters for thestudy of quantized heat pulses.

Roukes’ colleague, Andrew Cleland(University of California, Santa Bar-bara), described a paddle-shapedsilicon structure (whose smallest lat-eral feature was 200 nm) for detectingvery small amounts of electricalcharge, with a potential application inhigh-sensitivity photodetection. At thesame session, Rex Beck of Harvardreported a NEMS force sensor whichintegrates a field effect transistor intoa scanned probe microscope. Thepresent sensitivities are about 10 ang-stroms for displacement and 5pico-Newtons for force, but Beck ex-

pects improvements as the size of thedevice shrinks. The smallest transis-tor-probe structure Beck reportedhad dimensions of 3x2 microns x 140nm. Stanford’s Thomas Kenny re-ported on the use of slendercantilevers in atomic force micro-scopes to measure forces at theattonewton (10-18 newton) level.

MEMs may be a key enabling tech-nology for NASA to explore the solarsystem with ultra-miniaturized, robust,softball-sized spacecraft, one of themost promising application areas. JPLscientist William Tang described theintegration of microgyroscopes,microseismometers, quadrulpole massspectrometers, micropropulsion en-gines and other sub-pint-sizedgadgets on future space missions.When successful, these devices willserve as models for developing com-ponents and systems for spacecraftin the new millenium. “Space explo-ration in the coming century willemphasize cost-effectiveness andhighly focused mission objectives,”said Tang, who believes this new ap-proach should result in frequentmultiple missions, which will be faster,better, smaller and cheaper. “The aimis to broaden the scope of space sci-ence and to validate new technologies

on a timely basis.”Dennis Polla (University of Minne-

sota) has deposited ferroelectric thinfilms on silicon-based MEMs to makesensors and actuators with a broadrange of applications. These includeacoustic emission sensing in inte-grated diagnostics; measurement ofacceleration; biochemical sensing us-ing molecular recognitionmicrocantilevers; miniature steppermotors for precision positioning; andsurgical and scientific micro-instru-ments. Chih-Ming Ho (University ofCalifornia, Los Angeles), reported onrecent studies of microscale fluidflows, in which the surface forcedominates the force field, although,said Ho, other experiments indicatethat the viscous force alone cannotaccount for the observed results.

Ultimately, MEMs research and theensuing devices are expected to pro-vide possible foundations ofnanotechnology and the so called“Holy Grail” of atomic-scale assembly.“When we get there, nanotechnologywill provide techniques for the massproduction of tiny functional ma-chines assembled, atom-by-atom, withperfect precision,” said Rourkes. “Butright now, Mother Nature is really theonly true nanotechnologist.

Council Proposes Bylaw Revision forThesis Awards

In accordance with a recommendation from the 1998 Task Force on Prizes andAwards, Council has approved a revision to the APS Bylaws regarding the thesis awardsbestowed by several APS Divisions. The Bylaws state at present that prize and awardrecipients shall be approved by the Executive Board but Council voted to allow units topresent thesis awards without this approval. The rationale for the revision is that somedivisions understandably wish to select winners and present these awards at their an-nual meetings, immediately following competitive presentations from the candidates.The revision appears below in bold italics. Comments are invited from the member-ship. These should be sent by e-mail (halsted@aps.org), regular mail, or fax (301)209-0865 to Amy Halsted at APS Headquarters. Please respond by September 4.

ARTICLE IV - PRIZES AND AWARDS

2. Approvals.-The Council shall approve the criteria for all Prizes and Awardsawarded by the Society. Individual recipients of Prizes and Awards shall be approvedby the Executive Board, with the exception of any dissertation awards bestowedby Divisions or Topical Groups.

APS News June 1998

6

LETTERSPhysics is Not Always a Benefit to Mankind

Considering that we physicists pride ourselves for being precise, I wassurprised to read the amendment to the APS charter in Charles Schwartz’sletter. Surprised because the new wording is obviously false. “Understandingof the nature of the physical universe”, and knowledge in general, has his-torically not always been used as a “benefit to all humanity”. A belief otherwiseis simply naive. The power of knowledge, and the responsibility that comeswith it, has been a central theme in many of our culture’s stories, from theGarden of Eden to Frankenstein. Nevertheless, I am not an advocate of “ig-norance is bliss” and still believe in the “advancement and diffusion of theknowledge of physics”.Dan Durkin, Graduate StudentUC Berkeley

❖I support Charles Schwartz (APS News, April 1998, page 4) that the Ameri-

can Physical Society should abstain from having explicit faith-like andfuturological statements in key policy documents. Such claims not only ri-diculous as such but mislead general public about the inherent constrains ofour profession.Alexander A. BerezinMcMaster University, Hamilton, Canada

❖

Comment on: Why God Never Received a PhDWhat is the rationale or the justification of the material under the rubic of

Zero Gravity in the April 1998 issue of APS News ? The title indicates a jest;but to some members it is not appropriate to refer to the Creator and sustainerof the universe in this offensive manner. I have been personally acquaintedwith God through His Son for well over three quarters of a century. He is thesource of everything good in my life, and I owe Him total allegiance. There-fore I protest strongly this libel against Him. Its author expresses opinionsbeyond his professional competence.Edson R. Peck, Emeritus Professor of PhysicsUniversity of Idaho

❖

Fact or “Netmyth”?I think the netmyth stories are generally delightful. I don’t believe them,

but they are great stories. Here’s one for you that I think is actually quiteold.

A group of 4 soldiers had dismantled a chimney on top of a two storybuilding. The bricks were piled onto a 4 foot square board attached to a slingwith a rope that went over a pulley extending from the roof. One man wentdown and held onto the rope while the other three pushed the load ofbricks off the roof. Since the bricks weighed about 800 pounds, the 150pound man at the bottom was pulled up when he refused to let go of therope. He was bashed by the board on his way up (the bricks way down) andended up crashing into the pulley on the roof. When the bricks hit theground they scattered, leaving the 150 pound soldier supported, or not sup-ported, by a 30 pound board at the ground. So, he came down and theboard went up, naturally bashing him again on the way. When the soldier hitthe ground he let go of the rope and, of course, the board came back downand hit him on the head.

Probably not a true story, but who cares? It’s a good tale.Jon OrloffUniversity of Maryland

❖I just read your article about Netmyths, and I thought you might be inter-

ested in the following “news story” I received a couple of days ago. I doubtit’s true, since I’d heard this as a joke 15 years ago. This is the transcript of anACTUAL radio conversation of a US naval ship with Canadian authorities offthe coast of Newfoundland in October, 1995. Radio conversation released bythe Chief of Naval Operations 10-10-95.

Americans: Please divert your course 15 degrees to the North to avoid aCollision.

Canadians: Recommend you divert YOUR course 15 degrees to the Southto avoid a collision.

Americans: This is the Captain of a US Navy ship. I say again, divertYOUR course.

Canadians: No. I say again, you divert YOUR course.Americans: THIS IS THE AIRCRAFT CARRIER USS LINCOLN, THE SEC-

OND LARGEST SHIP IN THE UNITED STATES’ ATLANTIC FLEET. WE AREACCOMPANIED BY THREE DESTROYERS, THREE CRUISERS AND NUMER-OUS SUPPORT VESSELS. I DEMAND THAT YOU CHANGE YOUR COURSE15 DEGREES NORTH, THAT’S ONE FIVE DEGREES NORTH, OR COUNTER-MEASURES WILL BE UNDERTAKEN TO ENSURE THE SAFETY OF THIS SHIP.

Canadians: This is a lighthouse. Your call.Horst SeveriniOhio University

❖The netmyth I wish someone would put to bed is the idea that there can

be an e-mail message, recognizable by its subject line, that will fill up yourhard disk with nonsense if you read it. This message never specifies whichplatform or operating systems are susceptible, proving that the warning can’tbe for real. But if we define a virus as being any computer file that exploits aweakness in the computer system to propagate itself, the warning is itself thevirus that infects all platforms and operating systems. The weak point? Credu-lous users.Joe StraleyUniversity of Kentucky

APS VIEWSTHE WEALTH OF NATIONSby Andrew M. Sessler, APS President andFrancis Slakey, APS Public Information

A version of this editorial appeared in theSan Francisco Chronicle on March 20, 1998

There was a time when a nation’s futurewas determined simply by its store of gold.Those kingdoms faded, and their warriors’armor now hangs in dusty museum cases.Today, a nation’s wealth is measured by itsscientific ideas, and the idea warriors aretrained in university laboratories. The chiefs

may be in Washington, but in March the warriors came to California for the largestphysics meeting in the world.

A century ago, science was still in the backwash of gov-ernment priorities. The President would have been throwninto an asylum if he claimed to see a future where the topthree diseases were eradicated and our life expectancydoubled. Yet, it all came about — even if we do still stubour toes getting out of bed in the morning. Moreover, thenations that pursued those scientific ideas are now themost prosperous in the world.

The government gave civilian science a whirl fifty yearsago. One early investment was $50,000 toward creating anew source of microwaves. At the same time, Bell Labs leta few obscure scientists tinker with paper clips and germa-nium. Out popped the laser and transistor, and eventuallySilicon Valley’s semiconductor industry. That industry isnow the heart of California’s economy. To the rest of thenation, it’s the very identity of California. OK, so maybesurfing is.

Today, the scientific challenge resonates with scores ofpoliticians. Last October, four Senators wrote a bipartisanbill to double the federal investment in science over tenyears. In February, they wrote to their colleagues, explain-ing how science “drives future economic growth.” By mid-March, they had nettedeight more co-sponsors, including both California Senators.

The Administration is also talking science. In the State of the Union Address,President Clinton announced a “1st Century Research Fund.” In February, heforecast a future “where wars on cancer and AIDS have long since been won;where the benefits of science are broadly shared in countries both rich andpoor.” Tall tales? Hardly. It’s all quite doable stuff. If he’d said we’ll tame El Niño,now that would be tough.

While all this was going on in Washington, scientists were busy forging newideas. In March, they emerged from their labs and arrived in Los Angeles for aweek-long clash. Five thousand physicists attended, bringing a thousand newideas and maybe 2,000 clean shirts.

A few ideas will be closely watched by California industrialists. The semicon-ductor industry benefits from an astonishing engineering trend: the number oftransistors that can be squeezed onto a wafer of silicon doubles every eighteenmonths. The steady improvement feeds the public craving for smaller, morepowerful computers. The craving drives an industry that annually manufacturesmore transistors than the total number of raindrops that fall on California in ayear. Well, maybe not this year.

But, silicon technology won’t last forever. To maintain the trend, there need tobe some breakthrough scientific ideas. At the APS March Meeting, scientists fromCal Tech discussed “quantum computing” (see page 4) and “spintronics” (seepage 4) — radical alternatives that could reduce transistors to the size of a fewatoms. Scientists from Stanford described “holographic data storage” — a tech-nique that could store all of Pat Boone’s recordings on a single CD. That way, wecould throw them all away at once.

The prosperity of the next generation will be built on a few of the scientificideas discussed in California a few months ago. The next great industry, the nexthistory-shaping paradigm, it starts at such meetings as a raw scientific idea. InMarch, we had a chance to peek at the future of the nation.

Scenes from the APS L.A. Fellows Reception

C. Kumar N.Patel (top left)organized theevent held atUCLA onMarch 24, 1998.

Andrew M. Sessler

Francis Slakey

June 1998 APS News

7

The nice thing about going intophysics is that you don’t have to

write much — except for the grantproposal that has to convince fundersto support your work or the researchpaper whose publication is the keyto your promotion. Not to mentionthe general review article that explainsto other physicists, or maybe evenyour spouse, what is so special aboutthe work that consumes your everyliving hour.

Like it or not, competent writing isan important tool of the physicist. Rec-ognizing that, a few physicsdepartments include some kind ofwriting experience in the undergradu-ate curriculum. For example, studentsin the third-year lab course at StanfordUniversity must write up each experi-ment as if it were a paper intendedfor journal publication.

Although I have written for Phys-ics Today for nearly 30 years, I havenever taken or taught a science writ-ing class. So I can’t say what or howone might teach communication skillsto physics majors. I can only share afew rules that have stood me in goodstead. I name each rule for the men-tor who taught it to me.

I. Miss Ottenberg�s Rule: Prac-tice writing short summaries of longerarticles. This 7th grade teacher calledsuch a summary a “precis,” a foreignword no doubt intended to impressher naive students. Miss Ottenberg

Some Simple Rules of Writingby Barbara Goss Levi

regularly gave us several pages of textand asked us to boil them down toone paragraph. The exercise taughtus to cut down the trees to better seethe forest and forced us to write moresuccinctly. To make our word limit,we had to sacrifice many colorful ad-jectives, but along with them wejettisoned lots of imprecise and need-lessly wordy phrases.

II. Mr. Orloff�s Rule: Combinewriting with inspiring reading. I stillremember Mr. Orloff pacing the frontof my high school classroom as hedramatically recited the lines of Ham-let (he was faculty adviser to theDrama Club). He also entertained usby grouping the required readingsinto various themes, such as humor,death and love. Stimulated by the di-vergent thoughts and styles of theassigned readings, we wrote essays onthe given theme, no doubt trying toemulate the style of our favorite au-thor. Maybe today’s researchers andstudents would write better if some-one held up examples of reallywell-written papers in Physical ReviewLetters. Every once in awhile I comeacross one that can be read by some-one outside the narrow specialty, andit’s a real treat.

III. Terry Scott�s Rule: Get rid ofsuperfluous words. When I first ar-rived at Physics Today, I receivedimportant feedback from Terry Scott,who was then managing editor of the

magazine and later served the Ameri-can Institute of Physics as journalpublisher before his recent retirement.Among other things, he insisted I ex-punge wordy phrases from my stories.On the taboo list were such phrasesas “there is...” or “the fact that....” Asfrustrating as it sometimes was not tohave these phrases available to me, Isoon found that the sentences I con-structed without them were morelively and readable.

IV. Gloria Lubkin�s Rule: Rewriteif it’s not clear and define your terms.Throughout my tenure at Physics To-day, I have had feedback from GloriaLubkin, who founded the “Search andDiscovery” news section in 1967. Es-pecially when I first started writing forthe magazine, I would feel quite an-noyed when she scrawled “unclear”in the margin next to some paragraph.But when I critically re-read my ownwriting, I would think of more directand effective explanations to offer thereader. The rewrite has almost alwaysbeen better than the first draft. Thus,I try never to invest so much ego inmy writing that I am not willing to lis-ten to comments and drasticallyrephrase if necessary.

The other really annoying thingGloria does is to circle a word andwrite “define” in the margin. I hatethat. I have finally finished a compli-cated story and have become sosteeped in the language of a particu-lar subfield that I want to use itsjargon. Frequently the jargon term isreally complicated to explain and I amreluctant to interrupt the flow of mystory to define it. On the other hand,

if I stick it in unexplained, the termmight just stop my reader in his orher tracks. So I am challenged to find asimpler way to say the same thing, orelse completely drop the particular de-tail that required the jargon word, oftenwith no loss to the overall story.

V. Experience�s Rule: Good writ-ing is clear thinking. If I have to explainthe fractional quantum Hall effect in apalatable manner to a geophysicistspecializing in mantle convection, I’dbetter be able to explain it to myselffirst; it has to make sense to me. Thatdoesn’t mean I have to take a coursein every topic I write about, but atleast I have to understand the maincharacteristics of the phenomenon. Aneven better test of how well you un-derstand a subject is how well youcan explain it to a colleague in con-versation. Sometimes in staff meetings,we newsreporters summarize for oneanother the stories we are workingon. By having to field questions fromthe other writers, each of us has tohone our own understanding.

None of these rules is new. Theyare like the simple rule to tennis play-ers: “Keep your eye on the ball.” Theplayers all know the rule, but the chal-lenge is to consistently follow it. Andhaving completed this little piece, Iwonder which of the above rules Ihave violated in writing it.

Barbara Goss Levi is a senior editorof Physics Today, and a member of theForum on Education’s Executive Com-mittee. This article originally appearedin the fall 1997 issue of the Forum onPhysics and Society newsletter.

The APS Executive Board has appointed a Task Force on Academic Tenure tograpple with the active and sometimes acrimonious debate on the need for changein the academic tenure system, especially since the suggested changes could have animpact on the ability of universities to perform scientific research. Furthermore, thenature of physics research careers are changing and sometimes come into conflictwith current and proposed tenure procedures.

Chaired by John Poate of the New Jersey Institute of Technology, the task force ischarged with examining the present trends and proposed changes in the tenuresystem, and assessing how these might affect the vitality of research and teaching inphysics. In addition, it is being asked to consider additional studies of these issueswhich might be underway by other scientific societies and professional organiza-tions, and to conclude whether the issues are sufficiently urgent to warrant an officialAPS statement on the subject.

The connections between tenure, academic freedom, and economic security haveexisted for many years, and are very strong, according to Frank Franz, president ofthe University of Alabama in Huntsville (see back page article). “For most people, thestrongest rationale for tenure is the maintenance of academic freedom for our fac-ulty, and the concomitant freedom from coercion or persecution,” he says. “Tenure...provides a powerful buffer against arbitrary and capricious acts by administrators or,indeed, by fellow faculty members. The questions most often raised are, does thatprotection come at too great a cost, and, if so, are there other ways to provide it?”Franz identifies post tenure review and the burden of proof, as well as standards forthe removal of tenure, as among the most important issues at stake in considerationsof tenure policies. A brief report will be presented to the APS Executive Board inSeptember, with a final report to the APS Council slated for November. The othermembers of the task force are Robert Gluckstern (University of Maryland); JolieCizewski (Rutgers University); Steve Ralph (Emory University); Raymond Brock (Michi-gan State University); and Roger Falcone (University of California, Berkeley).

APS Executive Board Appoints TaskForce on Academic Tenure

How to Give a Better Physics TalkListed below, in no particular order, are the most important rules for giving agood talk at a professional physics meeting:

1. Carefully check each viewgraph for spelly misteaks.

2. DO NOT OVERUSE BOLD TO MAKE A POINT!

3. Absolutely no alcohol during the talk (this applies to the speaker only).

4. No singing or dancing... most of the time.

5. Answer all questions, even if you have to make up the answer.

6. Do not raise or lower your voice suddenly. This could disturb thoseresting in the audience.

7. Make use of the accuracy/clarity duality. It is very easy to be bothinaccurate and unclear at the same time.

8. No salacious physics jokes about two physicists and a religious person.

11. Make sure the viewgraphs are ordered correctly.

9. Prior to the talk, practice the art of ducking any flying vegetables.

10. Don’t let boo’s or hisses cause you to stray from your prepared talk.

12. Hand gestures to emphasize particular points can be used extensively,provided they do not insult any particular ethnic group.

13. Under no circumstances should you delete any overheads from yourtalk. Simply speak more rapidly and quickly flash all of the viewgraphs.[The world record for an APS meeting is 56 viewgraphs, 12 with substantialequations, given in only 10 minutes, at a spoken rate of 430 words perminute.]

14. Be sure to include this phrase on each overhead: “This talk could notpossibly be supported by the U.S. Government, Industry, or any Educa-tional Institution.”

15. There is no need for a concluding overhead if you think you have saideverything.

16. In the end, there are no rules.

From “Learning from a Negative Example,” talk by Brian Schwartz, BrooklynCollege, at the APS March Meeting in Los Angeles.

zero gravity

APS News June 1998

8

One of the primary motivating factors shared by the members of the APSTask Force on Careers and Professional Development (APS News, June 1997)was a desire to devise workable long-term strategies to better prepare physi-cists for a multitude of careers options. The task force made a number of keyrecommendations. The first was that a separate APS committee be estab-lished to address career and professional development issues. This has nowhappened in the newly established Committee for Careers and ProfessionalDevelopment (CCPD). APS Council unanimously approved the bylaw changeestablishing the CCPD at its April 1998 meeting. John Lowell, Applied Materi-als Inc, is serving as the first Chair of the CCPD.

A second key recommendation was for the establishment of a mechanismso that any materials developed could be disseminated widely, particularly tofaculty and students through physics departments in academic institutions. Thisrecommendation led to the idea of establishing a Career and Professional De-velopment Liaison (CPDL) Program (see front-page article for a description ofthe first workshop of the CPDL Program). In addition, the CCPD will monitorcareer/employment status from both the perspective of the employers andphysicists, such as was done in the recent email survey of Junior membersand statistical studies. In addition, the CCPD is investigating initiation of acareer and professional development site visit program to physics depart-ments; offering a series of short courses for professional development onsuch subjects as elements of patent law, accounting, proposal writing andothers. In addition, the CCPD is working closely with APS Units and commit-tees, such as FIAP and CSWP, AIP’s career and statistical divisions and CorporateAssociates, and the physics community. Members with comments or sugges-tions for the CCPD to consider are invited to contact John Lowell, Barrie Ripin(ripin@aps.org), or Arlene Modeste (modeste@aps.org).

The APS Career and ProfessionalDevelopment Committee ReceivesFinal Approval

dustry and academia. The afternoon presentations were concluded by Rob-ert C. Hilborn of Amherst College, who discussed the differences betweenapplying for jobs at research universities and applying for positions at teach-ing-intensive universities.

The final part of the workshop, led by Diandra Leslie-Pelecky, was a discus-sion of future activities for the CPDL program and APS’s role in providinginformation, communication and resources. A number of suggestions weremade by participants, including:

•Provide departments with accurate and timely career and employmentinformation and statistics.

•Produce career-oriented materials such as CD-ROMs, presentations, etc.for faculty to customize and use for students.

•Put information on internships/externships on the web: where they are,and how students can participate.

•Establishing a CPDL website to provide information to CPDL participants.The workshop presentations will be made available to Liaisons as PowerPointfiles so that participants can adapt the information in the presentations to theirparticular circumstances.

•Facilitate a threaded web-based discussion group to allow sharing of ideas,problems and solutions

•Plans a larger-scale CPDL meeting.The APS is in the process of setting up a web-site and discussion group for

the exclusive use of participating department Liaisons. Departments partici-pating in the Liaison Program will receive priority in a compilation of a resourceof best practices, eligibility for possible career site visits, and other physicscareer related information. The Workshop and the planned future activities ofthe CPDL program were met with overwhelmingly positive evaluations fromparticipants. Departments interested in participating in the Liaison Programare invited to contact Barrie Ripin (ripin@aps.org).

CPDL Program Launched (continued from page 1)

The APS Forum on Industrial and Applied Physics (FIAP) has establishedan online jobs search engine to assist young physicists seeking job opportu-nities by serving as a contact point between them and potential employers.The CareerWeb Resumé Database is a searchable engine for both job seek-ers and potential employers; FIAP membership is not a prerequisite.

Physicists seeking employment opportunities can enter their resumés onlineusing one of three options: (1) enter the resumé and keep it confidential sothat it is not searchable by employers, so job seekers can forward their resumésonly to employers offering positions of interest to them; (2) enter the resuméand make it searchable by potential employers; (3) enter your resume andmake it searchable using an alias to maintain confidentiality. The latter twooptions also enable users to make changes in their resumés online.

The Web site also includes suggestions and comments from FIAP mem-bers who are also recruiting professionals. One physicist employed in theindustrial research sector of a large textile manufacturer suggests supplyingthe following critical information when applying for jobs: career goals (e.g.,moving out of research into manufacturing); work interests (e.g., theoretical,computational, experimental); work style (e.g., close management or greatfreedom, alone or in groups); and any information about communicationand social skills. “My observation is that employers typically don’t doubt thecapability of candidates, but they worry about career fit: whether they workwell with others, and understand our constraints,” Says another FIAP mem-ber, “The better a candidate communicates career goals and interest in thejobs, the better chance that person has of succeeding.” Such jobs almostalways require cross-disciplinary skills, so any additional coursework in projectmanagement, business, manufacture design, etc., is helpful in terms of pre-paring graduate students for the realities of today’s job market.

Employers and recruiters who are APS/FIAP members can post job de-scriptions on the site at no cost, or control which candidates contact them bysimply searching the CareerWeb Resume database. Such posts include infor-mation about the hiring organization, the job opportunity and contactinformation. Potential employers who are not APS/FIAP members shouldcontact Chris Bastian at cbastian@cweb.com for more information on estab-lishing a presence on the site. APS members may access the FIAP Jobs SearchEngine through the FIAP homepage [www.aps.org/FIAP/index.html].

AIP Resumé Posting ServiceThe AIP Career Services also operates a Resumé Posting Service for the

APS and physics community. It is provided free of charge to physicists seek-ing employment. Resumés, identified by number only, are entered into asearchable database which is available to employers. The identity of the job-seeker and a complete resumé will be released to employers who contactour office directly. Participants will be notified of who requests your resumé.For more information, contact: Career Services Division, AIP, One PhysicsEllipse, College Park, MD 20740-3843, Tel: 301/209-3190, Fax: 301/209-0841,E-mail: jkiene@aip.org. Both the FIAP Job Engine and the AIP posting ser-vices may also be accessed through the APS Home Page [www.aps.org underthe Career/Employment button].

A Physical Sciences Internship opportunity web-site is now avail-able at: www.aip.org/careers/intern/.

Forum on Industrial and Applied PhysicsJ O B S E N G I N E

The American Physical SocietyThe American Physical Society is an organization of more than 40,000 physicists worldwide

Amherst CollegeApplied Materials, Inc.Argonne National LaboratoryArizona State UniversityBrooklyn College/CUNYCalifornia State University, FullertonCalifornia State University, Los AngelesCase Western Reserve UniversityFlorida State UniversityGeneral Motors R&D CenterGeorge Washington UniversityHarvard University (student reps)Idaho State UniversityKent State UniversityLawrence Berkeley LaboratoryLouisiana State UniversityMassachusetts Institute of TechnologyNorth Carolina State UniversityOklahoma State UniversityOregon State UniversityRose-Hulman Institute of TechnologySyracuse University

Texas Technology UniversityThe Ohio State UniversityUniversity of AlabamaUniversity of California, DavisUniversity of California, San DiegoUniversity of Il l inois, Urbana

ChampaignUniversity of KentuckyUniversity of MaineUniversity of Maryland, Baltimore

CountyUniversity of NebraskaUniversity of Nevada, RenoUniversity of PittsburghUniversity of Southern CaliforniaUniversity of VermontUtah State UniversityWake Forest UniversityWorcester Polytechnic Institute

Plus several representatives from theAPS and AIP.

Career Liaison Program Workshop Attendees

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June 1998 APS News

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Merzbacher Appointed as Consultantfor APS Centennial

Former APS President Eugen Merzbacher, a pro-fessor of physics at the University of North Carolina,Chapel Hill, has been appointed as a senior consult-ant to the APS Centennial Office. Merzbacher willadvise the Centennial staff on the the general APSexhibit; the individual unit exhibits and symposia; thevarious planned APS Reunions; the Centennial pub-lic relations initiative; and other issues as needed.

Born in Berlin, Merzbacher received his early edu-cation in Germany, but moved to Turkey in 1935 as arefugee from Nazi Germany. In Turkey, he completedhis secondary and college-level education, and sub-

sequently taught high school until 1947. He then became a graduate student inphysics at Harvard University, receiving his PhD in 1950.

After one year as postdoctoral fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study inPrinceton, and another year as a visiting faculty member at Duke University,Merzbacher joined the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1952. Therehe moved through the academic ranks and eventually became a Kenan Profes-sor of Physics, serving for several years as chair of the Department of Physicsand Astronomy. In 1988 he was elected as APS Vice-President, serving as theSociety’s President in 1990, and has also served on and chaired numerous APScommittees. He is a member of the Editorial Board of Physical Review A and ofAtomic Data and Nuclear Data Tables.

Merzbacher retired from teaching in 1991, and is now Kenan Professor ofPhysics, Emeritus. In 1993 UNC awarded him an Honorary Doctor of Sciencedegree. His primary research interests have been in the theory of ion-atom colli-sions, beta decay, nuclear reactions, and the fundamentals of quantum mechanics.In 1961 he published the textbook Quantum Mechanics, which is now in itsthird edition. While at Chapel Hill, he was also instrumental in the creation of theTriangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory (TUNL). He served for more than threedecades as principal investigator of the UNC-CH component of this three-univer-sity program, supported by the U.S. Department of Energy.

The fledgling APS Four CornersSection held its first annual meeting

at the University of New Mexico, April3-4. The section represents the APSmembers residing in Arizona, Colorado,New Mexico and Utah. The meetingbegan with presentations ofcontributed papers on Fridayafternoon, followed by a banquet, withkeynote lectures by APS PresidentAndy Sessler and Murray Gell-Mann ofthe Santa Fe Institute. Saturday’ssessions included lectures on suchtopics as an update of current excitingresearch taking place at Los AlamosNational Laboratory (John Browne),and Sandia National Laboratories(Thomas Picraux); physics research fornext generation space systems at AirForce Research Laboratory (JanetFender); and photovoltaic research andfuture directions at National RenewableEnergy Laboratory (Satyen Debs).

Quantum Computing. There hasbeen increased experimental interestin quantum computation since 1994,when it was shown that a quantumcomputer could efficiently factor largenumbers and a scheme was proposedfor realizing quantum logic gates withcold trapped ions. According to M.S.Gulley of Los Alamos National Labora-tory, who spoke on Saturday morning,ions cooled to their motional groundstate in a linear trap may be used asthe individual qubits, and entangledstates between these ions can be con-structed using laser manipulation of theions’ states. [For more on quantum com-puting, see story, page 4]

Neutron Testing of ICs. The high-energy neutron source at the LosAlamos Neutron Science Center(LANSCE) produces beams of neutronsfor accelerated testing of integrated cir-cuit devices, according to LANL’s S.A.Wender. Neutrons produced in the at-mosphere by cosmic-rays are thoughtto be a significant threat to integratedcircuits at both aircraft altitudes andlower elevations, causing single eventupsets, multiple event upsets, latchup

Four Corners Section Holds First Meetingand burnout in semiconductor devices.Neutrons are produced at LANSCE viaspallation reactions with the 800 MeVpulsed proton beam. Proton beam cur-rents of about 2 microamperes strike atungsten target and produce a spec-trum of neutrons whose energy andintensity can be precisely measured bytime-of-flight techniques. The neutronspectrum produced in this manner isvery similar in shape to the atmosphericneutron spectrum at 40,000 ft, with in-tensities over 100,000 times greater thanthe cosmic-ray neutron flux at 40,000ft (sea level).

Thin Film Charged Particle De-tector. Current charged particledetectors such as silicon barrier detec-tors are unable to operate at hightemperatures or in a high radiationbackground. However, Brian A. Roy ofthe Colorado School of Mines reportedthat it is possible to construct a newtype of charged particle detector thatdoes not suffer from these restrictions.This involves the stacking of several al-ternating conducting and insulatinglayers. It is then possible to estimatethe number of charged particles thatstop in any given conducting layer, andhence the particle energy by measur-ing the current from the layer. Detectorsbased on this design have been builtand tested with promising results, anda new detector is currently under con-struction that would greatly reduce itssize. The linear particle accelerator, lo-cated at the CSM, will used to evaluatethis new design.

Laser Induced BreakdownSpectroscopy. Jon E. Sollid of CoyoteMining and Environmental Instrumentsdescribed a new technique for in-situanalysis of mineral exploration samples,dubbed Laser Induced BreakdownSpectroscopy (LIBS). The technique canbe used to provide exploration com-panies with precise and accuratechemical analysis in the field in real-time, resulting in major time and costsavings, according to Sollid. Using afield portable analyzer, anomalies can

be followed up immedi-ately while crews are stillin the field. Lower limitsof detection LLDs are el-ement dependent, butmany are sufficiently lowto be useful in explora-tion. LIBS analysis requirelittle or no sample prepa-ration.

NMR Studies ofFluid Flow. A collabora-tion of researchers atNew Mexico Resonanceand the Lovelace Respi-ratory Research Instituteare using nuclear mag-netic resonance (NMR)to non-invasively mea-sure fluid structure, flow,and diffusion. Parametersmeasured include notonly concentration butalso higher order vari-ables of the position,such as velocity, velocityfluctuation, diffusion, anddispersion. NMR makesthese measurementsalong directions definedby magnetic field gradi-ents so anisotropies ofparameters can be mea-sured. When combinedwith imaging, traditionalNMR can yield spatial de-pendence ofheterogeneities of theseanisotropies.

Triple Flames. The study of (sub-sonic) combustion is divided forsimplicity into “premixed” and“nonpremixed” regimes. However, ac-cording to LANL’s Sandip Ghosal, amore realistic situation is the partiallypremixed regime, where the composi-tion of the mixture varies continuouslyfrom pure fuel to pure oxidizer, as inthe example of a fuel jet in an oxidiz-ing atmosphere. In some such situationsa particular 2D flame structure, knownas a “triple flame” or “tribrachial flame,”is observed. It consists of a curvedpremixed branch followed by a trail-ing diffusion flame. Ghosal hasdeveloped an asymptotic theory for thestructure and propagation speed oftriple flames, which he has comparedwith numerical simulations. Triple flamesare thought to play an essential role in

turbulent combustion, and, an under-standing of their behavior may be ofimportance in modeling combustionproblems.

Science Education. During a Sat-urday morning session, D.M. Riffe ofUtah State University described the cur-riculum-wide integration of Mathcadinto USU’s undergraduate physics pro-gram. The foundation is a one-creditcomputer-laboratory experience inwhich the students work through aMathcad handbook that teaches thestudents to use Mathcad in the con-text of solving physics problems. Byworking through the handbook the stu-dents gain familiarity with the functionsof Mathcad that are most useful for solv-ing undergraduate physics problems.To date, Mathcad has been used in atleast 10 upper-division physics coursesat USU.

Four Corners Section Executive Committee attendees clockwise from leftrear: Brenda Dingus (U. Utah), Andrea Palounek (LANL), Howard Voss(U. Arizona), Bill Evenson -Chair (Brigham Young U.), Mariet Hofstee(Colorado Sch. ), Scott Nutter (Eastern NMU), Harry Lustig (Sante Fe),Judy Franz (APS Executive Officer), Michael Petras (Motorola), Eric Jones- Sec. Tres. (Sandia), and J.D. Garcia - Chair-Elect (U. Arizona). Not inphoto: David Wolfe - Vice Chair (U. New Mexico), Barrett Ripin (APS).

Four of the students receiving awards ($100) for best presentations atthe Four Corners Meeting. Student award winners are: Leslie Chavez(UNM undergraduate), Ronald Grazioso LANL, Chris Heil LANL (goingto UNM in the fall as a grad student), Randy Jacobs LANL, J. D.Patterson (U of Colorado), Brian Roy (Colo School of Mines, under-graduate), Peter Schwindt (LANL, going to U of Colorado in the fall as agrad student), Morgan Wascko (LANL, UC-Riverside), Jason Webb(NM State), Marc Welliver (U of Colorado)

The formation of an APSNorthwest Section is well un-derway following the APSCouncil’s approval of its es-tablishment at its Aprilmeeting. Principal organizersErnest Henley (University ofWashington) and MaryAlberg (Seattle University)met earlier this year with 12other regional volunteers todraft a suitable charter andbylaws. Among the at-

tributes they would like to see in the new section are joint activities with localchapters of the AAPT, as well as a local coalition of physics departments calledthe Pacific Northwest Association of Collegiate Physics. Close ties to Canadianmembers of both the APS and the Canadian Association of Physics are alsodesired, as well as the inclusion of local industry and government laboratories.

The first meeting of the fledgling section has tentatively been scheduled forSpring 1999, in Vancouver, British Columbia, with subsequent meeting sites ro-tating throughout the region. The interim officers elected to govern the unit untilregular elections can be held are: Yogi Gupta (Washington State University),chair; Erich Vogt (University of British Columbia), chair-elect; and John Drumheller(Montana State University), vice-chair. Henley will serve as interim secretary-treasurer.

APS Northwest Section is Established

Northwest Section organizing group met in Seattle in February.

Eugen Merzbacher

APS News June 1998

10

1998 March Meeting Highlights (continued from page 3)

will heat it up, while removing themagnetic field will cool it down andenable it to absorb heat from its sur-roundings. Not only is this processmore efficient than conventional re-frigeration (in which the compressingand expanding fluid refrigerants loseenergy to processes like turbulence),it is more environmentally friendly:the solid Gd material can’t leak out, andthe only working fluid is water, which car-ries heat to the Gd refrigerant from theobjects to be cooled. Carl Zimm of Astro-nautics Corporation in Wisconsindescribed a Gd-based magnetic refrigera-tor, built in collaboration with the AmesDOE Laboratory, that has efficiency rival-ing that of a conventional unit and hasbeen operating for more than a year.Other physicists at the same sessiondiscussed similar approaches. Thispotentially more efficient design canbe used in supermarkets, whichcould conceivably lower the cost ofgroceries by using less energy-hungry refrigerators.

Ultrafast Laser Pulses. The inter-action of matter with ultrafast andultra-intense laser pulses is a currentfrontier of science. New discoveriesoften result from the ability to explorea new regime. Here one is exploringboth extremely short time scales (be-low one ten-trillionth of a second) andextremely high intensities (above a tril-lion watts per square centimeter),according to Roland Allen of TexasA&M University, who spoke at aWednesday morning session. The usualapproximations of theoretical physicsand chemistry break down under theseconditions, and both electrons and at-oms exhibit new kinds of behavior. Infullerenes, an ultrashort but less intensepulse can be used to “pluck” the mol-ecule and start it vibrating.

It has already been observed thatporovskites can undergo structuralchanges when exposed to electromag-netic radiation. In semiconductors like Siand GaAs, an ultrashort laser pulse cancause electrons to be quickly promotedfrom bonding states (in the valence band)to antibonding states (in the conductionband). The lattice is then destabilized, andthe band gap collapses to yield a metal-like state. In current experiments, thematerial undergoes a nonthermal “melt-ing”, similar to the thermal meltingobserved in earlier experiments on longertime scales. Allen’s simulations revealedthat lattice destabilization occurs at aboutthe same threshold intensity for Si andGaAs, in agreement with the experiments.The reason is that Si has tighter chemicalbonding, being a smaller atom, but alsohas a higher population of excited elec-trons because of its narrower band gap.

Liquefied Particle Physics. One ofthe most complex processes known tophysicists is the process of turbulence, inwhich a fluid exhibits irregular flow pat-terns that vary randomly in space andtime. A Cornell group is applying particlephysics detection technology to fluid me-chanics, by installing a silicon-strip detectoralso used in Cornell’s CLEO accelerator.The detector can make up to 100,000measurements per second of a particle—and can track perhaps up to 6 particles ata time, promising insights into such ques-tions as how two particles that are initiallyclose together in an extremely turbulentfluid fly apart. Such studies may aid un-derstanding of problems such as thetransport of pollutants in the atmosphere.

Quick as a Flash: FemtosecondLasers. New discoveries often happenat the frontiers of physics. Examplesinclude the discovery of the top quarkat Fermilab (the highest obtained par-

ticle collision energies) and Bose-Einstein condensates of gases insidemagneto-optic traps (the lowest ob-tained temperatures). A relatively newfrontier area is the domain of short-time(100 femtosecond), high-intensity(terrawatts/cm2) bursts of laser light.Pulses generated by femtosecond la-sers can almost instantly destabilize asemiconductor, turning it into some-thing like a metal, at least temporarily.Papers presented at a Tuesday sessionconsidered what these pulses do in avariety of materials, including C-60 mol-ecules (buckyballs), and human-vision(retinal) and photosynthesis com-plexes.

Polymer LECs. Alan Heeger of UC-Santa Barbara described a new type oflight-emitting device based on a semi-conducting polymer. In this design,known as a light-emitting electrochemi-cal cell (LEC), researchers create a blendof a light-emitting polymer material anda solid electrolyte, a substance thattransports ions. According to Heeger,polymer LECs have important advan-tages over polymer LEDs. For example,the way in which electrical charge isinjected into the semiconducting poly-mer is the same for all LECsindependent of the color of the emit-ted light, and the performance of LECsis insensitive to the thickness of thematerial.

Wavelet Analysis of HeartbeatPatterns. Scientists from BostonUniversity’s College of Engineeringhave developed the first objective di-agnostic tool to determine whether apatient suffers from congestive heartfailure. A simple mathematical analysisof the pattern of a person’s heartbeatdetects the problem with 100 percentaccuracy. Using a standard data set, thescientists, led by Malvin C. Teich, ob-tained clinically significant results usingthis multiresolution wavelet analysistechnique to determine how much thetime duration of a collection of heart-beats fluctuated and determine whetheror not a patient suffers from conges-tive heart failure.

Traditionally, congestive heart failureis diagnosed by a physician throughvisual observation, using indicatorssuch as swelling in the patient’s anklesand through stethoscopic observationof heart and lung sounds. Teich’s tech-nique uses objective criteria to makethe diagnosis. “It is perfectly reasonablethat using this information we coulddevelop a simple, portable device thatan individual would wear to monitortheir heartbeat pattern and warn themof a developing problem,” Teich said.“Now that we know that this techniquecan predict congestive heart failure, wewill apply it to other cardiac disordersthat are more difficult to diagnose.”

The Noisy World of the Cell. Forthe physicist, noise is more than just an-noying sounds - it is any type of randomand unpredictable variability, especially atthe molecular level. There are many typesof noise that occur in biological cells. Oneof the most interesting is ion channel noise.Ion channels are tiny pores that can openor close and allow important substances,such as sodium, potassium, and chlorinein and out of the cell, and are the ma-chinery behind many important cellularprocesses such as the firing of nerves.But how do random, noisy ion channelsproduce precise, organized activity? An-swers to this fascinating question are justbeginning to be revealed, according toPaul C. Gailey of Oak Ridge National Labo-ratory.

One surprise is that cells may be ableto actually use noise to their benefit. For

example, ion channel noise can providejust enough of a tickle to make certainnerves fire spontaneously. While toomuch noise would make for erratic activ-ity, too little can result in no firing at all.The amount of noise in the cell dependsin part on the number of ion channels inits membrane. Cells may exploit this factand control the number of channels toproduce optimum noise levels. Somestudies indicate that noise can enhancethe energy production of cells, amplifysignals, and assist in transporting sub-stances in and out of the cell. Otherssuggest that cells may utilize feedbackprocesses to help suppress ion channelnoise. “With characteristic creativity, na-ture appears to be using noise just as itwould any other available resource, saidGailey.

Laser Medicine. If you have everbeen the beneficiary of laser surgery,thank a physicist. Rangaswamy Srinivasanof UVTech Associates in New Yorkshowed at IBM in the early 1980s thatultrashort laser pulses could vaporize spe-cific regions of biological material withoutdamaging the surrounding material, help-ing to lead to the use of lasers in medicine.Honored at the APS Biological PhysicsPrize session, he described the physicalexplanations of how laser beams cansafely remove tissue. The session also fea-tured Michael Berns of UC-Irvine, whodiscussed how “laser scissors” and “opti-cal tweezers” can now cut and pastechromosomes and sequence genes.Alexander Oraevsky of the University ofTexas discussed how aiming laser light atskin lesions can induce sound waves thatprovide information on whether the le-sion is benign or cancerous.

The Mysteries of Water. Essential forlife on Earth and the beautiful geologicalfeatures on the surface of our planet, waterhas many unusual properties which arenot completely understood. For example,heating water shrinks it, unlike most otherliquids. Three sessions at the meeting dealtwith the physics and chemistry of water.Describing the latest quantum-mechan-ics based simulations of water, David Claryof University College in London was partof the team that recently discovered thatwater only begins to act like the liquidwith which we are familiar when at leastsix molecules of H

20 are clustered to-

gether. Gene Stanley of Boston Universitydiscussed an hypothesis that predicts apreviously unknown, low-temperature“critical point” for water in which two liq-uid phases—a higher-density liquid anda lower-density liquid—can coexist.

Making Nanopattern Surfaces.Researchers are pursuing an importantnew frontier in nanotechnology: tomake nanometer-scale patterns of twoor more chemically and physically dis-tinct materials. Such nanopatternsurfaces could be used as chemical andbiological sensors or the “masks” thatetch tiny circuit patterns in computerchips. Martin Moeller of Ulm Univer-sity in Germany described a newtechnique for creating such surfaces.The technique involves embedding ametal or semiconducting nanoparticleinside a polymer whose interior acts asa “nanocompartment.” Subsequently,these nanoparticle-containing polymersare deposited onto polymer films. Af-terwards, the polymer shells can beremoved with plasma beams similar tothose used to etch patterns in computerchips. This leaves metal or semiconduct-ing nanoparticles (1-20 nm in size,depending upon the amount of spacein the nanocompartment) which canbe separated by 10-200 nm (depend-ing on the overall size of the polymerwhich embeds the nanoparticle).

Making Smooth Silicon SurfacesWith Chemistry. The silicon-silicon di-oxide interface in ultrasmall silicon-basedtransistors must be smooth on the atomiclevel or else their performance is de-graded. If the boundary is too rough,electrons moving through the semicon-ducting silicon layer can scatter from theinsulating SiO

2 boundary, increasing elec-

trical resistance to undesirable levels.Melissa Hines of Cornell showed that anammonium fluoride solution could etchaway surface roughness on Si(111) andproduce surfaces of near-atomic smooth-ness over a large area. Hines hopes tofind similar chemical methods for theSi(100) surfaces used in integrated circuits.

Marcus Weldon of Lucent Technolo-gies presented studies of how H

2O reacts

with silicon at elevated temperatures dur-ing the beginning stages of forming asilicon dioxide layer. Marrying infraredspectroscopy and quantum chemistrycalculations, Weldon and colleagues dis-covered for the first time a silicon“epoxide,” a triangular arrangement of sili-con-oxygen-silicon that apparentlydominates the surface at the intermedi-ate stages of these reactions. Controllingthe quality of SiO

2 layers is increasingly

important in state-of-the-art silicon de-vices; one recently fabricated SiO

2 layer

has a thickness of just three SiO2 molecu-

lar units in an ultrasmall silicon transistorannounced by Lucent last year and envi-sioned for mass production by 2010. Builtby Greg Timp and colleagues at Lucent,this 60-nm transistor is four times smaller,five times faster, and needs 60 to 160 timesless power than present transistors.

Saving Energy in the 21stCentury. The research of Mark Levine,director of the Environmental EnergyTechnologies Division at Lawrence Ber-keley Laboratory, has led to enormousenergy savings for a number of billion-dollar technologies, such as lighting andwindows. He reported on new develop-ments in duct sealants (energy waste inducts can be as high as 30%); ultravioletwater purification; new incandescentlights; and a redesigned torchiere lamp.Still in the future is an energy-efficientfume hood to provide a safe workingenvironment in laboratories and factories.Levine maintains that while immediate en-ergy savings can be realized by switchingto alternative fuels and requiring permitsfor carbon emissions, new technologies— as well as new materials, processes,and manufacturing methods — will beessential in the long run.

Beyond the Ivory Tower. A jointsession of the APS Committee on theStatus of Women in Physics and theForum on Industrial and Applied Phys-ics featured four prominent femalephysicists who have established suc-cessful careers outside of academia,who offered advice to physicists seek-ing nontraditional employmentopportunities. Barbara Wilson (Jet Pro-pulsion Laboratory) described herexperiences working in a federally fundedR&D center, outlining possible employ-ment areas. Mary Young (HughesResearch Laboratories) focused on someof the key differences between an aca-demic and industrial environment. Bothshe and Bell Labs’ Cherry Murray citednumerous strategies to prepare graduatestudents for jobs in industry. And Bar-bara Jones of IBM’s Almaden ResearchCenter identified exciting research oppor-tunities in the world of data storage.

Special thanks to Philip F. Schewe andBenjamin Stein of the American Instituteof Physics’ Public Information Office forcontributing to the coverage of technicalsessions in this issue.

June 1998 APS News

11

Announcements

NOMINATIONS FORPRIZES AND AWARDS

The following prizes and awards will be bestowed at the Fluid DynamicsDivision Meeting in 1999. A brief description of each prize and award is givenbelow, along with the addresses of the selection committee chairs to whomnominations should be sent. Please refer to the new 1998-1999 CentennialAPS Membership Directory, pages A19-A37, for complete information regard-ing rules and eligibility requirements for individual prizes and awards.

1999 FLUID DYNAMICS PRIZE

Sponsored by friends of the Division of Fluid Dynamics and the American Institute ofPhysics journal Physics of Fluids.

Purpose: To recognize and encouragAnnouncementse outstanding achievement in fluiddynamics research.

Nature: The prize consists of $5,000, a certificate citing the contributions made by therecipient, and a travel allowance to the meeting at which the prize is bestowed.

Send name of proposed candidate and supporting information before 1 September 1998to:. Elaine S Oran (Chair), 3516Duff Dr., Falls Church, VA 22041; Phone (202) 767-2960;Fax 202 767 4798; Email ORAN@LCP.NRL.NAVY.MIL

1999 OTTO LAPORTE AWARD

Sponsored by the friends of Otto LaPorte and the APS Division of Fluid Dynamics.

Purpose: To recognize outstanding research accomplishments pertaining to the physics offluids.

Nature: The award consists of $2,000, and a certificate citing the contributions made bythe recipient.

Send name of proposed candidate and supporting information before1 September 1998to: Israel J Wygnanski (Chair), School of Engineering, University of Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv69978, ISRAEL; Fax 972-36429540; Email wygy@genius.tau.ac.il

APS News Online latest editionAPS Committees and Governance

• International Affairs page updated• Women in Physics Colloquium Speakers List updated• Minorities in Physics Colloquium Speakers List updated

Meetings• Ohio Section Spring Meeting Program• April 1998 Meeting Program• Virtual Press Room for April Meeting• DAMOP 1998 Meeting Program• Meeting IDs page added

Units• DAMOP, DCOMP, DMP, GMAG• FIAP Executive Committee updated• DPF page now on APS site

CAUGHT IN THE WEB

Notable additions to the APS Web Server. The

APS Web Server can be found at http://www.aps.org

Bumper Sticker & Tee-Shirt Slogan ContestPhysicists do it with Uncertainty

Got a catchy, physics-related slogan you�ve always wanted to see on a T-shirt, bumpersticker, or coffee mug? APS News challenges its readers for the best such slogans.For example, APS Associate Executive Officer, Barrie Ripin, who brought you thelimerick contest a year ago, said he is certain that physicists can do bumper stickers�relatively well.� Ooh! Submissions can be in the form of text and/or graphics. Therewill be a number of categories for winning, including most humorous, most clever,best graphic, best public image, loudest groan from the judges, etc.. Finalist andwinning entries will appear in a future issue of APS News. The best will be used on T-shirts, bumper stickers, and other products that will be available for purchase at theAPS Centennial Meeting in March 1999 in Atlanta, Georgia. The deadline for entriesis June 30, 1998. Submissions should be sent to: APS News Editor, The AmericanPhysical Society, One Physics Ellipse, College Park, MD 20740; Fax 301-209-0865,E-mail: TEESHIRT@aps.org

Physical Review FocusPR Focus, the fully electronic journal featuring physics highlights, is available FREE

through the APS Home Page [www.aps.org] or directly at [publish.aps.org/FOCUS]. Toreceive one-paragraph introductions to Focus stories each week by e-mail send the follow-ing message to majordomo@aps.org: subscribe focus [Leave the subject line blank].

Call for Nominations for 1999 APSPrizes and AwardsMembers are invited to nominate candidates to the respective committees chargedwith the privilege of recommending the recipients. A brief description of each prizeand award is given in the March APS News issue, along with the addresses of theselection committee chairs to whom nominations should be sent. Please refer to theAPS Membership Directory, pages xxi-xxxvi, for complete information regardingrules and eligibility requirements for individual prizes and awards or visit thePrize and Awards page on the APS web site at http://www.aps.org. Unless speci-fied differently, the deadline for receipt of nominations is July 1, 1998.Prizes:

Hans A. Bethe PrizeHerbert P. Broida PrizeTom W. Bonner Prize in Nuclear PhysicsOliver W. Buckley Condensed Matter Physics PrizeDavisson-Germer PrizeDannie Heineman Prize for Mathematical PhysicsHigh Polymer Physics PrizeIrving Langmuir PrizeJulius E. Lilienfield PrizeJames C. McGroddy Prize for New MaterialsLars Onsager PrizeGeorge E. Pake PrizeW.K.H. Panofsky PrizeEarle K. Plyler PrizePrize to a Faculty Member for Research in an Undergraduate InstitutionI.I. Rabi PrizeAneesur Rahman PrizeJ.J. Sakurai PrizeArthur L. Schawlow Prize in Laser ScienceRobert R. Wilson Prize

Awards:David Adler Lectureship AwardApker Award (Deadline is June 15, 1998)Edward A. Bouchet AwardAward for Outstanding Doctoral Thesis Research in Beam PhysicsJohn H. Dillon MedalJoseph A. Burton Forum AwardJoseph F. Keithley AwardMaria Goeppert-Mayer AwardDissertation in Nuclear Physics AwardShock Compression AwardLeo Szilard Award for Physics in the Public InterestJohn Wheatley AwardFrancis M. Pipkin AwardNicholas Metropolis Award for Outstanding Thesis Work in Computational PhysicsDissertation in Nuclear Physics Award

PhD �Family-Tree� ContestAPS News is holding a special Centennial PhD or �equivalent� lineage contest, inwhich entrants are asked to trace their professional �family tree� � i.e., theproduction of doctoral level physicists by their thesis advisors � as far back aspossible. Prizes will be awarded to those who can trace their PhD lineage backthe farthest, who have the most �generations,� most Nobel Laureates, and othercategories to be determined by the selection panel. Winners will receive prizes,and the most impressive or interesting lineages will be published in a future issueof APS News. See page 3 of the March 1998 issue of APS News for more details.

Entries should be sent to: Editor, APS News, The American Physical Society,College Park, MD 20740 or via E-mail to: letters@aps.org.

The Naval Research Laboratory is celebrat-ing its Diamond Jubilee the week of June 15,1998. A weeklong sequence of events will high-light the achievements of NRL�s past and willpeer into the future. NRL�s achievements rangefrom discovery and early development of ra-dar to key developments in navigationtechnology that led to the Global PositioningSystem. These innovations, among others, havecontributed to shaping the 20th century and havebrought cutting edge technology to the US de-fense.

For more information about NRL�s DiamondJubilee, daily schedule of the celebration events,and information about tours, demonstrationsand exhibits, see the NRL web site[www.nrl.navy.mil].

The Naval Research Laboratory isCelebrating its 75 th Anniversary

N A V A L R E S E A R C HL A B O R A T O R Y

APS News June 1998

12

THE BACK PAGE

The Back Page is intended as a forum to foster discussion on topics of interest to the scientific community. Opinions expressed are not necessarily those of the APS, its elected officers, or staff. APS News welcomesand encourages letters and submissions from its members responding to these and other issues. Responses may be sent to: letters@aps.org.

Keep Tenure: Fix the Problemsby Frank A. Franz

Let me begin with a statement ofdisclosure. I believe that a well-

administered system of tenure is beneficialto a university, and to its constituents. Igenerally support AAUP (The AmericanAssociation of University Professors)policies and procedures in these matters.I also think that some changes, at someplaces, almost certainly are necessary. Mycredentials in these matters are simplythose of a expatriate physicist inAdministration who has had experienceand interest in tenure issues at faculty andcampus administrative levels at severalresearch universities.

We could spend many pages discuss-ing why faculty tenure in a university is(or is not) a worthy institution. That’snot my purpose here. It is appropriate,however, to provide some backgroundby referring to a few phrases in the 1940Statement of Principles on Academic Free-dom and Tenure, endorsed by the AAUPand many professional societies:

On faculty and academic freedom:“…full freedom in research and the pub-lication of the results… freedom in theclassroom discussing their subject… Whenthey speak or write as citizens, they shouldbe free from institutional censorship ordiscipline…”

On economic security: “…a sufficientdegree of economic security to make theprofession attractive to men and womenof ability…” and,

On tenure: “…After expiration of aprobationary period, teachers or investi-gators should have permanent orcontinuous tenure, and their serviceshould be terminated only for ad-equate cause…” (emphasis added).

The connections between tenure, aca-demic freedom, and economic securityhave existed for many years, and are verystrong. For most people, the strongestrationale for tenure is the maintenanceof academic freedom for our faculty, andthe concomitant freedom from coercionor persecution. Tenure, as defined above,provides a powerful buffer against arbi-trary and capricious acts by administratorsor, indeed, by fellow faculty members.The questions most often raised are doesthat protection come at too great a cost,and, if so, are there other ways to pro-vide it?Underlying stresses

It’s important to recognize some un-derlying stresses and demands thatperturb the system. Most of us will agree,I believe, that the creation of the Ameri-can research university is one of the greatachievements of the twentieth century,and that the research university gener-ates extraordinary scientific, educational,economic, and social benefits. But:

How often have you heard the ques-tion, “Why aren’t your full-time facultyteaching our kids?”

Workloads and efficiency of facultyare being questioned, regardless of thestatus of tenure.

The public understands teaching andundergraduate instruction, or thinks thatit does: it places its emphasis there. Re-search is far more remote, more difficultto embrace.

Many citizens have a poor understand-

ing of the function and value of a re-search university.

A growing use of part-time instructorscan add to stress within the university (ten-ured vs. non-tenured vs. part-time). Isthe definition of “the faculty” changing?

Finally, there is the question of evalu-ation and assessment – of what, bywhom, and with what effect is it carriedout? There tends to be a misleading im-age of faculty removed from scrutiny,evaluation, and “control.”

Tenure often becomes a scapegoat inthese more pervasive issues.

The most important issues at stake inconsiderations of tenure policies are, Ibelieve, post-tenure review and the bur-den of proof; standards for the removalof tenure; locus of tenure; and what, ex-actly, is tenured.Post-tenure review and the burdenof proof

The concept of “post-tenure” reviewis one of the most controversial issuesfacing faculties and administrations today.Obscured, at times, is the crucial issue ofwho bears the burden of proof in ten-ure-related personnel matters.

In the process leading to the awardof tenure, a faculty member typicallypresents his or her record of accomplish-ment in teaching, research, and service.A succession of intensive evaluations, rec-ommendations, and judgments of thatrecord, usually incorporating some degreeof appraisal external to the university, thenfollows. Throughout the probationaryperiod that culminates in this process, theburden of proof is on the facultymember to demonstrate his or her suit-ability for the award of tenure.

The granting of tenure, as we see fromthe quotation recalled earlier, confers apermanent appointment in which one’sservice can be terminated only for ad-equate cause. In considering thedismissal of a faculty member from atenured appointment, therefore, the bur-den of proof falls on the university.This matter of the shifting of the burdenof proof from the faculty member to theuniversity once a person reaches tenuredstatus is of fundamental importance inthe protection of academic freedom, andis deeply enmeshed in the very fabric ofthe university.

A problem in many proposals for post-tenure review is that periodic reevaluation,recertification, or re-qualification of thefaculty member usually is implied. That’susually taken to mean “re-tenuring,” and,at the very least, represents a radical shift-ing of the burden of proof from theuniversity back onto the faculty member.It’s very suspect, and very threatening. Isone innocent until proven guilty, or guiltyuntil proven innocent? At the same time,most observers would agree, I believe,that tenure should not bestow upon onea shield that provides immunity againstassessment of one’s performance andevaluation of one’s contributions to theuniversity.Annual reviews offer a solution

A reasonable compromise is possiblein these matters. Meaningful annual re-views can be mandated for all faculty.We already require such reviews for pro-

bationary faculty: why should tenuredfaculty be exempt? Indeed, many uni-versities already follow such a policy, orsomething reasonably close to it. Pos-sible outcomes of such reviews includerecognition of successes, contributions,and deficiencies; determination of salaryincreases; possible redistribution ofworkload; and possible provision of de-velopmental assistance.

A somewhat more controversial, butnecessary, requirement is an understand-ing that a pattern of problems found inannual reviews should result in correc-tive action. Continued deficiencies, ifsubstantial enough, should lead into aseparate and distinct process in whichmore severe sanctions, including dismissal,are possible. It is imperative that anyprocess leading to the imposition of sub-stantial sanctions include participation andendorsement by peer faculty.

There is a crucial difference betweenthe approach suggested here, and themore standard notion of post-tenure re-view. Here, the burden of proof thatdisciplinary action is required clearly re-mains with the university. Typicalsafeguards for the preservation of tenureremain. There, the burden of proof fallson the faculty member to show that heor she should be continued in a tenuredappointment: the presumption of “perma-nent or continuous tenure” is gravelyweakened.Standards for the removal of tenure

One of the prevalent arguments againsttenure is that it provides a sinecure forthe unproductive. Present standards forthe dismissal of a tenured faculty mem-ber usually require the demonstration ofincompetence, dishonesty, neglect ofduty, or financial exigency. But whatshould our response be to a continued,unmitigated pattern of severely inad-equate performance? Inadequacy is notincompetence. It is a stretch, too, to con-sider inadequacy equivalent to neglect of duty.

If public confidence in the universityis to be maintained, and if externally im-posed mandates for more Draconianmeasures affecting all faculty membersare to be avoided, confidence must existthat the university deals effectively withcases of inadequate performance. Pro-gressive actions to address inadequateperformance must be available, andshould include the ultimate possibility ofdismissal.Other issues

A person’s tenure is usually consideredto be campus specific, but where, withinthe campus, does it actually reside? Doesit apply to the department, program, col-lege, or entire campus? If a university closesits Dental School, does it have an obliga-tion to find positions for the affected tenuredfaculty in, say, departments of Physics andEnglish? AAUP policies suggest a campus-wide locus for tenure, but actual policiesaround the country differ greatly.

I believe that tenure is granted mostappropriately in a person’s academic de-partment, or discipline, where one’scredentials for teaching and research havebeen proved. Granting of tenure through-out a college makes a more problematiccommitment and assumption on the ap-

propriateness of a person’s qualificationsfor reassignment to other areas, should thatbe necessary at some later time. Grantingof tenure in a unit smaller than a depart-ment can place a person at undue risk ofprogram termination due to changing em-phases among sub-disciplines.

To what extent, if any, is salary pro-tected by tenure? This question isparticularly important in units where a fac-ulty member may be tenured, but may beexpected (required) to earn a substantialportion of his or her salary from profes-sional practice. What happens if theopportunity to earn that portion is unavail-able? In a more general circumstance, cana university continue someone’s tenuredappointment, but reduce his or her salarysharply? Answers are often not clear andwell defined in institutional policy. Butthey should be.

Finally, some universities, mine amongthem, have a long responded to specialneeds by making a limited number of ap-pointments of research faculty or clinicalfaculty. Expected levels of performancecorrespond to those of regular faculty, butresponsibilities are more narrowly focussed.These positions carry a high degree of pro-fessional recognition and respect; conferan intermediate degree of job security; butusually do not include the promise of ten-ure. Such appointments appear to workwell as long as they are kept clearly dis-tinct from regular faculty appointments inscope of expectations, and are kept lim-ited in number.A final thought

While various kinds of reform in Ameri-can higher education are often proposed,and are often appropriate, our overall sys-tem of higher education remains the envyof the world. The institution of tenure isfirmly and inextricably rooted in that sys-tem. Modifications, where necessary, canbe made through cooperation between fac-ulty, administrators, and governing boards.Any benefits believed obtainable throughmore radical actions are, I believe, far out-weighed by wrenching and destructivecosts.

This talk was based on an invited pa-per presentation at the 150th AAASmeeting.

Frank Franz is President of the Univer-sity of Alabama in Huntsville. Previously,he served as Provost at West Virginia Uni-versity, and the Dean of Faculties atIndiana University, Bloomington.

Editor’s note: The APS has appointed atask force on the subject of tenure (see page7). Readers are encouraged to send com-ments to: letters@aps.org.