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Physics and Astronomy Colloquium Series
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Talks are scheduled for Thursdays at 12:40 PM in Room N304 of the Science and Engineering Building, unless otherwise indicated. Pizza and beverages are served at 12:20PM.
All are welcome!
Date |
Talk |
Thursday
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No Colloquium |
Thursday
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Summer Student Poster DayThe department hallways will be decorated by posters by Union College physics majors who participated in summer research this year. The authors will stand by their posters to discuss their work and answer our questions while we all enjoy lunch during our first official colloquium of the new academic year.
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Thursday
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available
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Thursday
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Novel Applications of Molecular Spectroscopy to Cultural Heritage and Biomedical Fields of Study Tom Tague
Recent technological advances in key components used in spectroscopic analysis have allowed the application of spectroscopy to samples smaller in size and concentrations than previously possible. About ten years ago Focal Plane Array (FPA) detectors were declassified for infrared spectroscopic use. The use of FPA's eliminated the largest source of increased noise when measuring small samples via infrared microanalysis, the field aperture. Subsequently, the spatial resolution of infrared microscopic analysis was limited only by diffraction. The more recent application of point spread deconvolution mathematics to resultant FPA images has resulted in data collection to 2-3x better than the wavelength of light. Lastly, the incorporation of ultra-bright sources, such as synchrotron light sources and quantum cascade lasers (QCL) has provided further access to samples in water or are highly scattering. Tissue and art samples have been analyzed utilizing these new tools to demonstrate the ability to chemically characterize samples beyond the diffraction limit.
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Thursday
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"Life After Union Physics; Stories by Alumni About Non-Grad School Options" Holly Burnside, Anna Hurst, Colin Fletcher, Justin King, and Bob Marvel.
A panel of Union physics alumni who pursued career paths different from going straight to physics graduate school will discuss their career experiences.
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Thursday
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A Sound Way to Measure Nanostructures: Ultrafast Optics and Picosecond UltrasonicsBrian Daly
We can take it for granted that progress in nanoscale science and technology in the coming
decades will depend heavily on imaging and sensing methods with nanometer resolution. A
number of established techniques can provide us with this resolution (e.g. electron microscopy,
atomic force microscopy) but these are restricted to objects on or very near the surface of
a sample. A wide range of nanostructures are currently under development across the spectrum
of the sciences, and in many cases these structures come in the form of multi-layered stacks.
As such, a method for the study of buried nanostructures and films is required.
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Thursday
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The Early History of Entanglement: EPR before 1935 Lousa Gilder
Heisenberg said that "science is rooted in conversations." If the conversations aren't clear, the science can suffer. This is what happened to the foundations of quantum mechanics in the early 1930s--mis-communication derailed progress. I will talk about two examples. |
Thursday
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none |
Thursday
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none
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Thursday
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Department Pot Luck
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Schedule for Winter Term 2012 |
Back to Physics and Astronomy Department Homepage
Last Updated: 6 October 2010