Dear students,

 

Fall 2009 will be my 2nd consecutive semester as the instructor for Physics Seminar (PHYS 6/8020) here at UT in P&A.  The format of the class has changed from last semester (more information below).  I look forward to working with both new and continuing students on the primary goals of this class:

 

Goals

  1. Improving each student’s skills and experience in the preparation and delivery of effective scientific presentations;
  2. Each student arriving at the end of their talk with a feeling of confidence and satisfaction that accompanies the delivery of an effective and engaging presentation;*
  3. Integrate and apply your physics knowledge within your presentation;
  4. Exposure of students to an array of current, interesting, and important research topics in the areas of condensed matter, materials science, chemical physics, atomic and molecular physics, nanoscale physics, and other active physics topics.**

 

*  This goal (#2) involves hard work – to carefully and thoughtfully define your talk’s topic area, fully research the relevant background, prepare effective graphics, and practice your talk until you’ve smoothed out all possible rough spots.  That means (a) arriving at as complete an understanding of the topic as possible, (b) honing and integrating (into your brain, sort of like memorizing) the salient points for each slide, transition, and graphic, and (c) practicing your delivery of the presentation until every key point is so-called ‘second nature’ for you.  It’s this level of preparation that enables your audience to leave the talk having absorbed much of what you know by the time you give your preparation.

 

**  This goal depends on you, the students;  accomplishing #2 will result in #4 – i.e. the class will gain significant insight into many areas of current research at UT and elsewhere in Physics and closely-related fields.

 

Previous Format

The P&A Dept. has two seminar courses for graduate students – one for Astronomy and the other for Physics.  The Astronomy Seminar is an hour brown-bag lunchtime seminar which brings consistent attendance and participation from the Astronomy faculty.  In Physics Seminar, the recent format has had each student present one short talk per semester, approximately 15 minutes in length, on a paper, their current research, or another assigned or chosen topic of current interest in Physics.

 

New Format

In an effort to improve the value of this course to the students, and potentially to encourage stronger faculty participation, we will try a more substantial format in which each student will present at least one full-length (~40 minutes) talk during the year.  As in Astronomy Seminar, students in their first semester of UT P&A graduate school will be excused from giving a talk (they’ll speak in the 2nd half of the year).

 

Topic Selection

Each student is responsible for selecting the topic of their presentation, with concurrence of the instructor.  Students engaged in active research projects for their Masters or Doctoral studies are encouraged to select a topic either directly related to, or strongly supportive, of their research.  Students who are not yet engaged in research should choose a topic of interest to them, either (a) for their anticipated area of thesis research, (b) to solidify and present results from previous research (e.g., in the case of a student who received a Masters degree elsewhere, or the student who is transitioning from one area of Physics/Astronomy to another area), or (c) to explore another Physics interest they hold and to present the results of the research on that topic to the other students.

 

Technical details, and components to your presentation:

 

  1. Presentation length:  class is formally 50 minutes, so please limit your talk to ~ 40 minutes to leave time for discussion and questions.
  2. Title and abstract, required at least one week in advance of your talk.
  3. Advance discussion of topic, finding sources, etc.:  you are encouraged to interact with any relevant P&A faculty in identifying starting points for references, and for identifying key themes.  You should expect to reference many (20+) scientific publications as you prepare your talk;  cite the appropriate sources as you refer to them, and include a slide on which you list all references.  You can schedule two 30-minute meetings with me, or a single hour-long meeting, to discuss your topic and ideas on an effective presentation.

 

First Class

The first class will be Aug. 26th in MH4009 at 4 pm.  During this class, we will review the goals of the class, discuss scientific presentations, choose topic areas (and specific topics for those students speaking in the first several weeks), and answer questions you may have.

 

I have set up a web page with course information, so please refer to it as you prepare for the class:

 

http://astro1.panet.utoledo.edu/~relling2/teach/fall09_phys_sem.html

 

See you Wednesday.

 

Randy