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Physics, Politics, Pop Culture
"Uncertain Principles" features the miscellaneous ramblings of a physicist at a small liberal arts college. Physics, politics, pop culture, and occasional conversations with his dog.
You've read the blog, now try the book: How to Teach Physics to Your Dog will be published December 22nd by Scribner.
"Prof. Orzel gives the impression of an everyday guy who just happens to have a vast but hidden knowledge of physics." (anonymous student evaluation comment)
Emmy is a German Shepherd mix, and the Queen of Niskayuna. She likes treats, walks, chasing bunnies, and quantum physics.
Category: Physics
One of my pet peeves about physics as perceived by the public and presented in the media is the way that everyone assumes that all physicists are theoretical particle physicists. Matt Springer points out another example of this, in this...
Posted by Chad Orzel at 11:31 AM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Science
In the time that I've been at Union, I have suffered a number of lab disasters. I've had lasers killed in freak power outages. I've had lasers die because of odd electrical issues. My lab has flooded not once, not...
Posted by Chad Orzel at 10:52 PM • 30 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Blogs
Dave Ng has recently upgraded the Order of the Science Scouts of Exemplary Repute and Above Average Physique site, which provides a variety of achievement badges for members to claim and post. I'm not a big one for extra graphics...
Posted by Chad Orzel at 9:27 AM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: MXP
Over the past several weeks, I've written up ResearchBlogging posts on each of the papers I helped write in graduate school. Each paper write-up was accompanied by a "Making of" article, giving a bit more detail about how the experiments...
Posted by Chad Orzel at 10:09 AM • 4 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: MXP
Thesis writing, too much signal, and the power of pulsed lasers.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 11:17 AM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: MXP
"Quantum mechanics is magic," "Who came up with this word, 'ballistic?'" and McDonald's cheeseburgers.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 9:17 AM • 4 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: MXP
Collegiality, the "one-afternoon experiment" that took three months, and the "biological lock."
Posted by Chad Orzel at 10:37 AM • 1 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: MXP
In a previous paper, we applied the light for a long period, and measured the change in the collision rate; here, we applied the light for a very short time, and watched the collisions happen in real time.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 10:13 AM • 5 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Physics
In which the first signal is the published data, and I develop a skewed idea of the research life.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 10:42 AM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Physics
In a series of forthcoming posts, I'll go through the four experimental papers that formed the core of my thesis research on metastable xenon. I'll also try to tell some stories about what it was like to do those experiments-- the personal nitty-gritty details that you don't get from the papers themselves.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 9:52 AM • 10 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
