Now on ScienceBlogs: The Galaxy's Biggest Valentine
Thoughts on physics, politics, and pop culture, by a physics professor at a small liberal arts college, plus occasional conversations with his dog.
You've read the blog, now try the books! How to Teach Physics to Your Dog is published by Scribner, and available wherever books are sold. How to Teach Relativity to Your Dog is published by Basic Books and will be available 2/28/2012, as foretold by the Maya.
"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.
"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: Academia
Via Bee, we have the BlaBlaMeter, a website that purports to "unmask without mercy how much bullshit hides in any text." Like Bee, I couldn't resist throwing it some scientific text, but rather than pulling stuff off the arxiv, I...
Posted by Chad Orzel at 2:50 PM • 12 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
Adding a green laser to push into a new and exciting regime of plasma physics.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 10:51 AM • 8 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
Adding one neutron to each atom in an ultra-cold sample can stop them from colliding at all.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 9:06 AM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: MXP
I was rather surprised to receive a notice from the editors saying that the article had been accepted on the strength of Referee A's report only.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 10:52 AM • 0 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: MXP
How we got beat to the results of the optical lattice paper, but it all worked out in the end.
Posted by Chad Orzel at 11:27 AM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
