SAIP Newsletter - May 2004 Editor: Judith Ncapayi (ncapayi@tlabs.ac.za) (A) SAIP matters Miss Jaynie Padayachee : Secretary@saip.org.za 1. Affiliation News The SAIP has signed affiliation agreements with the Astronomy Society of Southern Africa, the South African Spectroscopic Society and with the South African Association of Physicists in Medicine and Biology. The affiliation agreement with the South African Acoustics Society is being finalised. Details of the varioius agreements will be available on the website, shortly. 2. Council The next Council meeting will be held on Tuesday, 29 June 2004 in Bloemfontein. Please submit any items that you wish to be discussed to the Secretary, before 15 June 2004. 3. 49th Annual General Meeting The 2004 AGM will be held on Friday, 2 July 2004. The agenda will be sent out in June. (B) "Mysteries in my Bank Statements" Prof Japie Engelbrecht - japie.engelbrecht@upe.ac.za Honorary Treasurer : SAIP I am still battling to solve some "crimes" : those persons who pay their membership fees directly into the SAIP's bank account, but who do not inform me. I enjoy the mysteries each month in trying to figure out who paid, and feel like Sherlock Holmes. With great joy when I discover e.g. that the number "142" in the Bank Statement is actually member Engelbrecht. However, it is not always possible to crack the code. For example, the words "UCT" or "RAU" or "NRF" really has me baffled. I tried tarrot cards, "Your stars today", etc. but even that did not bring up the member's name. In the last financial year, there were 11 payments which I could not link to particular members. SO : if you received an "In Arrears" statement, knowing fully well you have paid, then do not blame me. Blame the electronic age, blame the stars, blame "the incompetent fool", but do not blame the Treasurer IF YOU DID NOT LET ME KNOW you made a payment. Please feel offended, and then just fax me proof of payment to (041) 504-2583. Or email me the proof at japie.engelbrecht@upe.ac.za (the old "phajae@upe.ac.za" also still works). (Just emailing the words "I paid" will NOT get you out of trouble .... ). (C) Job opportunities - HartRAO / SKA Dr Mike Gaylard - mike@hartrao.ac.za The Hartbeesthoek Radio Astronomy Observatory is a National Facility which runs radio astronomy and space geodesy research programmes. We are also engaged in research and technology development towards the next-generation radio telescope, the Square Kilometer Array, which is an international collaborative project intended to go well beyond the boundaries of current technology. We have vacancies for a microwave engineer, a computer engineer and post-Doctoral students for research and development for HartRAO and SKA. For more information see www.hartrao.ac.za. (D) Winter School: Introduction to Space Physics Dr Peter Sutcliffe : psutcliffe@hmo.ac.za The Hermanus Magnetic Observatory (HMO) will host a winter school from 5 to 10 July 2004 for final year BSc students majoring in physics. The winter school will include lectures, videos, and internet sessions in order to give students a basic introduction to the Earth's space environment. Topics will include: * Basic concepts in space plasma physics. * Structure and variations of the Earth's magnetic field. * The sun, solar activity, and the solar wind. * Structure of the ionosphere and plasmasphere. * Structure and dynamics of the magnetosphere. * The effects of space weather on man's technological systems. Further information on the HMO and winter school is available from the HMO's website at http://www.hmo.ac.za (E) Conference Announcements : (i) SQM2004 Prof J Cleymans The VIIIth International Conference on strangeness in quark matter (SQM2004) will be held from 15 - 20 September in Cape Town. The conference will focus on the physics of strange quarks in matter and heavy flavour (c,b) production in nuclei, including their role in characterizing hot hadronic matter and quark-gluon plasma formation. In addition to recent theoretical work, new results from experiments at the GSI, AGS, SPS and RHIC will be presented. The future heavy-ion programme at the LHC will also be discussed. This is a well-established conference bringing together scientists working in the fields of cosmology, particle and nuclear physics. Previous conferences were held in North Carolina (2003), Frankfurt (2001), Padova (1998), Santorini (1997), Budapest (1996), Tucson (1995), Crete (1994), Aarhus (1991). More details can be found at http://hep.phy.uct.ac.za/sqm2004 (ii) SAAPMB Miss Jaynie Padayachee : secretary@saip.org.za The 44th Annual Congress of the South African Association of Physicists in Medicine and Biology will be held from 22 to 23 September 2004 at the Johannesburg Hospital. Details can be found at http://www.wits.ac.za/SAAPMB. (F) Conference Report "Conference on Photo-responsive Materials" Prof Andrew Leitch (phaawl@upe.ac.za) The Department of Physics at the University of Port Elizabeth recently organized a very successful Conference on Photo-responsive Materials, held at the Kariega Game Reserve in the Eastern Cape. It was held under the auspices of the Condensed Matter Physics and Materials Science (CMPMS) subgroup of the South African Institute of Physics. The name "photo-responsive materials" refers to the class of materials used in the manufacture of devices such as solar cell, diodes (LEDs) and lasers. This is obviously one of the research focus areas of the UPE Physics Department. There were approximately 60 delegates who attended the conference. Countries represented were: UK, US, Norway, Sweden, Germany, Finland, Estonia, Austria, as well as Tanzania, Zambia, Lesotho and South Africa. The venue was ideal: being a residential conference, meals and social activities were enjoyed together. For the overseas guests (most of whom had never been to SA before), this turned out to be an incredible experience. The refereed proceedings of the conference will be published by Physica Status Solidi - a top journal published by Wiley in Germany. All in all, the conference proved to be a wonderful success, and has led to several new collaborative research ties with members of the Physics Department. (G) Report on WYP-2005 meeting Prof. P K Jain - jainpk@mopipi.ub.bw Professor P K Jain, Department of Physics, University of Botswana attended the second preparatory meeting for the World Year of Physics - 2005 (WYP-2005) in Montreal, Canada from 19 to 21 March 2004. The meeting was attended by 70 delegates from 30 countries who presented their plans of activities in their respective countries. The continent of Africa was represented by delegates form Tanzania, Ghana and Botswana. The WYP-2005 shall be officially launched simultaneously in Paris, France and in Trieste, Italy in January 2005. The year 2005 marks the 100th anniversary of the miraculous year of discovery published by Einstein that gave birth to what we call today the modern physics. During WYP-2005 public outreach activities are planned throughout the world by local groups to enrich the appreciation of physics by general public who would not normally experience physics. Schools, colleges, and universities shall be targeted to diminish science phobias, to motivate students to venture into physics/science based careers, and to inspire a new generation of scientists. The WYP celebrations will take place over a 500-day period that begins in October 2004 and culminates in February 2006. Details can be found at www.physics2005.org