University of Utah Department of Physics & Astronomy
Biannual Newsletter | Spring 2018 | Volume 6, Issue 2
A New
SPIN on Electronics page 6
In This Issue Building an Efficient Logistics System with Molecular Biophysics. . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 An Appreciation for Space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 A New Spin on Electronics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 A Fundamental Curiosity about the World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Christoph Boehme Receives U Award . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 Anil Seth Is Recognized for Early Teaching Career Award. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 Finding the Beauty in Physics and Math. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 New Development Coordinator Named for Physics & Astronomy Department. . . 11 Students Attend Conferences for Undergraduate Women in Physics. . . . . . . . . 12 Awards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
The Crocker Science Center is housed in the historic and newly renovated George Thomas Building.
The center serves as a world-class facility for science education through the addition of state-of-the-art teaching laboratories and flexible classroom spaces combined with integrated advising and tutoring centers.
Message from the Chair The University of Utah Department of Physics & Astronomy is recognized for its excellence in teaching and research at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. Our mission is to advance knowledge about the appearances and interactions of energy and matter and of celestial objects and phenomena. We strive to share this knowledge with students and the wider community through our teaching and outreach programs. During the 2017-2018 academic year, our faculty has continued to excel in teaching, research, and training, and their efforts and accomplishments have been recognized by numerous awards and distinctions, which are highlighted in this newsletter. The new Crocker Science Center (CSC) on Presidents Circle began serving students, faculty, and staff in January and was formally dedicated in April. The building has been completely renovated to provide a world-class facility for science education through the addition of state-of-the-art teaching laboratories and flexible classroom spaces combined with integrated advising and tutoring centers. The design and construction of the CSC support a renewed focus on the undergraduate curriculum in the Physics & Astronomy Department. Two of our professors are leading efforts to reinvigorate the introductory physics sequence taken by life science and health science majors. The reforms will create new and more relevant ways for students to learn and apply physics knowledge to living systems.
Peter E. Trapa
The Crimson Laureate Society (CLS) was established by the College of Science in May 2017. The charter of the Society is to build a community of alumni and friends who are passionate about the advancement of scientific research and education at the University of Utah, which includes mathematics, biology, chemistry, and physics and astronomy. For more information on how to support the Physics & Astronomy Department through the Society, please contact the College of Science at 801-5816958 or visit https://science.utah.edu/cls.
Sincerely,
Peter E. Trapa Chair Department of Physics & Astronomy
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Building an Efficient Logistics System with Molecular Biophysics
Michael Vershinin, assistant professor of physics and astronomy and adjunct assistant professor of biology at the U, uses math, physics, and chemistry in his biology-centered research. “To me, biology is the study of life, and physics provides a way for such studies at all levels of resolution to be expressed in the language of math,” said Vershinin, “All of the disciplines not only complement each other in my work—they are increasingly inseparable.” Vershinin’s lab is currently focused on the properties of the microtubule cytoskeleton and the associated cargo transport. He is interested in how individual molecular motors, which move cargos, can be regulated by various biochemical factors and biophysical parameters. Beyond that, he and his team want to know how to take this local machinery and build an efficient logistics system out of it. Michael Vershinin
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Research on Cargos and Logistics “Life is not static, so one of the key things that is essential to life is the ability to move things around,” said Vershinin. “For example, in our society we have roads, which form a network for distributing cargos and various cars and trucks, which do the actual moving. The overall strategy employed by cells is often surprisingly similar. My lab studies “roads” inside of cells, called microtubules, and we can study the “cars,” often referred to as molecular motors. But most importantly, we study how it all adds up to an efficient logistics system. We’re trying to find answers to the following questions: How does the distribution of cargos change if the layout of the microtubule network changes? Does it change where the cargos go? How fast they get there? We’re also interested in how the delivery systems in cells change with environmental parameters. In particular, we’re currently investigating how cargo motion in cells depends on temperature.” Vershinin’s research has many practical applications because logistics are at the heart of everything else that happens inside cells. For example, many neurodegenerative dementias, such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases, are associated with breakdowns in transport. In some cases, malfunctioning transport can even be identified as the cause of the disease. “When cells start to break down, their internal logistics tend to change,” he said, “so the issues we’re studying are crucial to understanding disease development and progression for many diseases and types of cells.”
Undergraduate and Graduate Years Vershinin experienced an intense undergraduate engineering program at Cooper Union that was much like a four-year boot camp. But it also allowed
him to take diverse classes, from number theory and elliptic curves to Shakespeare. He continued his studies at the University of Illinois, UrbanaChampaign, focusing on physics. As part of his doctoral program, he joined a new lab, designed an instrument, built and calibrated it, performed measurements, and wrote the data analysis code for it. “My science, math, and engineering skills were all taxed to the max during that time, but is was well worth it,” he said. Vershinin is grateful for the support of mentors in his career. “I had a wonderful physics teacher in my senior year of high school who dared to teach us Maxwell’s theory of electromagnetism in full vector calculus glory. It made me appreciate physics for the first time,” he said. “My graduate advisor, Dr. Ali Yazdani, now professor of physics at Princeton, made a huge impact on me as a scientist in virtually every respect. My postdoctoral advisor, Dr. Steven Gross, professor at the Department of Developmental and Cell Biology at the School of Biological Sciences at the University of California, Irvine, has helped me integrate into the world of biophysical research and has been a major inspiration for me.” In moving forward on his research, Vershinin believes scientists have just started to understand how complexity emerges in intracellular transport. Currently, they have no idea what makes cargo distribution robust, how to regulate and direct it globally, and how it can fall apart in diseases. “While advancements are made every day,” he says, “we don’t know how it all adds up to a full logistics system. As we move forward, we’ll begin to understand these things. Molecular biophysics is still a young, vibrant, and fast-developing field where the possibilities are endless. I’m excited to be a part of it.” 3
An Appreciation for Space For nearly twenty years, scientists and institutions around the world have been part of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), which has helped map millions of stars and galaxies and created some of the most detailed three-dimensional images of the universe. Gail Zasowski, assistant professor of physics and astronomy at the U, has been involved with the SDSS for many years and now serves as the spokesperson for SDSS-V (the fifth generation of the SDSS), which begins in 2020.
Gail Zasowski
“We’re already at work even though we don’t officially begin collecting data for two years,” said Zasowski. “I’m excited to represent the University of Utah in building on what we’ve learned from previous surveys and using new technology to help us continue to map individual stars in the Milky Way.” SDSS-V, however, will map more than stars. It will also help scientists make maps of giant gas emission in the Milky Way and nearby galaxies and measure properties of supermassive black holes and giant clusters of galaxies that existed in the early universe. “Gathering this data will help us answer some of the big questions we have, such as the relationship between black holes and their host galaxies across cosmic time,” said Zasowski. “In addition, the information will help us better understand the processes that make up the different chemical elements we find in space.”
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Motions and Chemistry of Stars Zasowski is currently focusing on the motions and chemistry of stars in the dense inner parts of the Milky Way, where most of the stars and the oldest remnants of the very young galaxy live. She also works on tracing the motions of giant interstellar dust clouds in the galaxy, as they carry heavy elements made in supernovae and old stars that are incorporated into later generations of stars. She received her undergraduate degree in physics from the University of Tennessee at Knoxville and her Ph.D. at the University of Virginia.
Moving to Utah After serving as a National Science Foundation postdoc at Ohio State as well as at Johns Hopkins, Zasowski moved on to the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. In the summer of 2017, she and her husband, Daniel Wik, both moved to Utah as assistant professors in the Physics & Astronomy Department. Zasowski also is interested in providing educational outreach activities for younger students. “Astronomy is great for bringing out the sense of awe and wonder in kids,” she noted. “It helps them understand science while giving them the tools to solve problems. These educational activities are important because they give students a perspective and an appreciation for space—it helps them see they’re part of something much larger.” 5
A New Spin on Electronics In 1991, University of Utah chemist Joel Miller developed the first magnet with carbon-based, or organic, components that was stable at room temperature. It was a great advance in magnetics, and he’s been exploring the applications ever since.
“With a magnon, you now have a way to broadcast information in a material,” says physics professor and paper co-author Boehme. “You can think about magnonics like electronics. You have circuitry, and when you manage to build digital logic out of this, you can also build computers.”
Twenty-five years later, physicists Christoph Boehme and Valy Vardeny demonstrated a method to convert quantum waves into electrical current. They too, knew they’d discovered something important, but didn’t know its application.
Although magnons have been known to science for decades, only recently has their potential for building electronics been realized.
Now those technologies have come together and could be the first step toward a new generation of faster, more efficient, and more flexible electronics. Working together, Miller, Boehme, Vardeny and their colleagues have shown that an organic-based magnet can carry waves of quantum mechanical magnetization, called magnons, and convert those waves to electrical signals. It’s a breakthrough for the field of magnonics (electronic systems that use magnons instead of electrons), because magnons had previously been sent through inorganic materials that are more difficult to handle. “Going to these organic materials, we have an opportunity to push magnonics into an area that is more controllable than inorganic materials,” Miller says. Their results are published in Nature Materials.
How Magnonics Works What is a magnon is and how is it used in electronics? Current electronics use electrons to carry information along wires. Magnons can also conduct information through materials, but instead of being composed of electrons, magnons are waves composed of a quantum property called spin. The quantum version of the spinbased wave is a magnon.
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Currently, most magnonics researchers are using yttrium iron garnet (YIG) as their wave carrier material. It’s expensive and difficult to produce, especially as a thin film or wire. Boehme says he once considered incorporating YIG into one of his instruments and had to give up because the material proved so problematic to handle for that particular application.
Assembling the Team Boehme and Vardeny, distinguished professor of physics, also study the field of alternatives to electronics called spintronics, of which magnonics is a subfield. In 2016 they showed how to straightforwardly observe the “inverse spin Hall effect,” a way to convert spin waves into electrical current. They began working together with Miller through the National Science Foundation-funded Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (MRSEC) at the University of Utah. They discussed Miller’s production of the first magnetic material using organic, or carbon-based, components. The three decided to test Miller’s organic magnet to see if it could be used as an alternative to YIG in magnonics materials. They tested for electron spin resonance (ESR), a measure of how long magnons would last in the material. The narrower the ESR line, the longerlived the magnons.
From left: Joel Miller, Royce Davidson, Hans Malissa, Haoliang Liu, Photo by: Eric V. Campbell
and Christoph Boehme
The line was very narrow indeed, Vardeny says. “It’s a record narrow line.” But working with the organic-based magnet, known as vanadium tetracyanoethylene or V(TCNE)x, still presented some challenges. The material is highly sensitive to oxygen, akin to rare-earth magnets. “If it’s freshly made, it’ll likely catch fire,” Miller says. “It’ll lose its magnetism.” The team needed to handle the thin films of V(TCNE)x under low-oxygen conditions. Conducting experiments required a concert of activity, with members of the research team each at their right place at the right time to carry on the next phase of the experiment. “Count the number of authors on the paper,” Boehme says. (There are fourteen.) “Every time we carried out an experiment, everyone had to stand there and be ready on time to participate in this process.” It began with one of Miller’s students arriving at 4 a.m. to prepare a precursor material and continued for two to three days continuously as research teams passed the baton of material and data. Not every experimental run was successful. Early on, the team learned that the copper connector they were using to convert magnons into electricity using the inverse spin Hall effect was reacting with the V(TCNE)x and thus wouldn’t work. A switch to platinum contacts in the next run was successful.
Promising Results In the end, the team reported that they were able to generate stable magnons in organic magnets and convert those spin waves into electrical signals — a major stepping stone. The stability of the magnons in the V(TCNE)x was as good as that in YIG. The researchers are hopeful that this advance will lead to more progress toward magnonics replacing electronics, since magnonic systems could be smaller and faster than current systems with less heat loss and much less energy required. Conventional electronics operate on a scale of volts, Boehme says. Magnons operate on a scale of millivolts, containing around 1,000 times less energy. The team next hopes to work toward magnonic circuits using V(TCNE)x and also test other materials. “There are many organic-based magnets,” Boehme says. “There’s no reason to believe that if you randomly pick one, it’s necessarily the best.” It’s yet to be seen, though, what the promise of magnonics might bring beyond faster, smaller and more efficient electronics. “We can’t anticipate,” Miller says, “what we can’t anticipate.”
A V(TCNE)x thin film with an inverse spin Hall effect detector.
Photo by: Eric V. Campbell
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A Fundamental Curiosity about the World Before Teddy Anderson began her undergraduate career, she spent nearly twenty years traveling the world as a river and mountain guide. She learned a lot about astronomy by sleeping mostly outside, and she loved teaching it to others. Her interest in astronomy was further piqued during an eight-month stint in Antarctica doing construction work at the U.S. Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station, a small research community where the astronomers were always willing to teach her about their research and equipment.
Teddy Anderson
When Anderson started classes at Salt Lake Community College, she slowly began working her way through three years of math until she could confidently declare herself a physics major when she transferred to the U. “I immediately embraced the challenge of being a student,” said Anderson. “My background had taught me that anything worth doing is worth doing well, and that the more challenging something is, the greater its rewards. Physics is definitely challenging and has been a good fit for me. I originally started on the astrophysics track but soon switched to pre-professional physics, while doing astronomy research on the side.” In May 2019, Anderson will graduate from the U with an Honors Bachelor of Science degree in physics and a minor in chemistry.
The Elusive Planet Nine Anderson has been working with Dr. Benjamin Bromley, professor and past chair of the Physics & Astronomy Department, and his associate Dr. Aaron Meisner, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, Berkeley. Together, they have been analyzing telescope data to look for Planet Nine, a hypothetical giant planet thought to be located in the outer solar system. The existence of Planet Nine was proposed in 2014 by astronomers at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington, D.C., and the Gemini Observatory in Hawaii. Ongoing research indicates that Planet Nine could be about ten times more massive than the earth, with a diameter two to four times that of our planet, and with an elongated orbit lasting approximately 15,000 years. “Our research at the U has determined that if the hypothesized Planet Nine exists, it’s not emitting strong infrared radiation in the W1 waveband,” said Anderson. “Next, we’ll look for the planet in the slightly longer W2 waveband.” Anderson notes that Dr. Bromley has been a great mentor. “He’s always shown a willingness to include me in projects big and small and has spent hours training me in research methods. He is supportive of efforts for student success and is committed to creating an inclusive environment for women, who are vastly underrepresented in physics.”
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Involvement in Society of Physics Students When Anderson transferred to the U, she wanted to get involved in extracurricular pursuits related to physics. Some of her fellow students had revived the fledgling Society of Physics Students club, and Anderson jumped on board. Since then, the club has built a new website, installed permanent displays in the physics building, purchased equipment for community outreach programs, and developed activities to involve U physics students. Anderson is president of the club this year and is proud that the chapter has received an outstanding award from the
national office of the Society of Physics Students. “Being involved in the organization has completely transformed my college experience in physics,” said Anderson. Before she graduates next year, Anderson will be applying to graduate schools in Utah and Arizona. “Despite my years of travel, I consider school to be one of the greatest adventures of my life,” said Anderson. “I’ll miss these crazy times and the students, the faculty, and the administrators that I’ve had the privilege of knowing along the way. I’m looking forward to the next adventure.”
Christoph Boehme
Anil Seth
Receives U Award
Is Recognized for Early Teaching Career Award
Christoph Boehme,
Christoph Boehme
associate professor, has received the University’s Distinguished Scholarly and Creative Research Award for 2018. Boehme is recognized for his seminal contributions and scientific breakthroughs in electron spin physics and for his leadership in the field of spintronics. He received his undergraduate degree at Ruprecht-KarlsUniversität Heidelberg in 2000 and his Ph.D. from PhilippsUniversität Marburg in 2003. After working as a postdoc at the Hahn-Meitner-Institut Berlin (now Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin) from 2003 to 2005, he joined the University of Utah in 2006. See article on page 6 for more about his work.
Associate Professor Anil Seth has received a 2018 Early Career Teaching Award from the University of Utah. This award is given each year to only a few faculty members at the University of Utah for “distinction in teaching, demonstrated by activities that result in increased learning by students, such as the development of new methods or other curricular innovation.”
Anil Seth
With his passion for teaching astronomy, Seth has opened the universe to students and the community in imaginative and effective ways. 9
Finding the Beauty in Physics and Math Caleb Webb experienced a few detours on
Caleb Webb
his path to earning two Bachelor of Science degrees in physics and mathematics at the U. He had taken an AP calculus class in high school and was excited by the possibility of enrolling in a mathematics program at the U. On campus, however, he found that he wasn’t certain what mathematicians do for a living, so he decided engineering might be a more practical major. He tried engineering for a semester but didn’t enjoy it. “It didn’t take long for me to realize that I didn’t want to be an engineer,” said Webb. “I’m curious about a lot of things, and I like to understand how the world works at its most fundamental level. Engineering didn’t satisfy that curiosity in me.” The following semester, Webb withdrew from engineering and enrolled in a physics class.
Studying Unconventional Superconductivity He was encouraged to begin with the physics pre-professional program. “I couldn’t yet recite Newton’s Laws, but I went ahead and enrolled in the pre-professional program, said Webb. “It was a steep learning curve—it really felt like an uphill battle—but I enjoyed the challenge and stuck with it.” Eventually, things began to get easier. He found the actual study of mathematics and physics extremely interesting, and for the first time, he began to understand the symbiotic relationship between the two—how math and physics could produce meaningful
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insights about the world. “Looking for, finding, and understanding that relationship has been worth every sleepless night in the last five years,” said Webb. “Besides, physics is just super interesting.” As an undergraduate, Webb has been interested in theoretical condensed matter physics, specifically unconventional superconductivity and exotic forms and states of matter, such as Symmetry-Protected Topological Phases, which refers to a kind of order in zero-temperature quantummechanical states of matter that have a symmetry and a finite energy gap. The principles of superconductivity were observed more than ninety years ago. In the 1980s, physicists discovered an entirely new class of high-temperature superconductors—complex ceramic compounds that have higher transition temperatures and behave in unconventional ways compared to superconductors. “In unconventional superconductivity, the physics that these electrons obey is completely different from what a normal electron does under superconductivity,” said Webb. “Physicists would like to find a uniform theory for unconventional superconductivity to help us understand why the electrons behave differently. This would have a great impact on technology because we could design a superconductor that works under ambient atmospheric conditions.”
Mentors at the U
“They have been excellent teachers and mentors, and I wouldn’t be where I am today without their help and guidance,” said Webb.
pursue physics. “If you’re really interested in learning physics, and not just getting a degree, then you need to understand the math; however, don’t take just the math courses for scientists and engineers because they won’t give you the depth of understanding that physics demands. I also would recommend doing the physics pre-professional degree, even if you’re not sure you plan to go to grad school. It sounds like a lot of hard work, and it is. But if you’re here for the right reasons, it’s fun and worth the effort,” he said.
In looking back on his academic journey, Webb has some practical advice for undergrads who want to
After graduation in May, Webb plans to attend graduate school to obtain a Ph.D. in physics.
Throughout his academic career, Webb has benefited from the help of faculty advisors in the Department of Physics & Astronomy, including Assistant Professor Dmytro Pesin and Professor Oleg Starykh.
New Development Coordinator Named for Physics & Astronomy Department Michele Swaner joined the University of Utah in October and is responsible for conducting communications, development, and fundraising activities for the Department of Mathematics and the Department of Physics & Astronomy. Swaner is skilled in all areas of communications, including philanthropy and fundraising, public relations, marketing, advertising, media relations and social media, community relations, and public outreach. A native of Salt Lake City, she began her career at Manufacturers Hanover Bank in New York City and spent a number of years working in New York and Greenwich, Conn. She joined R&R Partners in Utah, where her work was awarded a Silver Anvil from the Public Relations Society of America for a voter initiative for the Utah Transit Authority. She worked for a decade for Williams Northwest Pipeline in public outreach and community giving activities.
Michele Swaner
Swaner has a bachelor’s degree in theater from Whitman College and a master’s degree in communications from Westminster College. She is accredited in public relations and was inducted into PRSA’s College of Fellows in 2012 for her career accomplishments.
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Students Attend Conferences for Undergraduate Women in Physics
In January, nine undergraduate women students from the U’s Physics & Astronomy Department attended the annual American Physical Society (APS) Conferences for Undergraduate Women in Physics (CUWiP), held at Arizona State University (ASU). Twelve institutions, such as ASU, served as hosts to more than 2,000 women undergraduates who attended simultaneous CUWiP conferences held the same weekend across North America. The conferences are sponsored by the APS, along with financial support from the National Science Foundation, the Department of Education, host institutions, and donor contributions. APS seeks to help undergraduate women continue in physics by providing them with an opportunity to attend a professional conference, obtain information about graduate school and professions in physics, and have access to meeting other women in physics of all ages with whom they can share experiences, advice, and ideas. “The research talks, presentations, panel discussions, laboratory tours, and workshops were all interesting,” said Maile Marriott, a junior at the U majoring in physics, who has attended three conferences. “But my favorite part is always the networking and getting to know so many
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amazing women in physics. You see so many different career paths and ‘ways of being a physicist.’ It helps me think about my own circumstances and the decisions I need to make to be successful.” This year Dr. Pearl Sandick, associate professor in the Department of Physics & Astronomy, served as chair of the APS CUWiP National Organizing Committee. She also represented the APS at the University of Oregon CUWiP, where she facilitated two types of workshops. One was for an APS program called Step Up 4 Women, which hopes to address the underrepresentation of women in physics at the undergraduate level and beyond by reaching out to high school physics teachers and giving them research-based tools to encourage women to become physics majors in college. The second workshop was on professional skills for women in science and discussed practical skills to help attendees perform quality research and flourish in a variety of physics career settings. Utah State University will serve as one of twelve host institutions for the 2019 APS CUWiP conference (January 18-20, 2019). For more information, visit www.aps.org/cuwip.
Women in Physics and Astronomy (WomPA) Women in Physics and Astronomy (WomPA) is an association that strives to foster a sense of community among women in the U’s Department of Physics & Astronomy, encourage networking and mentoring across disciplines and career stages, educate women and others about issues important to the advancement of women in STEM fields, and increase the visibility of women in physics and astronomy. The Department of Physics & Astronomy welcomes your financial support in helping its women undergraduate and graduate students. For more information, visit https://umarket.utah.edu/ugive/index.php.
Overview of Physics & Astronomy Graduates The department offers a degree in physics and a degree in physics teaching. Within the physics degree, the department has three emphases: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Applied Physics, and BioMedical Physics. Last year marked the first year that the astronomy and astrophysics emphasis was available to students, and 2018 marks the first year that the other two emphases are available. Last year 11 undergraduates were awarded bachelor’s degrees in physics; another received a bachelor’s in physics teaching; and one student received a bachelor’s in physics with an emphasis in astronomy and astrophysics.
Students who obtained a Ph.D. in 2017-2018 are: Andrew Flinders Payel Kar
College of Science Distinctions Faculty • Tabitha Buehler—Undergraduate Teaching Excellence • Inese Ivans—for Fostering Undergraduate Research Excellence
Jonathan Paul Lundquist
Department of Physics & Astronomy Distinctions
Jing Ma
University Faculty Awards
Ryan McLaughlin
• Christoph Boehme—Distinguished Scholarly and Creative Research Award • Jordan Gerton—Distinguished Teaching Award • Jordan Gerton—John R. Park Fellowship • Pearl Sandick—Early Career Teaching Award • Anil Seth—Early Career Teaching Award
Xuefang Sui Bijaya Thapa Yaxin Zhi
Department Faculty Award • Clayton Williams—Faculty Recognition Award for Undergraduate Mentoring
Other Faculty Awards • Adam Beehler—Utah Governor’s Medal for Science and Technology • Christoph Boehme—Silver Award in Physics/Materials, International EPR Society • Paolo Gondolo—Elected fellow of the American Physical Society
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DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS & ASTRONOMY 115 South 1400 East, JFB 201 Salt Lake City, UT 84112 Social @uofu.Physics.Astronomy @uofuPhysAstro Online physics.utah.edu Phone 801-581-6901 The University of Utah Department of Physics & Astronomy is committed to educational excellence. Donations and bequests are gratefully received and help the department provide opportunities to students, conduct research, support faculty, and enrich the educational experience. For more information about giving opportunities, please contact Michele Swaner, development coordinator, at 801-580-9590, or email her at swaner@science.utah.edu.