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IOP president issues a warning against cuts

As departmental budgets face a £11.5 bn cut, the government must be deterred from “inflicting irreparable damage” on the science base, IOP president Prof. Sir Peter Knight said in response to the Budget. “We hover on the precipice of cutting our science budget,” he said, but welcomed increased R&D credits and expansion of the Small Business Research Initiative.

Workshop tackles the open access agendaA workshop in February on open access publishing, sponsored by five learned societies including the IOP, was addressed by minister for universities and science David Willetts. Also taking part were people from universities, funders, libraries and publishers. A statement by the five societies about the meeting and open access policy can be downloaded at www.iop.org/news/13/mar/file_59653.pdf.

Physics in a flash

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April 2013

Lord Rees looks to the future

Recent breakthroughs in physics and improvements in technology are making this an exciting time for young researchers, according to the Astronomer Royal, Lord Rees.

Lord Rees made the claim during his Newton Lecture, given on 28 February as the winner of the Institute’s Isaac Newton Medal.

His talk covered a wide range of astrophysics topics, from our solar sys-tem to the origins of the universe, and he speculated that within the next dec-ade we would see robotic exploration of the solar system, human adventuring in space, and the direct imaging of plan-ets around distant stars.

Lord Rees said that he was fortunate to have begun his research career in the 1950s when there was the first compel-ling evidence of the Big Bang and the discovery of neutron stars and pulsars, which can only be understood using general relativity.

“It was an exhilarating time for the young, because when so much is new, the old guys don’t have a head start over the young,” he said. “But the good news for the postdocs in the audience is that today is an equally good time for young researchers. The pace of advance has crescendoed rather than stagnated. Instrumentation and com-puter power have increased hugely.”

Manned missionsThat period was also the beginning of the space age, and saw the first human in space, quickly followed by the Apollo programme of manned missions to the Moon, he said. “The Apollo programme was a heroic episode, and it was all more than 40 years ago,” he said. “If the momentum had been maintained, there would be footprints on Mars by now.”

Discussing the unmanned space-craft sent to other planets in our solar system, such as the Curiosity rover that

recently landed on Mars, he added: “I hope that during the coming dec-ade our solar system will be explored and mapped by flotillas of tiny robotic spacecraft. Will people follow? I think they will, but as high-risk adventurers rather than for any scientific purpose.”

On whether life exists elsewhere, Lord Rees said that it was unlikely in our solar system, but possible in oth-ers, and that the detection of planets around other stars is “perhaps the hottest topic in astronomy”. He said that although these can currently only be detected indirectly – by picking up wobbles in a star’s motion due to a planet’s gravity or dimming of starlight during a transit – within the next decade or so we should be able to directly see Earth-sized planets around other stars, something he compared to “looking for a firefly next to a searchlight”.

Commenting on the formation of new stars from the remnants of old ones, he said: “What’s going on in our galaxy is

a sort of ecological recycling where pris-tine gas goes into the first stars, is partly transmuted into higher elements, and new stars form.” He added that each of us contains matter from hundreds of dif-ferent stars from all over the Milky Way.

Lord Rees pointed out that astrono-mers studying galaxies cannot do experiments but are instead reliant on computer simulations and observa-tions, and those observations imply the existence of mass that we can’t directly see, i.e. dark matter.

He pointed out that gravity is nec-essary to end up with a universe that contains stars and galaxies and is not completely uniform. “Gravity enhances density contrasts rather than wiping them out,” he said, adding that small fluctuations in the density of the early universe can be inferred from observa-tions of the cosmic microwave back-ground.

Lord Rees went on to discuss the other fine-tuning necessary for the “emergence of a universe from an amorphous beginning”, such as the existence of the fundamental forces and the values of physical constants, and the possibility of an inflationary universe as per theories developed by Alan Guth and Edward Witten, who are both previous winners of the Newton Medal.

“I hope that in the coming decade our solar system will be explored by flotillas of robotic spacecraft.”

Chris White reports on this year’s Newton Lecture by the Astronomer Royal.

Lord Rees giving his Newton Lecture, entitled “From Mars to the Multiverse”, in London.

Interactions Apr i l 2013

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Surprising connections between different areas of physics and unex-pected spin-offs from theory were explored by quantum physicist Prof. Sir Michael Berry in a lecture entitled “How quantum physics democra-tised music” held at the Institute’s London premises in March.

Describing how Einstein’s work on stimulated emission of radiation led to the invention of the laser in 1958, and eventually to compact disc play-ers, he said: “It was unimaginable by Einstein in 1917 that his idea would lead to production of the brightest, purest light, and that 25 years later engineers would use it in a machine to make music.”

CD players had democratised music because they could be used anywhere. Their successors – such as MP3 players and iPods – also used technology based on quan-tum physics, and the devices used to manufacture and advertise them relied on quantum physics too, he said. A huge range of devices,

from computers to MRI scanners, depended on understanding quan-tum theory, and their use in research had stimulated further discoveries and opened up new areas of science.

Henry Fox Talbot, who invented photography, had democratised access to photographic images when he invented the photographic nega-tive in 1935, enabling images to be distributed widely. With the advent of the digital camera in the 1990s,

individuals gained complete control over their own photos, he said. Digital cameras employ a charge coupling device to capture light, using a quan-tum process.

Prof. Berry described how “magic mirrors”, which existed 2000 years ago, can reveal the relief pattern on their reverse side, in a phenomenon that was not understood until the 19th century. Exploring this phenom-enon with the use of the advanced

technology in digital cameras, he had been able to measure relief patterns a few hundred nanometres high. “Previously, to have done this research I would have needed image capture equipment costing tens of thousands of pounds, but now I can do it using an ordinary digital camera and software,” he said.

Computer simulations had ena-bled physicists to visualise the spreading and reconcentration of wave packets within an atom – an example of a device that relies on the application of quantum physics being then used to understand quan-tum physics, he said.

“We theoretical physicists are never more delighted than when we find something in one area of phys-ics that can help us to understand a completely different area of phys-ics.” Asked how scientists could ensure that they make these connec-tions, he said: “You have to have your eyes and ears all over the place and often you miss them.”

Physicists from six university depart-ments that have achieved Champion status in the IOP’s Project Juno scheme are featured in a video to encourage colleagues elsewhere to take part. Project Juno aims to address gender inequality in uni-

versity physics departments and to promote best practice.

In the six-minute video, which was launched on International Women’s Day on 8 March, department heads as well as some mid-career physi-cists explain how their department’s involvement in Project Juno has helped to create a more effective working environment, not only for women, but for all staff.

The IOP’s director of education

and science, Peter Main, says during the video: “Juno is a code of prac-tice that’s based on five principles and we’ve encouraged universities to embody these principles and to demonstrate not only that they agree with them but also that they are put-ting them into practice.” Once they can show that real change has taken place, departments can aspire to Juno Champion status.

The video features physicists

from the universities of Cambridge, Glasgow, Warwick and York, Imperial College London, and Royal Holloway, University of London.

New entrants to Project Juno begin as Juno Supporters and can progress to being Juno Practitioners before applying for Champion status.

The video can be viewed on the IOP’s YouTube channel, and more details about Project Juno can be found at www.iop.org/juno.

Video championsProject Juno

Prof. Michael Berry speaking on connections in science to an audience in London.

Berry connects with lecture audience

Interactions Apr i l 2013

The inaugural Physics Journalism Prize has been won by Anil Ananthaswamy, author of The Edge of Physics and a consultant at the New Scientist, for an article that was published in the magazine last year on the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) radio telescope project.

The prize, established jointly by the IOP and the Science and Technology Facilities Council, is designed to increase coverage of physics in the media so as to inspire people to study physics. Ananthaswamy’s prize will be a trip to visit facilities in Japan where world-leading phys-ics research is underway. His award

was also marked by a trophy and cer-tificate, presented by the IOP’s presi-dent, Prof. Sir Peter Knight following this year’s Newton Lecture (p1).

The IOP’s director of communica-tions and international relations, Beth Taylor, said it was by happy coincidence that the prize-giving took place after the lecture by the Astronomer Royal, Lord Rees, which mentioned the SKA. Prof. Knight said Ananthaswamy’s article had brought one of the world’s most exciting astronomical endeavours to life. “We really need these incredibly skilled journalists,” he said.

Ananthaswamy said: “I’m really

honoured to be receiving this and to hear Prof. Rees speaking today was the icing on the cake.” He also

thanked New Scientist features editor, Valerie Jamieson, who had planned the feature with him, he said.

Valerie Jamieson, Peter Knight (centre), and Anil Ananthaswamy at the prize-giving.

Science writer receives the first physics journalism prize

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Sixth-former Edward Duckworth won the Institute of Physics Prize in this year’s National Science and Engineering Competition, which was part of the Big Bang Fair, held on 14–17 March at ExCel in London. The prize was presented by the IOP’s president, Prof. Sir Peter Knight, at an awards evening after final judging during the fair.

Duckworth, from The Thomas Hardye School in Dorset, won the award for an investigation that showed a correlation between tidal flows and seismic waves.

Prof. Knight commented: “Edward Duckworth stood out as an excep-tionally bright young talent and is highly deserving of this award. I am very pleased that the Institute has been able to recognise the work that he has put into the very high quality project that he presented at the Big

Bang Fair.”More than 50 prizes were

awarded, including Young Scientist of the Year, and more than 200 indi-viduals or teams reached the finals of the competition and showed their projects at the event.

The fair featured shows, activi-

ties and displays by more than 170 organisations. The IOP’s interactive stand focused on advances in quan-tum physics and in the application of physics to medicine.

Kawal Rhode, senior lecturer in biomedical engineering at King’s College London, involved his whole

group from St Thomas’s Hospital in helping to staff the stand during the fair. His group’s model of a robotic heart catheter had proved popular with visitors, he said, as had a dem-onstration of remote sensing technol-ogy to measure blood pressure and other vital signs, which the college is developing with Technomed Ltd.

Volunteers from University College London and Imperial College London, as well as several univer-sities in the South East Physics Network, helped with demonstra-tions on the stand. These included using electronic signals of the har-monics produced by a guitar to help visitors to understand quantum superposition; trapping ash parti-cles with lasers; and employing rare earth magnets to move particles in fake blood, to show potential appli-cations in drug delivery.

A celebration to mark a three-month tour of Somerset schools by the Institute’s Lab in a Lorry (LIAL) was held on 8 March.

During the event at West Somerset Community College, Minehead, guests were shown the mobile lab’s on-board experiments for students aged 11–14.

Bridgwater and West Somerset MP Ian Liddell-Grainger spoke at the event, as did the college’s principal Gaynor Comber, and David Eccles, who represented EDF Energy, which is sponsoring the Somerset tour.

Also taking part were the LIAL co-ordinator in Somerset, James Bamford, and the IOP’s head of pub-lic engagement, Caitlin Watson. She said: “The celebration was to thank all of our partners in the region, and our sponsors EDF Energy, for making it all happen.”

Two thousand Somerset students have already interacted with LIAL and the number was expected to have reached 3000 by the time the tour finished at the end of the spring term. The lab will now move on to Wales.www.labinalorry.org.uk

MPs open doors for early-career scientists to compete

Students shine at the Big Bang Fair

Interactions Apr i l 2013

Presenter Greg Foot (left) with Edward Duckworth (centre) and Prof. Sir Peter Knight.

VIP guests help to celebrate the Lab in a Lorry tour of schools in Somerset

Around 180 research students and early-career scientists met MPs and peers to discuss their research when they took part in the finals of the SET for Britain poster competition.

The event, on 18 March, was held at the House of Commons and was run by the Parliamentary and Scientific Committee (PSC) in collaboration with several learned societies, including the IOP, with financial support from a number of companies. PSC chairman Andrew Miller MP said: “These early-career scientists are the architects of our

future and SET for Britain is politi-cians’ best opportunity to meet them and understand their work.”

Thirty posters were exhibited in the physics category, with the Gold Medal in Physics and prize money of £3000 going to Claire Woollacott for her entry on “Dirac-like plasmons in honeycomb lattices of metallic nanoparticles”. Woollacott, a post-graduate research student from the University of Exeter, said: “It was such a fantastic opportunity to meet fellow scientists and to see how inter-ested the politicians were in what

was going on, and it’s the icing on the cake to have won.”

INEOS Group AG sponsored the Gold Medal in Physics, which was presented by its director, Tom Crotty.

The silver medal and £2000, sponsored by AgChemAccess, went to Christian Baker from the National Physical Laboratory, for his entry on improved CT scanning for breast can-cer screening.

The bronze medal and £1000, sponsored by GAMBICA, was won by Emma Wisniewski-Barker for her entry on slowing and storing light.

A student shows some apparatus to Ian Liddell-Grainger (centre) and David Eccles.

Claire Woollacott with her certificate.

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Supporting disabled students at uni-versity means thinking “outside the box” and being prepared to discuss challenges openly and honestly. These were among the views to emerge from “Supporting Students in STEM”, the spring conference of the STEM Disability Committee, of which the IOP is a member.

The conference on 28 February included workshops on academic life and admissions, assistive technolo-gies, and alternative communication.

Chris Stonehouse, a physicist from New College Worcester, for 16–19-year-old blind and visually impaired students, said programmes for such students could be adapted, but there had to be discussions about precisely what was possible.

Speaking about fieldwork, Tim Hall from the University of Gloucester, said that it was not immediately obvi-ous that this could pose problems for dyslexic students, but writing by hand in an unfamiliar environment could be difficult for them. Jenni Dyer, the IOP’s diversity manager, told Interactions that many people

would focus on mobility issues in this context, which showed the need to think more broadly about possible situations and solutions.

Mark Hughes, from the University of Manchester, showed one of the orientation videos that he has made for students with Asperger’s Syndrome to view before starting uni-versity. These help students to famil-iarise themselves with details such as the routes between buildings, and are designed to be straightfor-ward rather than high-tech and excit-ing with a lot going on, which can be counterproductive for such students.

The conference also heard from a team in Scotland that is developing new sign language terms for phys-ics concepts. Its work was reported to a conference in June 2012 (Interactions, July). Since then, the team has shared its experience inter-nationally and the IOP has helped to disseminate the signs in England.

Prof. Denis Wright, dean of stu-dents, learning and teaching, at Imperial College London, described how the institution had worked hard

to improve its support for disabled students from what had been a low base. It had upskilled staff and it rec-ognised the need for pastoral as well as practical support.

Speaking later, Dyer said that it was no good for institutions to prom-ise a great deal and then for students to find that the practicalities had not been dealt with or that some adjust-ments were not possible. This did not mean that the problems were insur-mountable, she said, or that health and safety should be used in a spu-

rious way to avoid accommodating disabled students, but it did mean thinking through what could be done.

One issue facing institutions is the cost of supporting overseas students whose disabilities are such that they need high levels of support but who have no recourse to UK public funds, she said. For UK students, funding normally comes from local authority social services or Student Finance England (or Student Finance Wales, or Northern Ireland), or the Student Awards Agency for Scotland, but insti-tutions were using different ways to find the money to support non-UK students, such as top-slicing the fees of all overseas students.

The next steps for the IOP may include asking members if there is value in creating a common reposi-tory of braille or electronic textbooks for the most commonly used texts, or lists of common course requirements, and sharing specialist expertise. Dyer has set up an e-mail network for those responsible for disability issues in physics departments. For details, e-mail jenni.dyer@iop.org.

Issues for disabled students are aired

MPs answer to some young scientistsYoung scientists and students ques-tioned MPs and government advis-ers at Voice of the Future 2013 – an event in Westminster that turned the select committee format on its head.

The participants sat in the seats normally reserved for MPs and asked questions about science and public policy, while politicians and senior officials appeared before them as “witnesses”. The event at Portcullis House was held on 20 March as part of National Science and Engineering Week.

Several learned societies, includ-ing the IOP, invited researchers and students to submit questions in advance of the event, and each chose up to six people to take part on the basis of these. A few schools and the Open University also partici-pated, and the organisers accepted some questions sent via Twitter.

After a brief introduction from the Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow MP, participants ques-tioned witnesses in four separate sessions, with new sets of young sci-

entists for each one. In the first, the government’s outgoing chief scien-tific adviser, Prof. John Beddington, was the witness.

MPs from the Science and Technolology Committee, including chair Andrew Miller, were witnesses in the second session. Minister for universities and science, David Willetts, and chief scientific adviser to BIS, Prof. John Perkins, were wit-nesses in the third. The final witness was shadow minister for universities and science, Shabana Mahmood.

Far more questions were sent in than could be asked on the day, but there was time to cover a wide range of topics including scientific advice, funding, tackling global challenges, education and careers. Encouraging more women into science proved to be a major theme, and many ques-tions were based on the participants’ in-depth knowledge of issues facing the research community.

The event was webcast live and a recording can now be viewed at www.bbc.uk/democracylive.

A STEM conference discussed disability.

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Rewarding your commitment, developing your people

The IOP Best Practice in Professional Development Awards 2013

These awards commend, celebrate and promote companies that deliver outstanding training

and professional development opportunities for physicists working in the UK.

Nominations close on 1 June 2013; for more details please contact Stephanie Richardson, the Institute’s Head of Membership

Development (e-mail cpd@iop.org or tel 020 7470 4886).

5notices

Interactions Apr i l 2013

Research Student Conference FundThe fund provides financial support to

research-student members to attend international conferences and major national meetings.

Apply for up to £250 during the course of your PhD.

Applications are considered on a quarterly basis and should reach the Institute by 1 March, 1 June, 1 September or 1 December.

For further information, visit www.iop.org or e-mail supportandgrants@iop.org.

Do you have a fantastic idea for making physics accessible? Do you want to reach a wider audience? Do you need some support to make your outreach activity happen?

Then why not apply for a Public Engagement Grant from the Institute of Physics? They are worth up to £1500 and aim to support physics-based public outreach activities throughout 2013.

Application forms and guidelines for the grant scheme are available online at www.iop.org/about/grants/outreach/page_38843.html, or by e-mailing physics.society@iop.org.

Closing date: 22 April 2013

Public EngagEmEnt grant SchEmE 2013 round 2

Editor Heather Pinnell, Production Editor Alison Gardiner, Art Director Andrew Giaquinto. Institute of Physics, 76 Portland Place, London W1B 1NT, UK. Tel +44 (0)20 7470 4800; fax +44 (0)20 7470 4991; e-mail interactions@iop.org; web www.iop.org/interactions

new fellowsGabriel Aeppli, Kok Wai Cheah.

new MeMBeRsJuliet Ash, Louise Axford, Katie Barber, Edward Barker, Alexander Bastin, Kerry Billingham, Andreas Biternas, Charlotte Britton, Agnetha Brown, James Bullock, Mihai Caleap, Chris Calver, Louise Cannon, Graham Carden, Antonia Carruthers, Laurence Carson, Maria Carter, Stephen Chamberlain, Enea Colleoni, Martin Coombes, Thomas Cooper, Charles Corlett, Christopher Cottier, Andrew Coulson, Barry Coyle, Robert Crockett, Naomi Crossland, Samuel Daly, Gareth Davies, Benjamin Doyon, Jonathan Easthope, John Edmundson, Samuel Evans, Sinead Farrington, Jason Fazakerley, Jonathan Fitt, Alexander Gabriel, Mark Gilbert, Michael Golowczynski, Richard Gould, Eva-Maria Graefe, David Grant, Mariah Gray, Martin Haas, Jesse Hamer, James Harrison, Judith Hart, Karen Haughian, David Head, Mark Hetherington, Catherine

Heyward, Jack Hill, Nathan Hill, Michael Inkson, Sirinath Jamieson, Iain Johnston, Christopher Jones, Nader Karimi, Steven Kee, Helmut Kessler, Yusuf Khalifa, John Kiely, Young Kim, Brian Klaveness, Michelle Lanyon-Foster, Bin Li, Deepali Lodhia, Oliver Madge, William Marley, Richard Marsh, Judith McCarron, Andrew Morris, John Morton, Dominic Moss, Lloyd Mukunza, Lewis Murphy, Tristian Nicholas, Victor Nové-Josserand, John Omotani, James Paley, Matthew Panayiotou, Michele Piscitelli, Matthew Pitkin, Christopher Pleasant, Andrew Poll, Stephen Prince, Benhamin Quayle, Stuart Reid, Brian Reville, Gemma Roberts, Claire Rocks, Joseph Rogers, David Russhard, Asel Sartbaeva, Cal Saville, Stephen Sawiak, Martin Shaw, Nicholas Shepherd, James Siverns, Richard Smith, Robert Smith, Kimberley Steed, Tuuli Sutinen, Laura Thomson, Jamie Townes, Daniel Truby, Amira Val Baker, Wendy Vandoolaeghe, Thomas Wall, Derek Ward-Thompson, Marc Warner, Edmund Warrick, Louise

Weeks-Bunyan, James Wilgeroth, Jun Yamamoto, Zoe Yates.

In MeMoRIAMThomas Charnley, Maurice Ebison, Raymond Glaister, Leslie Arthur Holland, Alister Mclellan, Peter Richard Norton (Abingdon), Hans Puls, Tim Hildyard Richardson (Abingdon), Stephen John Singleton, Harry Smith (London), Donald Charles Smith (Thurso), Walter Stiles (Dorset), Jennifer Ann Thomson.

AnnounceMentsl Now open for entries are the IOP Innovation Awards 2013, which celebrate companies operating in the UK and Ireland that have achieved significant commercial success built on physics-based innovations. Visit www.iop.org/innovation for more details or to enter. The closing date is 31 May.l The IOP is offering bursaries of £2000 (or the equivalent in euros) for up to 40 physics students to undertake work-experience

placements lasting eight-weeks in business or industry before their final year. Applicants must be undergraduates at a higher education institution in the UK or Ireland, and must find their own placement. For details, visit www.iop.org/careers/top40placements/index.html. The closing date is 26 April.l Round 2 of the IOP’s 2013 Public Engagement Grant Scheme is open for applications. The grants, worth up to £1500, are intended to support physics-based outreach activities in the UK and Ireland throughout 2013. Activities supported by the scheme should provide engaging experiences of physics for public audiences. For details, application forms, guidelines and summaries of past projects, click About Us, then Support and Grants, at www.iop.org. Applicants are strongly encouraged to talk to a member of the IOP’s Physics in Society team before applying: e-mail physics.society@iop.org or telephone 020 7470 4845. Applications must be received by 12 noon on 22 April.

6 reflections

Why pirated books cost us all too dear

Finally holding a copy of my under-graduate textbook, Understanding Solid State Physics, was a relief. While I love the subject area, and had long wanted to write it, I was in significant debt due to lost earnings as the pro-ject had unexpectedly taken five years of full-time work to complete. As a pro-fessional writer with bills to pay I was, of course, hoping royalties would com-pensate for the financial hardship.

So imagine my horror when I dis-covered pirated versions online. One website alone had registered several hundred illegal downloads for the title and someone was even sponsoring a link to an illegal copy. Worryingly for academic publishers and authors alike, this is not an isolated case.

“Piracy is ubiquitous and perva-sive. It stretches across all academic subjects, and all product types from introductory texts to research mono-graphs,” says Mark Majurey, commer-

cial director of digital publishing at my publisher, Taylor and Francis.

As well as lobbying government – via the Publisher’s Association – to ensure any new copyright rules do not destroy academic publish-ing, and using legal measures to combat piracy, Taylor and Francis is working with schools, colleges and Universities UK to help both students and staff understand the rules on copying copyrighted material.

My editor John Navas, now sen-ior commissioning manager for IOP Publishing’s new e-book programme, says it is actively involved with rel-evant publishing organisations and their activities to remove illegal online content and educate end users.

Education seems an essential step, as 47% of the internet users ques-tioned for the 2012 Ofcom Online copyright infringement tracker bench-mark study were unsure whether the online content they were accessing was legal or not. Meanwhile, the Student attitudes towards intel-lectual property study, published last year by the National Union of

Students, revealed that only 35% of the 2144 students questioned had received tuition about copyright within their current course.

“To avoid driving piracy, academic publishers must also make it easier for people to obtain legal versions of the types of products they want,” feels Majurey. So along with other publish-ers, Taylor and Francis are starting to enable e-textbook rentals via legiti-mate online retailers and the ability to purchase single e-chapters.

I can only hope that these anti-piracy measures prove effective. Although sales cannot be guaranteed for any book, I certainly wouldn’t have spent several years writing something that I knew would be stolen. I’ve lost out, as have the charities who would have received part of my royalties. Worse still, I fear illegal copying could ultimately result in only the wealthi-est individuals being able to become authors. And that’s a long way from the fair and equal world that I dream of.

Sharon Ann Holgate is a freelance science writer and broadcaster.

Online piracy is far from a victimless crime, says Sharon Ann Holgate.

“Someone was even sponsoring a link to an illegal copy of my textbook.”

Sharon Ann Holgate.

Interactions Apr i l 2013

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