Sunday, October 12, 2003

Science for everyone

Saturday Morning Physics, a popular weekly science lecture for general audiences, is under way at the University of Michigan. Every week for nine weeks, more than 300 people - from middle school students to retirees - listen to U-M scientists describe in non-technical terms their cutting- edge research. Each talk is illustrated with multimedia technology and live demonstrations.

Lectures are 10:30-11:30 a.m. Saturdays in 170 Dennison Building, 501 E. University Ave.

The lectures are free and open to the public. High school students are especially encouraged to attend, but all ages are welcome. Coffee and refreshments are served.

The series is sponsored by the Department of Physics and Dr. M. Lois Tiffany of Ann Arbor, who received her U-M master's degree in physics in 1946 and a U-M doctorate in biophysics in 1971. It also is supported in part by donations from the public.

Upcoming talks in the series include:

Oct. 18: "Weighing the Untouchable," Dr. Stephen Miller, U-M physics department. Massive, unstable elementary particles decay into subatomic particles. Without directly measuring the original particle, however, we can learn its mass and everything else we want to know about it from the pieces of its decay. Miller will explain how these new particles are discovered and the search for the Higgs boson, the particle that explains the property of mass itself.

Oct. 25: "Finding the Invisible," Dr. Stephen Miller, U-M physics department. Some elementary particles travel right through the earth (and us) without leaving a trace. Miller will discuss how these particles were discovered, surprises uncovered while studying these invisible particles, and the search for Dark Matter - the invisible particles making up most of the universe's matter.

For more information, visit the Saturday Morning Physics Web site, www.physics.lsa.umich.edu/nea/smp/.