Student Organization

PHOTON is the Boston University chapter of the Society of Physics Students (SPS), and serves as a social organization for undergraduates involved in physics at BU.  Every semester, the group organizes social events for physics majors, sets up lectures by faculty on subjects of current interest, and offers attendance at professional meetings.

For the past few years, the officers have worked towards making PHOTON a more active SPS chapter.  For its work two years ago, PHOTON received the Outstanding Chapter Award from the SPS.

PHOTON’s primary effort this year was in increasing students’ knowledge about different areas in physics and research.  The organization held lectures about every two weeks ranging from astronomy with a research presentation on exoplanets, to a general presentation of the areas of physics as seen from the different types of Physics Review Letters.  PHOTON also encouraged members to present their research by having several days of student presentations.  The group also made t-shirts this year as a club.

PHOTON attended several conferences this past year, including the Yale Undergraduate Women in Physics Conference in January. Four students gave talks and there was a poster presentation, making BU one of the best represented universities for presentations.  Members also attended the Society of Physics Zone 1 Conference, held at Northeastern University.  Also, many of the students gave presentations at the regular Friday meetings.  Talks delivered at the Friday meetings served as practice for more formal presentations given at conferences, and also provided a learning experience for other PHOTON members who were unable to attend conferences.

During weekly meetings this year, PHOTON often did physics demonstrations.  These included concepts such as eddy currents and magnets, along with popular demos such as light polarizers and Van de Graaff generators. Students don’t often get a chance to have hands-on experiences with demonstrations in class, so PHOTON gives the students a chance to interact with demos and learn in the process.

PHOTON also helped organize the annual Physics Department Pumpkin Drop.  Members emptied pumpkins of their natural stuffing, filled them with paint, jello, and other interesting items, to drop off of the roof of the Metcalf Science Building.  This year the event took place on October 30th, and attracted a large crowd as expected.

For the second year in a row, members created a presentation about the sun and its energy and presented it to the entire 8th grade class at the Andrew Peabody School in Cambridge.  The club also created a worksheet teaching the children how to simply calculate power, as well as get quantitative ideas about different power sources. The exercises helped the children improve their qualitative ideas about energy.  As a part of the outreach program, the students worked on a lab using solar panels to measure the power produced from the sun from indirect sunlight, and various light sources like flashlights and lamps.  The children were excited to use the solar panels and asked some fun and inquisitive questions.  Like last year, the presentation was successful in getting the children thinking about physics and applying it to their lives.

In addition, PHOTON took a tour of the fusion lab at MIT. Members contacted BU Alum Zach Hartwig to organize the event. Zach is a graduate student working in fusion, and gave a tour of the facility. The tour included an introduction into the basics of fusion and fusion power. Zach showed the group around the control room for the reactor. The machine was undergoing maintenance, so the visit was especially exciting as members got a chance to see the reactor disassembled.

Aside from PHOTON’s academic aspects, it also functions as a social gathering for physics undergraduates. Members get a chance to interact with other students from their classes. Students can learn more about the degree program from members who know it first hand, or join people from their year to make study groups, which are essential. Students will often gather for an hour or more after the meeting to socialize.

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