UNCW CAS: Department of Physics

Director: Professor Marvin Moss
Participants: UNCW Physics Professor Fred Bingham; others from UNCW Departments of Biology, Chemistry, Earth Sciences, and more

Description: Initiated in 1998, this interdisciplinary program supports efforts by a large number of UNCW investigators and collaborators from other universities and agencies to study the physical, geological, chemical and biological properties of the coastal ocean in the Cape Fear region. Monitoring has focused on larval fish recruitment, discharge of materials from the Cape Fear River, effects of storm events on bottom sediments and organisms, physical and chemical signals of water movements at various scales, biology of marine vertebrate populations, and analysis of the effects of hurricanes on the coastal ocean. For more information, visit the CORMP home page.

Director: Professor John M. Morrison
Participants: A collaborative effort between University of North Carolina Wilmington, North Carolina State University, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center, Charles Darwin Research Station, Galápagos Islands, and Galápagos National Park Service, Ecuador

Description: One of the central challenges of environmental research is to develop an understanding of how the physical, chemical, geological, hydrological, and biological processes that comprise the Earth's natural systems are functionally interrelated. The effort being carried out here is focused on the natural and human-induced variability in the ocean, the responses of the ocean to that variability, and how these changes affect the biodiversity of the Galápagos. We are using remotely sensed data, integrated with in situ data collection and monitoring and modeling programs to characterize key oceanographic processes that have been shown to have a strong signature associated with climate change and their realized and potential effects on the Galápagos Archipelago. The focus is on how filaments from the Equatorial Undercurrent that propagate across the Galapagos platform vary in position and strength, on where they end up, and their impact on nutrient supply and potential larval transport through the system. In addition, the Galápagos provide an ideal “field laboratory” for assessing the effects of events of extreme climate variability associated with El Niño and La Niña. On shorter time-scales, the Galápagos acts as a natural experiment for measuring the effects of annual to interannual variability on flora and fauna.

Participants: A collaborative effort of professional physicists from more than twenty universities and research institutes here and abroad, including UNCW Physics Professor Liping Gan

Description: PrimEx is an experiment to perform a precise measurement of the neutral pion lifetime using the small angle coherent photoproduction of the pi-zero in the Coulomb field of a nucleus, i.e. the Primakoff effect. Precision measurement of the pi-zero radiative decay width is widely recognized as a key finding that bridges chiral symmetry breaking and our understanding of quantum chromodynamics. The results of this experiment will provide fundamental input to the theory of the strong interaction, which has profound significance for our understanding of nature and the structure of matter. For more information, visit the PrimEx home page.

Description: QMTools is a software development project providing a collection of tools to facillitate the creation of multimedia-enhanced, computer-based classroom materials —worksheets, exercises, tutorials, etc.— for use in teaching introductory quantum physics. Each tool encapsulates a single pedagogical element that can be inserted [as a Java applet] into an HTML document to provide an interactive experience at any point in the presentation. The package is available to the academic community at no charge for non-commercial use. For more information, visit the QMTools home page.


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	Coastal Ocean Research and Monitoring Program (CORMP) Director: Professor Marvin Moss Participants: UNCW Physics Professor Fred Bingham; others from UNCW Departments of Biology, Chemistry, Earth Sciences, and more Description: Initiated in 1998, this interdisciplinary program supports efforts by a large number of UNCW investigators and collaborators from other universities and agencies to study the physical, geological, chemical and biological properties of the coastal ocean in the Cape Fear region. Monitoring has focused on larval fish recruitment, discharge of materials from the Cape Fear River, effects of storm events on bottom sediments and organisms, physical and chemical signals of water movements at various scales, biology of marine vertebrate populations, and analysis of the effects of hurricanes on the coastal ocean. For more information, visit the CORMP home page. Connectivity and Upwelling Dynamics In the Galápagos Marine Reserve (GMR) Director: Professor John M. Morrison Participants: A collaborative effort between University of North Carolina Wilmington, North Carolina State University, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center, Charles Darwin Research Station, Galápagos Islands, and Galápagos National Park Service, Ecuador Description: One of the central challenges of environmental research is to develop an understanding of how the physical, chemical, geological, hydrological, and biological processes that comprise the Earth's natural systems are functionally interrelated. The effort being carried out here is focused on the natural and human-induced variability in the ocean, the responses of the ocean to that variability, and how these changes affect the biodiversity of the Galápagos. We are using remotely sensed data, integrated with in situ data collection and monitoring and modeling programs to characterize key oceanographic processes that have been shown to have a strong signature associated with climate change and their realized and potential effects on the Galápagos Archipelago. The focus is on how filaments from the Equatorial Undercurrent that propagate across the Galapagos platform vary in position and strength, on where they end up, and their impact on nutrient supply and potential larval transport through the system. In addition, the Galápagos provide an ideal “field laboratory” for assessing the effects of events of extreme climate variability associated with El Niño and La Niña. On shorter time-scales, the Galápagos acts as a natural experiment for measuring the effects of annual to interannual variability on flora and fauna. The Primakoff Experiment at Jefferson Lab (PrimEx) Participants: A collaborative effort of professional physicists from more than twenty universities and research institutes here and abroad, including UNCW Physics Professor Liping Gan Description: PrimEx is an experiment to perform a precise measurement of the neutral pion lifetime using the small angle coherent photoproduction of the pi-zero in the Coulomb field of a nucleus, i.e. the Primakoff effect. Precision measurement of the pi-zero radiative decay width is widely recognized as a key finding that bridges chiral symmetry breaking and our understanding of quantum chromodynamics. The results of this experiment will provide fundamental input to the theory of the strong interaction, which has profound significance for our understanding of nature and the structure of matter. For more information, visit the PrimEx home page. The QMTools Project Director: Professor Curt Moyer Description: QMTools is a software development project providing a collection of tools to facillitate the creation of multimedia-enhanced, computer-based classroom materials —worksheets, exercises, tutorials, etc.— for use in teaching introductory quantum physics. Each tool encapsulates a single pedagogical element that can be inserted [as a Java applet] into an HTML document to provide an interactive experience at any point in the presentation. The package is available to the academic community at no charge for non-commercial use. For more information, visit the QMTools home page.
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