PHY 3091:
COMMUNICATION IN PHYSICS
Instructor:
Horst D Wahl,
- Office 512 Keen Bldg.,
- Phone 644-3509, e-mail: wahl@hep.fsu.edu;
- Office Hours: After class and by appointment, any time you can get a hold of me
Credits: 02
Prerequisite:
PHY 2048, corequisite: PHY 2049 (or instructor's permission)
Text: no text needed
Purpose of course:
- The purpose of this course is to develop
abilities in the area of written and oral communication in physics.
(note that communication of scientific results and ideas takes up a
large fraction of a scientist's time and effort)
Outline of class:
- The class will be conducted in an informal research group meeting
format, with everyone participating. At the beginning of the semester, we
shall discuss areas of specific interests to the students, and identify
the sources of background materials related to these areas.
- In consultation with the instructor, students will choose
topics. The selected topics can be drawn from any area of physics or close
to physics, and can
be the subject of the student's research project or his/her interest, or
can be one that the group as a whole is interested in learning about.
- For those students who take the intermediate or advanced lab during this
semester, the physics related to the lab experiments, including
description of the experiments and discussion of the results, can serve as
suitable topics.
- Once topics have been agreed on, students will then
- produce a written abstract of their selected topic
- make short (about 10 minutes) presentations of the subject in
American Physical Society format;
for this presentation, transparencies (or projection from a computer
file) must be used, and the files have
to be submitted to the instructor before the presentation
- eventually, prepare a longer presentation (about 50 minutes) in
colloquium format
- write a paper (about 10 pages) about the chosen subject.
- goal of all of these activities:
- practice oral communication skills
- have fun talking about physics, and teach each other some physics
- learn how to write a scientific paper
- increase your proficiency with word-processing and presentation
software tools
- learn to use Powerpoint, TeX (if you are interested)
- grading: final grade will be based on class participation (~25%), the
10-minute talk (~15%), the 50 minute talk (~30%), and on the
paper(~30%).
- The only accepted method of submitting the abstract, paper, and
presentation is in the form of a computer file,
in a standard format
(e.g. plain text, MSWord, TeX, pdf, postscript, html), as part or an attachment of
an e-mail
message to the instructor, or by posting on a Website.
Paper copies will not be accepted.
Grade ingredients:
Class participation
|
25% |
Short talk outline
|
3%
|
Short talk
|
12%
|
| Long talk outline |
3% |
| Long talk |
27% |
| Paper outline |
3% |
| Paper abstract |
3% |
| Paper |
24% |
Websites:
ADA statement:
-
Students with disabilities needing academic accommodations should:
(a)
register with, and provide documentation to, the Student Disability Resource
Center (SDRC); and
(b) bring me a letter from SDRC indicating
your needed academic accommodations. Please do this during the first week of
class.
For more information on this see the
Resource Center's web site.
Academic honor code:
-
Students are expected to uphold the Academic Honor Code published in
The Florida State University
Bulletin and in the Student Handbook. The first paragraph is:
The Academic Honor System of Florida State University is based on the premise
that each student has the
responsibility
- to uphold the highest standards of academic integrity in the student's own work,
- to
refuse to tolerate violations of academic integrity in the University community, and
- to foster a high
sense of integrity and social responsibility on the part of the University community.