The University of Western Ontario Department of Physics and Astronomy invites applications for approximately 20 diverse Master’s and Doctoral project offerings.

The two-year MSc program is based half on completing graduate course requirements and half on research. The four-year PhD program is based mostly on supervised research under the guidance of one of the faculty members.

In Astronomy, areas of research span observations and theory in meteor physics, solar system and exoplanetary astronomy, substellar objects, planet and star formation, the interstellar medium, the evolution of hot stars, stellar populations, and active galactic nuclei.

The Astronomy group consists of 12 full-time faculty and approximately 30 graduate students and postdocs. The Astronomy group is affiliated with the Centre for Planetary Science and Exploration (CPSX; http://cpsx.uwo.ca/). Western astronomers have access to all telescopes with a Canadian national share, and regularly lead observational programs on the Hubble, Spitzer, Chandra, and XMM space telescopes, and on the SOFIA stratospheric observatory. Western further owns and operates astronomy research facilities in Southwestern Ontario.

Our Physics faculty work on a broad range of experimental, theoretical and computational problems in condensed matter and materials physics, nanotechnology, biological physics, medical physics, atmospheric physics, theoretical physics, and planetary science.

The Physics group consist of 19 full-time faculty and approximately 40 graduate students and postdocs, conducting research in in a wide variety of areas within the field. The group is affiliated with many top research facilities on campus including Interface Science Western (home of the tandetron accelerator), the Western Nanofabrication Facility and the Robarts Research Institute, and also has partnerships within industry.

More information about physics & astronomy research at Western can be found at http://www.physics.uwo.ca/research/index.html.

Scholarships and Fellowships are available to outstanding students from the School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies, CPSX, the Ontario government, or the Canadian government.

Complete applications submitted by January 15, 2017 will receive full consideration for external scholarships and an invitation to visit campus. Application forms and instructions can be found at http://www.physics.uwo.ca/graduate/future_students/how_to_apply.html.

Western is a vibrant university with over 23,000 undergraduate and over 5,000 graduate students, located in the city of London, the multicultural hub of Southwestern Ontario.

If you would like more information or have any questions about our programs please contact our graduate affairs assistant Brian Davis at bdavis66@uwo.ca or 519-661-2111 ext.86639

Professor Shantanu Basu and longtime colleague Eduard Vorobyov of the University of Vienna had in 2006 developed a gravitational instability and fragmentation model which predicts stellar accretion outbursts on time scales of hundreds of years or less.  Other models of the early life of stars predict events occurring at much larger time scales, on the order of thousands of years.

A recently observed short term ( ~ 40 years) accretion burst of the young star V346 Normae will certainly have astronomy community revisiting the Basu-Vorobyov model.   This is very exciting news indeed.

[newly published paper (pdf)]

On Friday, 16 Dec. 2016, Sabastine Ezugwu gave a public lecture on his thesis topic titled, “Nanoscale thermal and electronic properties of thin films of graphene and organic polyradicals”. He then successfully defended the thesis.

Sabastine’s supervisor is Dr. Giovanni Fanchini. 

test 2

[Flickr images (courtesy Mitch Zimmer)]

The Faculty of Science awards and recognition luncheon was held on Tuesday, 13 December 2016 in the Great Hall at Summerville House.

Jan Cami was formally presented with his Undergraduate Teaching Award.

Tamie Poepping received the special Physics and Astronomy Achievement Award, which was presented by Chair Bob Sica.

Bob and his fellow Science Chairs all received service awards from Dean of Science Charmaine Dean.

New hires were recognized, including Professor Rob Cockcroft, and staff members Emily Adams, Paul Christiaans, and Abedin Abedin.

A town hall meeting and Christmas luncheon were held on Friday, December 9, 2016.

Department Chair Bob Sica welcomed the gathering. Many retired faculty and staff attended, including Mila Kagan, Willy Lennard, Ian Mitchell, Harry Chen, David Rosner, John Landstreet, James Moorhead, Michel Debruyne, and Patrick Whippey. Postdoctoral fellow Elizabeth Silber dropped in from Rhode Island. Custodial staff members Emira Abdovic and Mike MacDonald were also present.

Bob’s first order of business was to have the staff introduce themselves. This was followed by a formal welcome of new staff members Emily Adams, Abedin Abedin, and Paul Christiaans, along with new faculty member Rob Cockcroft.  It was then time to honour three new retirees, these being staff members Clara Buma, and Peter Frank, as well as faculty member Dick Holt. This was an emotional moment. Bob spoke about Clara’s career in which she was the face of the main office for years.  John deBruyn thanked Peter for his service of over 40 years, while Professor Emeritus David Rosner spoke of Dick Holt’s career, beginning with his famous thesis on the topic of Bell’s Theorem. Professor Emeritus Patrick Whippey spoke warmly of his time with Peter, Clara, and Dick.

Chair Bob then turned the discussion to new departmental academic and outreach initiatives. Faculty committee members Martin Houde, Els Peeters, Tamie Poepping, and Jan Cami spoke to the various topics.

A moment was taken for John de Bruyn to formally honour Jackson Scholarship winner Cameron Hopkins, and William Wehlau Prize winner Isabelle Cyr.

A question and answer session followed, along with a tribute by Professor Emeritus John Landstreet to recently deceased Professor Emeritus Romas Mitalas.

Hungry stomachs then had to patiently wait through two group photos sessions, after which the everyone headed to the buffet tables. It was interesting that some headed directly to the dessert table!

Lunch was followed by informal building of gingerbread houses and Christmas ornaments.  Individual photos were taken by the Christmas trees.

There were some wonderful Christmas sweaters in evidence, and certainly those worn by Emily Pass and Peter Brown caught the attention of the Chair.

[images on Flickr]

Professor Emeritus Romas Mitalas passed away quietly late on Wednesday, 30 Nov.  2016, at 83 years of age.

Romas was born in Kaunas, Lithuania in 1933. The second world war uprooted many Baltic families, and thus he came to Canada.

He received his B.A. and M.A. in Applied Mathematics from the University of Toronto. He then went on to Cornell University where he received a PhD. in Theoretical Physics.

Romas was first hired by the Department of Physics at Western in 1964.  He then moved over to the newly formed Department of Astronomy in 1968. He retired in 1996. After retirement Romas enjoyed coming to colloquia and other events.

Romas was an expert in stellar interiors, as trembling graduate students could attest.

He is survived by his wife Nancy, sister Giedre, sister-in-law Dalia, along with many nieces and nephews.

Romas was a true intellectual, being extremely curious about the world and its people. He was extremely kind-hearted, and generous, also seeing the humour in many things. A typical conversation with Romas could be politically charged, but could also touch on the beauty of there being roughly Pi x 10**7 seconds in a year, or could move to the quality of maple syrup in Ontario.

He will be dearly missed.

[a small gallery of images can be found on our Flickr site.]

We welcome Paul Christiaans to the staff, where he takes on the role of Technical Specialist (Electrical Engineer).

Paul has a Masters degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Western.

He has most recently spent 4 years at Western’s Research Park where he was involved in systems design and development for the imaging technology industry.