One of the world's leading chemists and the physicist who first used individual atoms to spell out the name of his company are among a dozen scientists who will present free public lectures in Sonoma State University's renowned "What Physicists Do" series this fall. Lectures are on Mondays at 4 p.m., from Sept. 11 through Nov. 27, in room 108 Darwin Hall on the SSU campus.
Darleane C. Hoffman, awarded the top prize of the American Chemical Society this year, is the chemist. Codiscoverer of several of the heaviest elements, she is a senior advisor and charter director of the Seaborg Institute for Transactinium Science at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. She was awarded the National Medal of Science by President Clinton in 1997. A coauthor of a new book, "The Transuranium People: The Inside Story," she will speak Nov. 6 on "The Long Sought Superheavy Elements."
Donald Eigler of IBM Almaden Research Center in San Jose won acclaim and several awards a decade ago by using individual xenon atoms to spell out the letters IBM. Since then, Eigler has led an active group of scientists in a series of experiments aimed at extending basic knowledge about the physics of atomic-scale structures and exploring the potential for atomic-scale logic and data-storage technologies. He will speak on "Quantum Mirages" at SSU Oct. 16.
The series opens Sept. 11 with physicist Andres Larraza of the Naval Postgraduate School describing "The Crookes Radiometer: How a Toy Pushed the Frontiers of Physics." Larraza is the inventer of a device that responds directly to the pressure of sound waves. "First, Kill a Physicist" is the title of a pre-Halloween lecture Oct. 30 by mystery writer Camille Minichino. The former Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory physicist is writing a murder mystery about each of the chemical elements.
Other topics to be featured in the series include star clusters, spectacular new images made with the world's largest telescopes and adaptive optics, a cosmic soup of quarks and gluons, environmentally safe phosphors, neutrinos, and the latest measurements of the density and curvature of the universe.
Two SSU physics graduates will speak: Siana Hurwitt Alcorn on tracking air pollution in California, and Richard DeFreez on the use of laser-induced autofluorescence to detect molecules that might be used for biowarfare or terrorism.
For a free poster describing all twelve lectures, see http://www.phys-astro.sonoma.edu/wpd/, send e-mail to gayle.walker@sonoma.edu, or call (707) 664-2119.
