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News Teaching

Teaching in the Age of COVID-19

My Honors Physics class is a very hands-on class. Managing that in the age of COVID-19 has been an interesting challenge. Tonight, I invited my students (if it was safe to do so) to buy some inexpensive kitchen items – food dye, corn starch, and chocolate – and participate in “Physics in the Kitchen” tonight. […]

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Podcast Uncertainty Principle Podcast

Uncertainty Principle Podcast – Episode 4: Dangerous Beauty

We humans cherish beauty, even in our mathematics. Beauty – or “symmetry” – is taken as a sign of success and simplicity in a mathematical model or physical theory. But what if that beauty was a threat to a complete understanding of nature? In this, the first part of a two-part series on symmetry and […]

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Podcast Uncertainty Principle Podcast

Uncertainty Principle Podcast – Episode 3: An Enjoyable Time Was Had By All

Paul Adrian Maurice (P.A.M.) Dirac, or just Paul Dirac, is one of the most brilliant physicists who has ever lived. He is also one of the most curious human beings ever to be a physicist, and that’s saying a lot in a field where curious personalities litter history.  This week, we take a look at […]

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Outreach

The Uncertainty Principle Podcast

A podcast for our uncertain times, featuring readings from stories and articles (set to period music) that reflect the intersection of the unexpected and physics. Subscribe on FeedBurner or directly subscribe to the RSS feed for this podcast: https://people.smu.edu/ssekula/?feed=rss2&category_name=podcast/uncertainty-principle-podcast

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News Teaching

COVID-19 Changes Everything for Spring 2020

The COVID-19 pandemic, caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, is changing everything about our society right now. Social distancing is essential to slowing the spread of the virus, which is particularly dangerous to anyone with underlying cardiovascular or respiratory conditions, especially combined with advancing age. SMU is keeping us up-to-date as they change their policies to […]

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Podcast Uncertainty Principle Podcast

Uncertainty Principle Podcast – Episode 2: The Uncertain Road

Are people born to a profession, or do they stumble into it? Is personal talent the most important thing, or a mentor entering the picture at a key moment? Let’s explore this question anecdotally in this episode, drawing on the memoir of SMU alumnus and astrophysicist Donald D. Clayton. Show Notes “Catch a Falling Star: […]

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Podcast Uncertainty Principle Podcast

Uncertainty Principle Podcast – Episode 1: Isaac Newton’s Pajamas

A podcast for those times of uncertainty in physics Episode 1: Isaac Newton’s Pajamas To help us feel a bit more connected during these weird and uncertain times, enjoy the first in a short series of podcasts that ties the quirky things in life to physics.  Show Notes “During a pandemic, Isaac Newton had to […]

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Research

CERN: Spring 2020

I am happy to be at CERN Feb. 28 – March 5, 2020. This is my first trip to the laboratory since fall, 2018. In part, that was because of a funding gap as our old grant expired in spring 2019 and the new grant came online in summer 2019. The other reason was taking […]

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Award News

Honored to have been nominated twice for the 2020 HOPE Award

Two of my recent former students nominated me for an Honoring Our Professors’ Excellence (HOPE) award. As described on the award’s website: “Each year since 1998, Residence Life and Student Housing (RLSH) has encouraged students living on campus to honor their outstanding professors by nominating them for the HOPE Professor of the Year Award. HOPE […]

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News

Thanks to Highland Park High School for their Science and Technology Festival!

I am very pleased to have been invited this year to speak at the annual Highland Park High School Science and Technology Festival. I spoke with three periods of students about the life of a traveling particle physicist and what it meant (both from a personal and professional perspective) to discover the Higgs particle. Thanks […]