Related papers: The Physics of baking good Pizza
The University of Maryland (UMD) Biology Education and Physics Education Research Groups are investigating students' views on the role of physics in introductory biology courses. This paper presents data from an introductory course that…
Thermodynamics is based on a coarse-grained approach, from which its fundamental variables emerge, effectively erasing the complicate details of the microscopic dynamics within a macroscopic system. The strength of Thermodynamics lies in…
The liquid to vapour transition can occur at unexpected conditions in nanopores, opening the door to fundamental questions and new technologies. The physics of boiling in confinement is progressively introduced, starting from classical…
Learning to use math in physics involves combining (blending) our everyday experiences and the conceptual ideas of physics with symbolic mathematical representations. Graphs are one of the best ways to learn to build the blend. They are a…
We report several simulation programs which can be used to teach the statistical foundation of thermal physics in the introductory college physics courses. These programs are simple applications of a technique of generating random…
Courses in mathematical methods for physics students are not known for including too much in the way of mathematical rigour and, in some ways, understandably so. However, the conditions under which some quite commonly used mathematical…
A sketch of three senses of emergence and a suggestive view on the emergence of time and the direction of time is presented. After trying to identify which issues philosophers interested in emergent phenomena in physics view as important I…
I believe that most teachers develop a belief in a set of pedagogical practices. As we teach, we try different ways to teach topics and then judge how successful the methods were. After several years, we have a compilation of techniques in…
It is generally believed that physical laws, reflecting an inherent order in the universe, are ordained by nature. However, in modern physics the observer plays a central role raising questions about how an observer-centric physics can…
We present some episodes from the history of interactions between geometry and physics over the past century.
Physical properties of materials are seldom studied in the context of packing problems. In this work we study the behavior of semifluids: materials with particular characteristics, that share properties both with solids and with fluids. We…
We describe an undergraduate course where physics students are asked to conceive an outreach project of their own. The course alternates between the project conception and teachings about pedagogy and outreach, and ends in a public show. We…
The key difference between math as math and math in science is that in science we blend our physical knowledge with our knowledge of math. This blending changes the way we put meaning to math and even to the way we interpret mathematical…
The coking process is composed of two main stages: drying process and pyrolysis of coal. A heat and mass transfer model was developed to simulate the drying process of coal. The mechanisms of heat and mass transfer described in the model…
Education is a goal-oriented field. But if we want to treat education scientifically so we can accumulate, evaluate, and refine what we learn, then we must develop a theoretical framework that is strongly rooted in objective observations…
This is the first paper of a series aiming to present a new teaching sequence for Particle Physics in high school. We propose a systematic discussion of the subject, covering not only the understanding of its key concepts, but also of the…
The modeling theory of instruction is widely applied and highly successful in high-school instruction, and seldom in university physics. One reason is lack of familiarity with models in the physics classroom. Ongoing curriculum development…
After a very brief review of twentieth century elementary particle physics, prospects for the next century are discussed. First and most important are technological limits of opportunities; next, the future experimental program, and finally…
In medicolegal situations, the consequences of a stabbing incident are described in terms that are qualitative without being quantitative. Here, the mechanical variables involved in knife-tissue penetration events are used to determine the…
Quantum thermodynamics addresses the emergence of thermodynamical laws from quantum mechanics. The link is based on the intimate connection of quantum thermodynamics with the theory of open quantum systems. Quantum mechanics inserts…