Other Facilities & Resources

Communication & Outreach

A sampling of our activities:

Amit Lath and Eugenia Etkina run the Physics Education Summer Training Program for teachers of high-school, Honors, and AP physics. The program was designed in collaboration between the Department of Physics & Astronomy and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. For more information about the program, visit https://www.teachphysics.com
Steve Schnetzer, Yuri Gershtein, Eva Halkiadakis, and Amit Lath run and maintain the very active and productive Rutgers QuarkNet Center. The group has distributed cosmic ray detector kits supplied by QuarkNet to high school physics teachers throughout New Jersey. Now for the 10th year, the group is hosting the Quarknet-supported Summer Research Program for High School Students. Rutgers Quarknet website
Physics Support Specialist David Maiullo gives numerous physics demonstration shows at schools, libraries, fairs and senior centers. He is included in the NJ State Library Performer list. He also conducts many demonstration workshops for school teachers as well as college faculty. Dave's public service has been recognized with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the NJ section of the American Association of Physics Teachers and with the Rutgers Ernest McMahon Award and Presidential Recognition for Outstanding Service. In 2006 Dave did an all-day show at a science street fair in Manhattan, seen by thousands of people and featured on CBS. Watch Dave demonstrate standing waves in this NY Times video. Dave is also the star of the Off-Broadway hit, "That Physics Show", where his educational and entertaining Physics demonstrations are delighting sold-out crowds. UPDATE: "That Physics Show" is now on Broadway! At the 2016 Drama Desk Awards on Jun 5, 2016, Dave took home the award for "Most Unique Theatrical Production" of the year for Broadway/Off Broadway.
Gateway Program Director Suzanne Brahmia who is also the Associate Director of the Rutgers Math and Science Learning Center (MSLC) does weekly physics educational activities that she developed with New Jersey's school groups. Approximately 1000 NJ school children from mostly inner city school districts visit the University every year and get a taste of physics thanks to her initiative.

In addition, Suzanne Brahmia helps develop the physical science curriculum for the MSLC's traveling science bus that visits middle schools in NJ and Lecturer Baki Brahmia provides computer support for the bus. See http://sciencebus.rutgers.edu
Public observing sessions are held twice each month with the Serin Observatory 20-inch telescope. These sessions are led by an astronomer and give you an opportunity to look through the telescope in the dome above the Physics and Astronomy building in Piscataway. Please check schedule and for cancellation notices.
The Henry R. and Gladys V. Irons Lecture in Physics and Astronomy is an annual talk intended for the general public. The lecture is free and open to the public, and is held at the Physics Lecture Hall on Busch Campus in Piscataway, NJ. The 2009 Lecture by Greg Boebinger (Director, National High Magnetic Field Laboratory) Levitation, Superconductivity and the World's Largest Magnets will take place on Saturday, March 7th, at 2PM. More info about the Irons Lecture is available.
Prof. Mark Croft (left) and David Maiullo (right and inset)

The Annual Faraday Holiday Children's Lectures are held on weekend evenings around the 10th of December. These fun physics demonstration and lecture shows are free of charge and open to the public

Here are some sample video clips CLIP1(Real Media) CLIP2 (Real Media) CLIP3 (Real Media) CLIP4 (mpeg video)
More demonstration clips (Windows Media): dishes.wmv, massresacc.wmv, forcereact-fireex.wmv, balloon.wmv, rot-fireext.wmv
Professor Steve Schnetzer, under the auspices of the Fermilab-based QuarkNet program, held three workshops on cosmic rays and their detection for high school physic teachers from throughout New Jersey. Several teachers are reporting that their students have been excitedly designing and carrying out their own experiments. Steve Schnetzer and Joe Spaccavento, one of the lead teachers gave a presentation at the New Jersey Science Teachers Convention. They are also planning a demonstration at the annual New Jersey American Association of Physics Teachers meeting in March and another workshop in spring. Also as part of the QuarkNet program, a teacher and three high school students conducted research in the high energy physics lab in summer '07.
Students at work during an ASI summer workshop

Professor Terry Matilsky (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.), with Prof. Eugenia Etkina of the Graduate School of Education and high school teachers Dr. Michael Lawrence and James Coleman, runs Rutgers Astrophysics Institute, a four week astrophysics research program in summer with a year-long followup. Participation is limited to 16 to 25 high school students, five to eight physics teachers and pre-service teachers each per year.
Click here for more details.

Prof. Matilsky is also involved with the extensive Chandra education website that allows you to analyze X-ray satellite data.
Prof. Sang-Wook Cheong (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) has trained several high school students in his laboratory, focusing on quantum physics on nano-structured materials, as a continuing contributor to the Partners in Science Program at the Liberty Science Center.
Prof. Mohan Kalelkar, Director of The Undergraduate Physics Program, gives physics talks to high school students at their science clubs. He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. He also participated in the experimental particle physics outreach program called QuarkNet that reaches out to NJ's high school physics teachers. Prof. Steve Schnetzer ran this program in cooperation with the NJ Chapter of the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT) and can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
Prof. Kalelkar also showcases Rutgers' physics undergraduate program during the University Open House in early April every year (to be held on Saturday, 8 April 2006 this year). Those considering a physics bachelor's degree are advised to attend.
Prof. Piers Coleman (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) gives public talks on the frontier physics of condensed matter (http://www.physics.rutgers.edu/~coleman/aspen/aspentalk.htm), and with his musician brother Jaz Coleman conveys the beauty and challenge of correlated matter through combined live music and physics concerts. The animated website "Music of the Quantum" http://musicofthequantum.rutgers.edu features music and interviews with prominent physicists.
Professor Jolie Cizewski, also the Vice Dean of the Rutgers-New Brunswick Graduate School, is committed to enhancing the access to opportunities in the physical sciences for early career scholars from diverse backgrounds by encouraging participation in summer research, graduate school, or postdoctoral positions at Rutgers. She recently carried out physics demonstrations in a shopping mall in Hawaii to popularize physics!
Professor Ted Williams gave a 1-week summer introductory astronomy program at the Montgomery High School for a group of ten 9th grade students in July 2006.
Joel L. Lebowitz, the George William Hill Professor of Mathematics and Physics, has a distinguished history of International Human Rights activism and co-chairs the Committee of Concerned Scientists. See http://www.math.rutgers.edu/~lebowitz/
Professor Jolie Cizewski was highlighted by the American Institute of Physics on its Physics Central website in April 2006. Click here to see her People in Physics profile.
Professor Sunil Somalwar is a former chair of the Sierra Club for New Jersey, a grassroots environmental group with approximately 23000 members in NJ. He also co-chairs Saving Wild Tigers, an international nonprofit dedicated to saving threatened tigers in the wild. He teaches about global warming and runs a campaign to promote use of energy efficient devices such as Compact Fluorescent light bulbs
You can download a brochure describing our Department (pdf format, 10pp, 3MB).