In this issue...

General News	Awards and Honors	Student and Alumni News	Colloquia
Seminars	Presentations and Talks	Publications	Proposals
Travel and Conferences	Visitors	Upcoming Events

June/July/August/September 2001

Everything is made of atoms. That is the key hypothesis. The most important hypothesis in all of biology, for example, is that everything that animals do, atoms do. In other words, there is nothing that living things do that cannot be understood from the point of view that they are made of atoms acting according to the laws of physics. This was not known from the beginning it took some experimenting and theorizing to suggest this hypothesis, but now it is accepted, and it is the most useful theory for producing new ideas in the field of biology.

Richard Phillips Feynman, 1918-88
The Feynman Lectures on Physics vol. 1, 1963 (San Francisco: Addison-Wesley) pp. 1-8

GENERAL NEWS

The Montana Space Grant Consortium BOREALIS project had a third successful high altitude balloon flight on Sept. 29. The balloon reached a new record altitude of 96,000 feet, and carried a cosmic ray experiment which succeeded in obtaining an altitude profile of cosmic ray flux. Another set of great pictures also resulted, including ones showing the Purdy fire smoke plume: visit their website to see mission details and pictures.

One of the most prodigious sources of solar data has been the Yohkoh satellite, and this autumn marks the tenth anniversary of its launch. A NASA press release celebrating this milestone, and heralding the Yohkoh Tenth Anniversary conference, was produced by the MSU Solar Physics group. The story was carried on NASA TV, the NASA website, Bozeman Daily Chronicle, Space.com, and the local Bozeman TV news.

Members of the Ion Beams Group, Dick Smith, Cynthia Tripp, Choi Bum-sik, spent the week of August 20th conducting experiments at the Environmental and Molecular Sciences Laboratory in Richland, WA. Facilities there were used to perform nuclear reaction analysis of the oxidation properties of an ultra-high temperature multi-use ceramic composite material intended for thermal protection applications, such as heat shields.

The annual meeting of the Montana Space Grant Consortium affiliates was held at MSU on Sept. 14. Affiliate Representatives attended from the Museum of the Rockies, MSU-Billings, Salish-Kootenai College, Little Big Horn College, Dull Knife Memorial College, MSU-Northern, Montana Tech, Rocky Mountain College, Ft. Peck Community College, Ft. Belknap Community College, the University of Montana, MSU's College of Engineering, and AdVR, Inc.

National Teachers Enhancement Network: Since 1993, high school and middle school science teachers in Montana and nationwide have taken MSU-Bozeman courses directly by computer in their home or workplace. These offerings, designed with classroom practice in mind, are the products of the National Teachers Enhancement Network (NTEN), an experimental program of professional development funded by the National Science Foundation with grants totaling over $5 million to date. An outgrowth of summertime teacher institutes on the Bozeman campus, NTEN delivers courses over the Internet via MSU's Burns Telecommuni-cations Center. Although participants never meet face to face, the courses are still highly interactive and structured - so much so that NTEN students invariably report as a main benefit the networking that takes place with fellow teachers. NTEN has sponsored the development of over 40 different courses, most carrying graduate credit, and has reached several thousand participants. Most recently, NTEN has received NSF funding to develop a program of short courses for elementary teachers. These courses will be designed to support the use of the hands-on science curricula - science kits, as opposed to textbooks alone - that research now shows to be the most effective way of bringing science concepts to elementary school children. NTEN will focus on the "science behind the kits", empowering teachers to make the most of these modern curriculum tools by deepening their own understanding. Contact information: The NTEN Co-directors are George Tuthill (x6177) of the Physics Department, and Kim Obbink (x5681) of The Burns Telecommunications Center.

AWARDS AND HONORS

This summer, Meredith Wills-Davey was selected as an American Dissertation Fellow by the AAUW (American Association of University Women) Educational Foundation. These fellows are women from all disciplines near completion of their dissertation work. The fellowship emphasizes not only Ph.D. studies for women, but also focuses on gender in education and involvement in community outreach. The fellowship has an annual stipend of $15,000.

David Klumpar has accepted an appointment as Associate Director of the Montana Space Grant Consortium.

Sachiko Tsuruta won a Max-Planck-Institute Visiting Professorship to work in Max-Planck-Institute in Garching, Germany, June and July 2001.

Meredith Wills-Davey was awarded an AUW Fellowship

Tom Brown received the CLS Outstanding GTA Award.

Larry Kirkpatrick was elected by the AIP Governing Board to serve a second three-year term on the Advisory Committee on Media and Government Relations. He has been re-appointed as Chair of the Committee and, therefore, is an ex-officio member of the Committee on Physics Resources Policy.

New members of the official Committee of the Solar Physics Division of the American Astronomical Society: Dana Longcope and David Alexander have been elected to the AAS-SPD Committee. Alexander was a "founding member" of the MSU Solar Group who is presently with the solar and astrophysics group at Lockheed-Martin.

STUDENT and ALUMNI NEWS

Volker Kraseman (M.S. '96) Volker writes that all is going very well and the new addition to his family (son Daniel) is doing very well. What follows in an excerpt from an email received from Volker: "I think teaching high school for a year or two is a great experience for somebody that is thinking about a career in teaching. It is very intense and as a teacher you have a lot of freedom while benefiting from the tight-knit community of a boarding school."

Volker has been teaching in Suffield to be closer to his wife Beth's school (The Ethel Walker School - an all girl's school). Beth and Volker live in a dorm with 20 girls. Volker says "life with them is like having a big family. It happens that at 10 pm they come asking for milk or last minute help in math or history".

"Teaching at the high school level at a boarding school is very obviously very different than teaching at a college or university…… you know the kids really well…...you have them in the dorm, athletic field, or you have lunch with them, and you teach them. That makes for a very personal relationship. But it is a lot of fun because you can make or break physics or science in general for them. At this level, it is possible to turn even the weakest kids on to science, kids who will never get above a D+ or a C- in science or math, actually like the class and like participating. You help them out by grading homework assignments or giving them special projects, like power point presentations on MRI or animal magnetism. At the high school level it is easier to experiment with different approaches. I really like teaching at this level. But what I like even more is that when coming to a boarding school like Suffield Academy, it is more like choosing a lifestyle than choosing a profession. And I really like the life we are living here…"

COLLOQUIA

"Sounding Rocket Probing of Localized Plasma Heating Cavities in the Aurora", David J. Knudsen, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Calgary, Sept. 7.

"Gravitational Wave Astronomy", Neil Cornish, Sept. 21.

"The Space Elevator: Progress toward reality", Dr. Bradley C. Edwards, Los Alamos National Lab, Sept. 28.

SEMINARS

Condensed Matter Physics
"Brainstorming Session on Graduate Student Recruitment", coordinated by Dick Smith, Sept. 17.

ICAL
"Determining Environmental History of Freshwater Fish using ToF-SIMS", Andrew Munro, MSU Ecology Dept., Jul. 11.

"A ToF-SIMS Study of the Surface Chemistry of Atmospheric Aerosol", Bonnie Tyler, Univ. of Utah, Jul. 18.

"Study of Dinosaur Egg Shell using SEM", Frankie Jackson, Dept. of Earth Sciences. MSU, July 25.

"Introduction to Advanced Silicon Materials' Operation", Ron Russell of Advanced Silicon Materials Inc. (ASiMi) in Butte, Aug. 1.

"Integrating Molecular Biology with Surface Science, Identification of FerA Gene Expression and Iron Reduction on Iron Oxides Colonized by Geobacter sulfer reducers", Andy Neal, MSU Microbiology , Aug. 8

"SEM Imaging of Bacterial Biofilms on Various Surfaces", Rick Veeh, CBE, Aug. 22.

"Laser Cleaning in Artwork Conservation", Ed Teppo, Ex-CEO and President of Big Sky Laser, Aug. 29.

Optics
"Learning about Driven 2-Level Quantum Systems from Radio Frequency Measurements", Neil B. Manson, Laser Physics Centre, Research School of Physical Sciences and Engineering, Institute of Advanced Studies, Australian National University, Canberra, Aug. 7.

"Quantum Computing with Rare-Earth Doped Crystals ", Matt Sellars, Laser Physics Centre, Research School of Physical Sciences and Engineering, Institute of Advanced Studies, Australian National University, Canberra, Aug. 10.

Surface Science
"Applicationsof MeV ion channeling and backscattering to the study of metal/metal epitaxial growth", Dick Smith, July 25.

REU Presentations - July 25th
Mark Loeffler, "A New Heatshield for NASA"
Matt Klee, "Thin Film Growth and haracterization"
Andy Keiser, "Atomic Force Microscopy of Magnetic Films"
Nichole Fortin, "Liquid Atomic Force Microscopy"
Patrick O'Neil, "Problems with Ultra-high Vacuum"
Rachel Ruch, "Introspective Retrospective of an MSU REU"
Dustin Rich, Mechanical Engineering and Michael Patterson, Physics, worked in the Cone/Sun Group in the Spectrum Lab's undergraduate research program.

PRESENTATIONS AND TALKS

"Level Structure of Rare Earth Ions in Solids, Overview, Examples From Spectroscopy", R. L. Cone, The 2001 Workshop on Laser Physics and Quantum Optics - Ramsey Fest, Jackson Hole, Wyoming, July 29 - Aug. 3.

"Slitless Imaging Spectroscopy", Charles Kankelborg, Southwest Research Institute, Boulder, CO, Sept. 24.

"Thermal Evolution of Neutron Stars", Sachiko Tsuruta, Ringberg Conference on High Energy Astrophysics, Ringberg Castle near Munich, Germany, Jul. 16-20.

"Anisotropy Studies of Ultra-High Energy Cosmic Rays as Observed by the High Resolution Fly's Eye (HiRes)", John Belz, 27th International Cosmic Ray Conf., Hamburg, Germany, Aug. 11.

"Systematics of 4f Electron Energies Relative to Host Bands by Resonant Photoemission of Rare Earth Doped Optical Materials", C. W. Thiel, H. Cruguel, Y. Sun, G. J. Lapeyre, R. M. Macfarlane, R. W. Equall, and R. L. Cone, International Conference on Dynamical Processes in Excited States of Solids, Lyon, France, July 1-4.

Contributed Talks
"Low frequency gravitational waves from the Galactic halo", Bill Hiscock, GR16, Durban, S. Africa, July 20.

"Er3+ 4I15/2 and 4I13/2 Levels and Magnetic g-Tensors for C2 and C3i Sites in Y2O3 by 1.5 mm Diode Laser Spectroscopy", G. Reinemer, T. L. Harris, Y. Sun, R. L. Cone, and R. W. Equall, March Meeting of the American Physical Society, Seattle, Washington, March 12-16.

"Compact Laser Frequency Stabilization at 1.5µm Using Spectral Hole Burning", T. Böttger, G.J. Pryde, N. M. Strickland, and R. L. Cone, 2001 Quantum Electronics and Laser Science Conference, Baltimore, Maryland, May 6-11.

"Er3+ 4I15/2 and 4I13/2 Levels and Magnetic g-tensors for C2 and C3i Sites in Y2O3 by 1.5 mm Diode Laser Spectroscopy", G. Reinemer, T. L. Harris, Y. Sun, R. L. Cone, and R. W. Equall, Third Annual Meeting of the Northwest Section of the American Physical Society, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington May 25 - 26.

"Spectral Diffusion at 1.5 microns in Er3+ Compounds Measured with a Diode Laser Frequency Stabilized to a Spectral Hole", T. Böttger, G. J. Pryde, G. Reinemer, Y. Sun, and R. L. Cone, International Conference on Dynamical Processes in Excited States of Solids, Lyon, France, July 1 - 4.

"Overview of Cone/Sun Group Efforts on Material Design and Characterization and on Laser Frequency Stabilization to Spectral Holes", R. L. Cone, Y. Sun, G. J. Pryde, T. L. Harris, C. W. Thiel, T. Böttger, G. Reinemer, G. J. Lapeyre, R. W. Equall, and R. L. Hutcheson, OpTeC Conference, Bozeman, Aug. 2001.

"Measurement and Control of Spectral Diffusion at 1.5 Microns in Er3+ Materials for Spectral Hole Burning Applications", T. Böttger, G. J. Pryde, G. Reinemer, Y. Sun, R. L. Cone, and R. W. Equall, OpTeC Conference, Bozeman, Aug. 2001.

"Magnetic Field Suppression of Optical Dephasing for Er3+:Y2O3 and Measurement of Magnetic g-Tensors for C2 and C3i Sites by 1.5 Micron Diode Laser Spectroscopy", G. Reinemer, T. L. Harris, Y. Sun, R. L. Cone, and R. W. Equall, OpTeC Conference, Bozeman, Aug. 2001.

Abstracts

Posters - OpTeC Conference - Bozeman July 2001
"Spectral hole and laser dynamics: What happens when a laser is stabilized to a regenerative spectral hole frequency reference?", G. J. Pryde, T. Böttger and R. L. Cone, International Conference on Dynamical Processes in Excited States of Solids, Lyon, France, July 1-4.

"Site Occupancy Determination in Pr3+:Y2SiO5 by Optical Nutation and Absorption", Y. Sun, F. Könz, R. L. Cone, and R. W. Equall, International Conference on Dynamical Processes in Excited States of Solids, Lyon, France, July 1-4.

"Compact Frequency Stabilized Laser at 1.5 Microns Using Spectral Hole Burning", T. Böttger, G.J. Pryde, N. M. Strickland, and R. L. Cone.

"Energy Level Structure of Rare-Earth-Activated Laser, Phosphor, and Scintillator Materials Probed by Electron Photoemission", C. W. Thiel, H. Cruguel, Y. Sun, G. J. Lapeyre, R. L. Cone, R. W. Equall, R. L. Hutcheson, and R. L. Cone.

"Model for Optimizing Spectral Hole Burning Laser Frequency References", G. J. Pryde, T. Böttger and R. L. Cone.

"Progress in Rare Earth Materials for Hole Burning and Coherent Transient Applications", Y. Sun, C. W. Thiel, G. J. Pryde, T. L. Harris, T. Böttger, G. Reinemer, R. L. Cone, R. W. Equall, and R. L. Hutcheson.

PUBLICATIONS

"Semiconductor Lasers Stabilized to Spectral Holes in Rare Earth Crystals", R. L. Cone, T. Böttger, G. J. Pryde, N.M. Strickland, Y. Sun, P. B. Sellin, and J. L. Carlsten, Submitted to SPIE Proceedings on Physics and Simulation of Optoelectronic Devices IX (OE09), S4283-41 (2001).

"Properties of magnetic clouds resulting from eruption of coronal sigmoids", RJ Leamon, RC Canfield and AA Pevtsov, submitted to Journal of Geophysical Research, Sept. 2001.

Publications Accepted
"Systematics of 4f Electron Energies Relative to Host Bands by Resonant Photoemission of Rare Earth Ions in Aluminum Garnets", C. W. Thiel, H. Cruguel, H. Wu, Y. Sun, G. J. Lapeyre, R. L. Cone, R. W. Equall, and R. M. Macfarlane, to appear in Phys. Rev. B 64, Aug. 15.

"Systematics of 4f electron energies relative to host bands by resonant photoemission of rare earth doped optical materials", C. W. Thiel, H. Cruguel, Y. Sun, G. J. Lapeyre, R. M. Macfarlane, R. W. Equall, and R. L. Cone, accepted for publication in J. Luminescence (2001).

"Diode laser frequency stabilization to transient spectral holes and spectral diffusion in Er3+: Y2SiO5 at 1536 nm", Thomas Böttger, Y. Sun, G.J. Pryde, G. Reinemer, and R.L. Cone, accepted for publication in J. Luminescence (2001).

"Numerical modeling of laser stabilization by regenerative spectral hole burning", G. J. Pryde, T. Böttger and R. L. Cone accepted for publication in J. Luminescence (2001).

Publications
"Laser Stabilization at 1536 nm Using Regenerative Spectral Hole Burning", P. B. Sellin, N. M. Strickland, T. Böttger, J. L. Carlsten, and R. L. Cone, Phys. Rev. B 63, 155111-1 - 155111-7 (2001).

"Observation of the coronal hard X-ray sources of the 1998 April 23 Flare", J. Sato, ApJL, 558, 137-140 (2001)

"Response to Lowe's Comment", Paul R. Anderson (Wake Forest Univ.), William A. Hiscock, Brett E. Taylor (Radford Univ.), Phys. Rev. Lett., Vol. 87, 029002 (2001).

"Sigmoid Structure of an Emerging Flux Tube", Magara, T. & Longcope, D. W. 2001 ApJ, 559, L55.

"Origin and Evolution of Filament-Prominence Systems", P.C.H. Martens and C. Zwaan 2001, Astrophys. J., 558, 872-887.

"Chromospheric Damping of Alfven Waves", B. De Pontieu, P.C.H. Martens, and H.S. Hudson 2001, Astrophys. J., 558, 859-871.

"First observation of the decay KL -> pi0 e+ e- gamma", John Belz, V87, issue 2 of Physical Review Letters.

"Measurement of the branching ratio and form factor of KL -> mu+ mu- gamma", John Belz, V87, issue 7 of Physical Review Letters.

"First measurement of form factors of the decay XI0 -> SIGMA+ e- nubar", John Belz, V87, issue 13 of Physical Review Letters.

"Branching ratio measurement of the decay KL -> e+ e- mu+ mu-", John Belz, V87, issue 11 of Physical Review Letters.

"Downflows and structure above LDE arcades: Possible signatures of reconnection?", McKenzie, D. E., and Hudson, H. S., Earth Planets Space 53, 577-580 (2001).

"Hard X-rays from slow flares," Hudson, H. S., and McKenzie, D. E., Earth Planets Space 53, 581-584 (2001).

"Systematics of 4f Electron Energies Relative to Host Bands by Resonant Photoemission of Rare Earth Ions in Aluminum Garnets", C. W. Thiel, H. Cruguel, H. Wu, Y. Sun, G. J. Lapeyre, R. L. Cone, R. W. Equall, and R. M. Macfarlane, Phys. Rev. B 64, 085107.

"Semiconductor Lasers Stabilized to Spectral Holes in Rare Earth Crystals", R. L. Cone, T. Böttger, G. J. Pryde, N.M. Strickland, Y. Sun, P. B. Sellin, and J. L. Carlsten, in Physics and Simulation of Optoelectronic Devices IX, Yasuhiko Arakawa, Peter Blood, Marek Osinski, Editors, Proceedings of SPIE Vol. 4283, 335-346 (2001).

PROPOSALS

TRAVEL AND CONFERENCES

Larry Kirkpatrick attended the AAPT Summer Meeting in Rochester NY on 21-26, July.

Neil Cornish and Bill Hiscock attended the 16th International Conference on General Relativity and Gravitation, held in Durban, South Africa, 15-21 July.

Yves Idzerda attended the Advanced Light Source Physical Sciences Proposal Review Panel in Berkeley, CA, July 19-21.

Dave Klumpar traveled to Washington, DC, to attend a NASA Advisory Panel Meeting, July 22-25.

Larry Kirkpatrick, Jeff Adams, Jack Dostal and Jeff Crowder attended the AAPT Conference in Rochester, NY, July 18-27.

Yves Idzerda, Daniel Bauer, Johnathan Holroyd, Damon Resnick, and Alex Lussier conducted experiments at Brookhaven National Lab., Upton/Long Island, NY, July 25 thru Aug. 16.

Dick Smith, Choi, Bum-Sik, and Cynthia Tripp traveled to NPPL in Richland, WA, to conduct research, Aug. 19-23.

Bill Hiscock and Mike Murray attended the National Council of Space Grant Directors meeting in Fairbanks, Alaska, Sept. 6-8. Hiscock chaired the National Space Grant Alliance meeting held during the Council meeting.

Bill Hiscock attended and chaired the meeting of the National Space Grant Alliance Board of Directors at Kennedy Space Center, July 8-9.

Tom Böttger, Geoff Pryde, and Rufus Cone visited Jean-Louis Legouet and Ivan Lorgere at Laboratoire Aimé Cotton, University of Paris, South in Orsay, France on June 28-30, 2001, for discussions of spectral hole burning devices.

Tom Böttger and Rufus Cone visited the Max Planck Quantum Optics Laboratory in Garching, a suburb of Munich, Germany, on July 5, 2001; ultrastable lasers and Fabry-Perot cavities, atomic frequency standards, mode-locked lasers, and optical frequency comb instrumentation were discussed.

Tom Böttger and Rufus Cone visited the diode laser company Toptica Photonics in Martens Reid, a suburb of Munich, Germany, on July 6, 2001, to discuss opportunities for cooperation and product development.

Rufus Cone, Third Annual Meeting of the Northwest Section of the American Physical Society, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington May 25 - 26. Presided over session on Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Physics.

Rufus Cone, 13th International Conference on Dynamical Processes in Excited States of Solids / Conférence Internationale Dynamique des Etats Excités dans les Solides, Université Claude Bernard Lyon1, Lyon, France, July 1 - 4. Presided over session on Dynamics of Highly Excited States of Solids.

Rufus Cone, The Texas A & M 2001 Workshop on Laser Physics and Quantum Optics - Ramsey Fest, Jackson Hole, Wyoming, July 29 - Aug. 3.

Charles Thiel, Tom Böttger, Geoff Pryde, Yongchen Sun, and Rufus Cone attended the International Conference on Dynamical Processes in Excited States of Solids, July 1 - 4, 2001, at the Université Claude Bernard Lyon1, Lyon, France.

Charles Thiel, Geoff Pryde, and Yongchen Sun visited the Laboratoire Physico-Chimie des Matériaux Luminescents at the Université Claude Bernard Lyon1, Lyon, France, on July 5.

Dana Longcope attended a SECAS meeting in Washington, DC, July 22-25.

Hugo Schmidt and Jil Hallenberg traveled to Herndon, VA, for DARPA Piezo Crystal workshop and present a talk, July 24-27.

John Belz and Malina Schindel worked with collaborators on the HiRes Cosmic Ray Experiment in Salt Lake City, UT, July 1-31.

Ezana Negusse traveled to Tallahassee, FL, to work on experiments at the National High Magnetic Field Lab, July 16-Aug. 3.

George Tuthill traveled to San Francisco, CA, Boston, MA, and Washington, DC, for collaboration on research projects, July 16-27.

John Carlsten visited ILX Lightwave in Boulder, CO, for a collaborative program during July 21-Aug. 11.

Sachiko Tsuruta spent June and July in Max Planck Institute in Garching near Munich, as a Max Planck Institute visiting professor and to collaborate with scientists there on AGN and pulsars. She also participated during Aug. 7-10 at a Conference on Lighthouses of the Universe held in Max Planck Institute in Garching, Germany. Tsuruta spent Aug. 3-7 and 10-29 as a visiting scientist at Institute of Astronomy in Cambridge University, England, to collaborate with Martin J. Rees and Andy Fabian on AGN problems.

Bill Hiscock attended the Space Grant Director's Council Executive Meeting at the Kennedy Space Center from July 6-9.

Bill Hiscock traveled to Durban, South Africa to attend the International Society on General Relativity and Gravitation 16th Conference from July 14-27.

Dave Klumpar, Steve Jepsen, Brian Larsen, Mike Obland, and George Hunyadi traveled to Logan, UT, to participate in USU/AIAA Small Satellite Conference, Aug. 12-16.

Alex Rebane, Randy Babbitt and Geoff Pryde attended the 2001 TAMU-ONR Workshop in Jackson, WY, July 30-Aug. 2.

Bennett Link attended the INT Workshop on Neutron Stars at the University of Washington, Seattle, WA, July 8-28.

Bill Hiscock and Mike Murray travel to Fairbanks, AK to attend the Fall Meeting of the Space Grant Director's Council from Sept. 4-9.

Bob Leamon Attended IAGA - IASPEI Joint Scientific Assembly in Hanoi, Vietnam, Aug. 20-29.

Charles Kankelborg attended the SPIE Conference on EUV Instrumentation in San Diego, CA, July 31-Aug 5. He then visited Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, CO the week of Sept. 24 to present a talk.

Hugo Schmidt traveled to Houston, TX, to the Johnson Field as advisor to student flight opportunity team.

Randy Babbitt attended an NSF EPSCoR Workshop in Fayette, AR, Aug. 15-17.

Craig Zaspel attended a math conference at the University of Colorado, Aug. 9-14.

John Belz traveled to Snowmass, CO, to attend the 2001 summer workshop on Particle Physics, July 15-18. He then attended the 27th International Cosmic Ray Conf. And presented an analysis of HiRes Data, Hamburg, Germany, Aug. 6-15.

Marcus Teter traveled to the Two Years of Science with Chandra Symposium in Washington, DC from Sept. 4 to 9. The trip was funded through a NASA EPSCoR travel grant.

Charles Kankelborg visited Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, CO the week of Sept. 24 to present a talk.

Ron Hellings traveled to Pomona College in Claremont, CA, for collaboration on research, Sept. 12-17.

Craig Zaspel attended the Seeheim Conference on Magnetism in Frankfurt, Germany, Sept. 6-14.

VISITORS NEWS

Professor Uwe Happek, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Georgia, visited Rufus Cone, Charles Thiel, and Yongchen Sun on May 2-6.

Szymon Gburek, a Polish grad student managed to get his Visa and travel to the US after Sept. 11, and will be working with Piet Martens until mid-November on in-orbit determination of the Yohkoh-SXT Point Spread Function, and consequently the optimal restoration of SXT images. This knowledge is crucial for determining reliable SXT temperature maps, and measuring faint emission such as that in coronal holes.

J. L. Hall of JILA, Boulder, CO, passed through Bozeman and visited MSU on Aug. 24. Rufus Cone, Geoff Pryde, Kevin Repasky, and Lei Meng discussed their latest experimental results as he visited their laboratories. Hall has helped the Carlsten and Cone groups establish programs in new areas of laser frequency stabilization involving enhanced stimulated Raman scattering and spectral hole frequency references.

UPCOMING EVENTS