Mishra Selected for CMNS Board of Visitors Award

The CMNS Board of Visitors selected Rashmish Mishra, a graduate student in the Maryland Center for Theoretical Physics, to receive the 2013 Outstanding Teaching Assistant Award. The 2013 CMNS Board of Visitors Awards will be presented at this year's Academic Festival on May 10, 2013 at 2:00 p.m. in the G. Forrest Woods Atrium of the Chemistry Building.

Milchberg Selected as 2013 OSA Fellow

Professor Howard Milchberg was named a 2013 fellow of the Optical Society of America (OSA). The number of OSA Members recommended for election to Fellow each year is limited to less than 0.5 percent of the total OSA Membership.  Fellows are selected based on their overall impact on optics, as gauged through factors such as specific scientific, engineering, and technological contributions, a record of significant publications or patents related to optics, technical leadership in the field, and service to OSA and the global optics community.

These distinguished Fellow Members will be recognized individually at meetings throughout 2013. Specific information on each new Fellow Member’s accomplishments are published in the February issue of Optics and Photonics News.

Buonanno and Banavar are Added to the APS Outstanding Referees List

Alessandra Buonanno and Jayanth Banavar are among the new Outstanding Referees selected by the editors of the APS journals. Initiated in 2008, the highly selective Outstanding Referee program recognizes scientists who have been exceptionally helpful in assessing manuscripts for publication in the APS journals. Selections are based on two decades of records on the number, quality and timeliness of referee reports.

The full list of Outstanding Referees is located at, http://publish.aps.org/OutstandingReferees

Roald Sagdeev Interviewed by NPR's Daniel Zwerdling

The Day I Said ‘Nyet!’ to Gorbachev… and Other Life Tales of a Famous Soviet Scientist

Distinguished University of Maryland Professor Roald Z. Sagdeev discussed “The Day I Said ‘Nyet!’ to Gorbachev… and Other Life Tales of a Famous Soviet Scientist” with journalist Daniel Zwerdling on February 7, 2013 at the Marriott Conference Center on the UMD campus. Sagdeev ran the Soviet space program and advised Soviet leaders on the nuclear arms race. He spoke about love, communism, physics and the end of the Soviet Union with Daniel Zwerdling, an award-winning correspondent and investigative journalist with National Public Radio. 

The interview was part of the "Sagdeev at 80" symposium sponsored by the University of Maryland Department of Physics and the Eisenhower Institute. A videorecording is posted here: