KPU Physics for Modern Technology
8771 Lansdowne Rd V6X 3X7 Richmond, BC, Canada

Starting your new year with a new plan for your educational journey! Join us for our upcoming KPU Richmond Virtual Open House on Thursday, January 21, 2021, from 6pm-8pm (PDT).

One of the holy grails of modern physics has been to discover a room temperature superconductor, and this was reported last week more than a century after superconductivity was first discovered! The only problem is that it is only observed when the material is crushed at extremely high pressures between two pieces of diamond (such as in the diamond anvil cell shown in the picture). Scientists are hopeful that by modifying the chemistry of the superconducting material they wil...l be able to reduce the required pressure. Currently, the practical use of superconductors (such as in MRI scanners in hospitals) requires them to be cooled to very low temperatures. A practical room temperature superconductor would have many uses (such as transmission of electricity from power plant to user without any losses) that would revolutionize modern technology. Read more at: https://www.sciencemag.org//after-decades-room-temperature And hear from the lead scientist of the new discovery in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onB0w3_Su9I

Congratulations to the winners of this year’s Nobel prize in physics! The prize was awarded to Roger Penrose (left) for his work in predicting the existence of black holes, and to Andrea Ghez (centre) and Reinhard Genzel (right) for their discovery of a supermassive black hole at the centre of our galaxy. For more, see: https://www.cbc.ca//tec/nobel-prize-physics-2020-1.5751726

Kudos to 4th year Physics for Modern Technology student Jonathon Lee, who will be speaking on a panel this evening as part of Vancouver Startup Week. The panel discussion is about virtual internships and is being organized by Riipen, who facilitate connections between students and industry. Jonathon completed a very successful virtual internship this summer with Gowin Semiconductor Corp. For more info on the panel, see: https://hubs.ly/H0wYcqN0

We were happy to welcome colleagues and students from Langara College earlier this month to use our cloud lab demo for their online classes. Students learn concepts such as acceleration of a cart down an inclined track, a mainstay topic in introductory physics. Students learn about experimentation, backed by the relationship between displacement, velocity and acceleration and an application of Newton’s 2nd Law of Motion. A great example of taking lessons normally learned in class to an online format! Pictured here is KPU Physics instructor Dr. Takashi Sato, in front of the track that he helped develop.