Summer 2012 Newsletter

Edited by Barbara Jones

A Note from the DCMP Chair

Planning for the 2013 March meeting is underway. Mark your calendars, if you have not already, for March 18-22, 2013 in Baltimore, Maryland. The highest priority for DCMP right now is the invited symposia. Nominations from DCMP membership are critical here, because all invited speakers, and all substitutes for invited speakers who decline, must come from the cohort of nominated speakers in the DCMP nominations database. Unlike other units, we in the executive committee cannot come up with our own list of speakers. The deadline for nominations is approaching, namely Tuesday September 4. Information on how to create and submit a nomination for an invited symposium, together with links with all the relevant url’s, are in this newsletter.

We will have a mid-week plenary session again next March, tentatively entitled, "Forefront Physics for Real World Problems." The newsletter describes the subject area and how you can be involved. Information on contributed talks follows that.

Upcoming deadlines involve DCMP elections and nominations for Fellow, and the deadlines, information, and url’s are all in this newsletter as well.

DCMP has been involved in a number of other activities, such as seeking additional funding for the Buckley Prize, discussing implementing a travel fund for the March meeting, and, continuing from last year, a possible update of the DCMP name. All these will be developing over the fall, and we will have updates on these and other matters, either in a fall newsletter or the winter.

Barbara Jones

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In this Issue

Important Deadlines and Dates:

DCMP Executive Committee Nominations
Saturday, September 1, 2012

DCMP Invited Symposia Nominations
Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Voting Starts for DCMP Executive Committee
mid-October 2012

Contributed Abstracts Deadline
Friday, November 9, 2012 (5 pm EST)

APS Fellow Nominations
Friday, February 1, 2013

Baltimore APS March Meeting
March 18 - March 22, 2013

The 2013 March Meeting

The March Meeting will be held in Baltimore, Maryland from Monday, March 18 to Friday, March 22, 2013. The March Meeting headquarters hotel is the Hilton Baltimore in the Inner Harbor. The Hilton is connected via sky bridge to the Baltimore Convention Center. DCMP will organize about 35 of the 100+ Invited Sessions. There will be over 40 parallel sessions. The complete bulletin will be available only in electronic form.

Invited Symposia Nominations

Please help make the 2013 March Meeting a great success by submitting excellent nominations for invited DCMP Symposia. The deadline is Tuesday, September 4, 2012. To submit a nomination of an Invited Symposium for the March Meeting, go to: http://meetings.aps.org/aps_invited/Invited/LoginForm.cfm?MT=MAR13&UNIT=DCMP
or find it on the main DCMP web page.

A major role of DCMP is to organize Invited Symposia (about 35 of them). According to DCMP bylaws, the speakers are drawn from member nominations. Please create your symposium nomination, and then go to the link above to enter it into the database.

You must notify your speaker and session chair nominees beforehand and obtain their willingness to participate, if chosen, before you submit. Once you have completed the nomination -- and will not make any more changes or additions -- please click on "Complete Nomination." This will initiate a notification email to the speakers and the chair of your nominated session to reconfirm their willingness and to serve as a check of the accuracy of their email address information. Via their timely responses (by Sept. 17) we will track their intention to participate in the 2013 March Meeting. You will also receive a confirmation of your session nomination.

Please note that the Executive Committee as a whole selects invited talks only from those proposed by the community. It cannot substitute speakers of its own choosing. This procedure is unique among APS units. You are encouraged to submit joint nominations for invited sessions with other APS units when submitting to DCMP. In putting together proposals for invited symposia, please consider minority, female, and international candidates, who historically have been underrepresented among invited speakers at the March Meeting.

Suggestions for Creating a Successful Proposal

  1. Propose a symposium on a timely topic with five excellent talks. Generally the Executive Committee favors symposia (preferably with five talks, rather than fewer) over individual invited talks. There are very few of the latter.
  2. Choose an appropriate title and provide a clear justification. This will aid the committee in making its decision.
  3. Choose titles of individual talks carefully. The speaker can revise the title later, but it is important to have the topic and intent of the presentation stated clearly.
  4. Provide an informative abstract for each talk. This will underpin the central theme of the symposium and aid the committee in reaching a decision. Speakers who are invited will be asked to submit their own abstracts later.
  5. Provide references to publications. This will aid the committee in determining whether the work is current and whether it has some level of acceptance by the scientific community. Electronically posted preprints are useful, though they do not have the same status as refereed publications.
  6. Include an alternate speaker. It is important to provide a substitute in the event that someone becomes unavailable. Please ask the alternate (like the main choices) to confirm availability.
  7. Enter the proposed symposium under a relevant sorting category. This will ensure that the correct subcommittee examines the proposal. Multiple submissions of a proposal are counterproductive and ineffective.

March 2013 Plenary

Following the successful plenary on meso in March 2012, we are planning a plenary again for the 2013 March meeting. The working title for the session is "Forefront Physics for Real World Problems." The planned theme is current forefront physics research that addresses real-world issues in new ways. The topics that we currently have in mind include modeling ocean dynamics, weather, and climate; the physics of batteries for next-generation vehicles; to the challenges of photovoltaics and other energy source. These topics all have some mix of the features of complex dynamical systems, and/or interdisciplinary science involving both physics and chemistry.

We are now asking for suggestions for possible speakers and ideas which will fit this theme. If you have ideas, please send them to the program chair for your unit, typically the Chair-elect, who will collect and organize the suggestions.

Contributed Abstracts

The deadline for the receipt of abstracts of contributed papers is Friday, November 9, 2012, 5:00 PM EST. Contributed abstract submission for the 2013 March Meeting will open in September 2012. Submission instructions and a link to the submissions page (when ready) can be found at http://www.aps.org/meetings/abstract/instructions.cfm

Nomination and Election of DCMP Executive Committee Members

Please participate in the election of DCMP officers and members-at-large of the Executive Committee. You will be asked to elect a new Vice Chair (who will become, in successive years, Chair Elect, Chair and Past Chair), and three Members-at-Large who serve 3-year terms. The deadline for nominations is Sept. 1, 2012. To submit a nomination please go to DCMP Call for Nomination page. The election will open mid-October 2012. Members will receive voting instructions from the APS. Candidate biographies and statements will be available on both the APS and DCMP web sites before and during the election. You can go to the DCMP web-site and click the link that will appear there shortly, or go to the link in an email that you receive from APS once the election site opens.

The DCMP Executive Committee performs several functions. One of its most important responsibilities is to lead the organization of the APS March Meeting. It is the body that selects the division's Invited Symposia from those nominated by the community. Thus a proper balance of expertise and diversity of the Committee are essential for a successful meeting. The Executive Committee helps to lobby Congress on science policy issues. Finally, the DCMP Members-at-Large choose potential new Fellows, from those nominated, to be considered by the APS Fellowship Committee and Council. The current membership of the Executive Committee appears at the end of this newsletter or can be found at DCMP Executive Committee page.

The DCMP Web Site

The DCMP website provides general information and announcements of potential interest to members. The site also informs the general public of the role and value of condensed matter physics in their lives. There is an impressive collection of images in the on-line gallery. We welcome contributions to the site from the DCMP membership involving any subject matter that may help achieve the goals of DCMP.

Please submit images via: http://www.aps.org/units/dcmp/gallery/submissions.cfm
Please submit notices of meetings via: http://www.aps.org/units/dcmp/meetings/suggestion.cfm
Please submit any comments and suggestions using the webform found here: http://www.aps.org/units/dcmp/comments.cfm

APS Fellowship Nominations

Fellowship is a distinct honor signifying recognition by one's professional peers. Members are encouraged to nominate outstanding scientists for Fellowship in the APS, especially those from under-represented groups. DCMP each year can sponsor 0.5% of its current membership (which is 6,102 at present). Nominations can be submitted at any time, but must be received by the Feb. 1, 2013 deadline to be considered for sponsorship, where the award would take place at the 2014 March Meeting. See the following for deadlines, instructions, and tips to prepare an effective case: http://www.aps.org/programs/honors/fellowships/index.cfm

Nominations are active for two years. Updated information from sponsors, as needed, is welcomed before the second-year deadline. The DCMP Fellowship Committee consists of the DCMP Councillor and Members-at-Large. The committee meets before the March Meeting and makes recommendations to the APS Fellowship Committee.

Tips for Successful Nominations

The selection process is highly competitive. When preparing nominations, the sponsor should ensure that the achievements of the candidate are properly reflected in the material submitted. The Fellowship Committee looks for sustained contributions to the field. Successful nominees generally have over ten years of professional experience beyond the Ph.D. The eight representative publications and ten other contributions listed in the application should be chosen with care. The committee is helped considerably by support letters that evaluate the candidate's work, highlighting exceptional achievements.

Join DCMP

Please encourage others to join APS and DCMP. Also, make sure that your own membership is current. The more members we have, the more invited symposia that we can sponsor at the March Meeting, and the more nominations to be a Fellow of the Society that we can sponsor. Thus, an increase in our membership benefits our community. Student membership in DCMP is free. Otherwise, it costs $8 to join DCMP. You can join at any time. To join APS, go to: http://www.aps.org/membership/join.cfm. For APS members to join DCMP, go to: http://www.aps.org/membership/units/join-unit.cfm

DCMP Executive Committee Roster

Chair: Barbara Jones (03/12 - 03/13)
IBM Almaden Res Ctr

Chair-Elect: Allan MacDonald (03/12 - 03/13)
Univ of Texas, Austin

Vice Chair: Arthur Ramirez (03/12 - 03/13)
Univ of California-Santa Cruz

Past Chair: Samuel Bader (03/12 - 03/13)
Argonne Natl Lab

Secretary/Treasurer: Nicholas Bonesteel (03/11 - 03/15)
Florida State Univ

Councillor: Frances Hellman (01/12 - 12/15)
Univ of California - Berkeley

Members-at-Large:

Yves Chabal (03/10 - 03/13)
Univ of Texas, Dallas

Peter Johnson (03/10 - 03/13)
Brookhaven Natl Lab

Charles Kane (03/10 - 03/13)
Univ of Pennsylvania

James Sauls (03/11 - 03/14)
Northwestern Univ

Nandini Trivedi (03/11 - 03/14)
Ohio State Univ - Columbus

Nai-Chang Yeh (03/11 - 03/14)
Cal Inst of Tech (Caltech)

Paul Canfield (03/12 - 03/15)
Iowa State Univ

M Cristina Marchetti (03/12 - 03/15)
Syracuse Univ

Ali Yazdani (03/12 - 03/15)
Princeton Univ

The information and articles found in this issue of the APS Division of Condensed Matter Physics Newsletter are not peer refereed and represent solely the views of the authors and not necessarily the views of the APS.