The American Physical Society (APS) is a not-for-profit membership organization of professionals in physics and related disciplines, comprising nearly fifty divisions, sections, and other units. Its mission is the advancement and diffusion of knowledge of physics. The society publishes more than a dozen scientific journals, including the prestigious Physical Review and Physical Review Letters, and organizes more than twenty science meetings each year. APS is a member society of the American Institute of Physics. Since January 2021 the organization has been led by chief executive officer Jonathan Bagger.
Carl Edwin Wieman is an American physicist and educationist at Stanford University, and currently the A.D White Professor at Large at Cornell University. In 1995, while at the University of Colorado Boulder, he and Eric Allin Cornell produced the first true Bose–Einstein condensate (BEC) and, in 2001, they and Wolfgang Ketterle were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics. Wieman currently holds a joint appointment as Professor of Physics and Professor in the Stanford Graduate School of Education, as well as the DRC Professor in the Stanford University School of Engineering. In 2020, Wieman was awarded the Yidan Prize in Education Research for "his contribution in developing new techniques and tools in STEM education." citation.
Helen Rhoda Arnold Quinn is an Australian-born particle physicist and educator who has made major contributions to both fields. Her contributions to theoretical physics include the Peccei–Quinn theory which implies a corresponding symmetry of nature and contributions to the search for a unified theory for the three types of particle interactions. As Chair of the Board on Science Education of the National Academy of Sciences, Quinn led the effort that produced A Framework for K-12 Science Education: Practices, Crosscutting Concepts, and Core Ideas—the basis for the Next Generation Science Standards adopted by many states. Her honours include the Dirac Medal of the International Center for Theoretical Physics, the Oskar Klein Medal from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, appointment as an Honorary Officer of the Order of Australia, the J. J. Sakurai Prize for Theoretical Particle Physics from the American Physical Society, the Karl Taylor Compton Medal for Leadership in Physics from the American Institute of Physics, and the 2018 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Physics from the Franklin Institute.
PhET Interactive Simulations, a project at the University of Colorado Boulder, is a non-profit open educational resource project that creates and hosts explorable explanations. It was founded in 2002 by Nobel Laureate Carl Wieman. PhET began with Wieman's vision to improve the way science is taught and learned. Their stated mission is "To advance science and math literacy and education worldwide through free interactive simulations."
Kennedy J. Reed was an American theoretical atomic physicist in the Theory Group in the Physics & Advanced Technologies Directorate at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and a founder of the National Physical Science Consortium (NPSC), a group of about 30 universities that provides physics fellowships for women and minorities.
Physics education research (PER) is a form of discipline-based education research specifically related to the study of the teaching and learning of physics, often with the aim of improving the effectiveness of student learning. PER draws from other disciplines, such as sociology, cognitive science, education and linguistics, and complements them by reflecting the disciplinary knowledge and practices of physics. Approximately eighty-five institutions in the United States conduct research in science and physics education.
Geraldine Lee Richmond is an American chemist and physical chemist who is serving as the Under Secretary of Energy for Science in the US Department of Energy. Richmond was confirmed to her DOE role by the United States Senate on November 5, 2021. Richmond is the Presidential Chair in Science and professor of chemistry at the University of Oregon (UO). She conducts fundamental research to understand the chemistry and physics of complex surfaces and interfaces. These understandings are most relevant to energy production, atmospheric chemistry and remediation of the environment. Throughout her career she has worked to increase the number and success of women scientists in the U.S. and in many developing countries in Africa, Asia and South America. Richmond has served as president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and she received the 2013 National Medal of Science.
Noah David Finkelstein is a professor of physics at the University of Colorado Boulder. He is a founding co-director of the Colorado Center for STEM Learning, a President’s Teaching Scholar, and the inaugural Timmerhaus Teaching Ambassador. His research focuses on physics education and on developing models of context, the scope of which involves students, departments, and institutional scales of transformation. In 2010, Finkelstein testified to the United States House Committee on Science, Space and Technology on how to strengthen undergraduate and postgraduate STEM education.
Luz Martinez-Miranda is an American-Puerto Rican physicist. She is currently an associate professor in the College of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Maryland. Martinez-Miranda is an APS Fellow and was the first female president of the National Society of Hispanic Physicists.
Heather Lewandowski is a professor of physics at the University of Colorado Boulder. She looks to understand the quantum mechanical processes in making chemical bonds. She uses time-varying inhomogeneous electric fields to achieve supersonic cooling. She also studies how students learn experimental skills in instructional physics labs and help to improve student learning in these environments. She is a Fellow of the American Physical Society.
Paula R. L. Heron is a Canadian-American physics educator who works as a professor of physics at the University of Washington.
Mustapha Ishak-Boushaki is a theoretical physicist, cosmologist and professor at the University of Texas at Dallas. He is known for his contributions to the studies of cosmic acceleration and dark energy, gravitational lensing, and testing alternatives to general relativity; as well as his authorship of Testing General Relativity in Cosmology, a review article published in Living Reviews in Relativity. He was elected as a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in 2021 and as a fellow of the American Physical Society (APS) with the quote: "For distinguished contributions to the field of theoretical cosmology, particularly for testing modifications to general relativity at cosmological scales, and for sustained excellence in teaching and mentoring of students."
Lillian Christie McDermott was an American physicist. In the early 1970s, McDermott established the Physics Education Group (PEG) at the University of Washington to "improve the teaching and learning of physics from kindergarten all the way through graduate school." She was recognized for her many contributions to the field of physics education research with an election to the American Physical Society in 1990.
Gay Bernadette Stewart is an American physics educator who directs the West Virginia University Center for Excellence in STEM Education, where she is a professor of physics and Eberly Professor of STEM Education. She is a former president of the American Association of Physics Teachers.
Priscilla Watson Laws was an American physics educator, known for her work in activity-based physics education. She was a research professor of physics at Dickinson College.
Gerceida E. Adams-Jones is an American physicist, a clinical associate professor at New York University, and a faculty member at Pioneer Academics, an online research program for high school students connected with Oberlin College. In 1981, she became the first African-American woman to receive a B.S. degree in physical oceanography in the United States.
Catherine Louise Hirshfeld Crouch is an American materials physicist. She is a Full professor in the Department of Physics at Swarthmore College and faculty director of Swarthmore's Natural Sciences & Engineering Inclusive Excellence Initiatives.
Beverley Ann P. Taylor is an American physicist and physics educator known for her physics books for children. She is a professor emerita at Miami University Hamilton in Hamilton, Ohio.
Amy Lisa Graves is a retired American physicist and physics educator, the Walter Kemp Professor Emerita in the Natural Sciences and Professor of Physics at Swarthmore College. Her publications include works on gender bias in physics, physics education, and computational simulations of phenomena in condensed matter physics, including jamming.
Marie Lopez del Puerto is a condensed matter physicist whose research concerns the computational study of the electronic, optical, and quantum properties of nanocrystals and nanostructures. As a physics educator, she has worked to integrate computational physics into the undergraduate physics curriculum. Educated in Mexico and the US, she works in the US as a professor of physics and chair of the physics department at the University of St. Thomas, a private Catholic university in Minnesota.
