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PHYSICS teacher Emily Galloway aims to bring ‘some of the magic’ of CERN, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research, into the classroom after being selected to attend a special global gathering of tutors at its pioneering Swiss scientific centre this summer, writes Stan Szecowka.
The member of the St Christopher’s Senior School Science Department has been plucked to participate in the High School Teacher Programme, which will take place in Geneva, for 19 days in July.
Emily, a sports-loving adventurer, who studied Physics at Exeter University in England, told GulfWeekly: “I’m incredibly excited to visit CERN, to gain firsthand insight into the experimentation underway at the frontiers of Particle Physics research.
“Physics is the knowledge of nature, understanding of the world around us. I’m fascinated by the concepts which challenge our imagination, such as quantum mechanics and string theory – which have led to inventions such as the iphone.”
Emily will be part of a group of 48 teachers from more than 20 countries worldwide who will have the chance to see the world’s largest and most complex scientific instruments at work, and who will be guided through the experimentation underway at the frontiers of Particle Physics research.
She will also be attending lectures on the latest theories in the fields of Particle Physics and Cosmology, presented by the leading experts in the field. In the 1980s, CERN was the birthplace of the World Wide Web.
The CERN particle physics laboratory near Geneva is one of the world’s largest and most respected centres for scientific research. More than 10 metres below ground an accelerator can simulate the conditions occurring fractions of a second after the big bang. This enables researchers to investigate the structure of matter and the fundamental laws of nature.
Emily has worked as a teacher of Physics in England, Mexico and Thailand, and most recently Bahrain. She loves ‘the outdoors’ and at university as well as ‘learning about the workings of the universe’ she also participated in many outdoor sports, including sailing, windsurfing, climbing and hiking. She enjoys travelling, meeting new people and learning new languages.
Asked what she hoped to gain from the CERN experience she quoted Arthur C Clark, author of 2001: A Space Odyssey: ‘Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic’ and added: “The aim of the course is to bring some of the magic of CERN into the classroom.”
Competition to gain a place on the teachers’ programme was said by the centre to have been ‘high’ as it is considered to be a dream destination for all interested in Physics.
At the end of 2008, the most powerful particle accelerator in the world – the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), which is nearly 27 kilometres long – entered into operation.
It has been hailed as a triumph for international science, the coalescing of four decades of intellectual and engineering effort to create a new understanding of the universe’s structure. And certainly the discovery of the Higgs boson represents a significant milestone in the history of particle physics.
At CERN, around 10,000 scientists have collaborated for several years at the £5 billion LHC – an underground circular device constructed to a billionth of a metre accuracy – to uncover a sub-atomic entity that gives stars, planets and living creatures their mass.
By battering streams of protons together at colossal energies round this tunnel, they have transformed our understanding of the cosmos. We now know that an invisible energy field, the Higgs field, stretches across the universe, one that clings to fundamental particles like the proton to give them mass. The Higgs boson is the signature particle of that field.
Hoped for discoveries include particles that could explain the presence of dark matter in the universe. Astronomers know that the quarks, electrons and other forms of normal matter found on Earth can only explain about a sixth of the mass of the universe. There is something else out there. Scientists call it dark matter but cannot agree about its nature. A particle, as yet undetected, that permeates the cosmos, might be responsible.
