News Release | For Immediate Release | April 02, 2009
(Vancouver, BC) -- Members of the InterAction Collaboration today announced the launch of the new Quantum Diaries, a web site that follows physicists from around the world as they experience life at the energy, intensity, and cosmic frontiers of particle and nuclear physics. Through their blogs, the diarists offer a personal look at the daily lives of physicists with stories, videos, photos, and biographies. The site can be found at http://www.quantumdiaries.org.
The original Quantum Diaries chronicled the lives of scientists as they experienced the World Year of Physics, 2005. Over the course of a year, thousands of readers followed the highs and lows for some 25 particle physicists--discoveries, new jobs, new babies, funding cuts, loss of old friends, and public discussions of science.
Today Quantum Diaries returns with a new set of diarists representing a vibrant cross-section of working physicists. Writing in multiple languages, scientists and students from universities and laboratories in North America, Asia and Europe have volunteered to blog about life as a physicist, sharing their challenges at the lab as well as at home. Every few months, new diarists will join the site to share even more stories about life in the laboratory and beyond.
Two Canadian voices join the initial team of 10 diarists: Chris Ruiz and Anadi Canepa, both from TRIUMF, Canada's national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics. Ruiz is a nuclear physicist working as the group leader for the DRAGON experiment which explores the astrophysical origins of the chemical elements. Ruiz said, "[This project] allows me to share my passion for the work that I do, and to try to reach out to those people out there who are deeply interested in physics but sometimes can't get past our veil of technical jargon and mathematics." He added, "Blogging is not only about the actual science that we do, but also the other, more mundane parts of our lives that give people a chance to see that physicists are not all wild-haired, white-coated mad scientists, but share the same life experiences and day-to-day problems, joys, thoughts and experiences as everyone else." For instance, Ruiz's recent blog post contrasted his musical and scientific tastes.
Anadi Canepa is a TRIUMF particle physicist, presently stationed at the ATLAS experiment at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland. She is enthusiastic about sharing her experiences there. She introduces the Large Hadron Collider in her first blog post, providing a friendly description of the particle accelerator and encouraging her readers to learn more about it. She observed that, "[This] is an opportunity for me to share my every day experiences as a TRIUMF scientist based at CERN. Exciting times are ahead of us in the field of particle physics. By exposing young physicists to the fascination of our research, [the blog site] can also play a role in expanding our field."
MEDIA CONTACTS
Quantum Diaries Project
Elizabeth Clements
Senior Science Communicator
InterAction Collaboration
Phone: + 1.630.840.2326
E-mail: Elizabeth Clements
TRIUMF
Timothy I. Meyer
Head, Strategic Planning & Communications
TRIUMF
Phone: + 1.604.222.7674
E-mail: Tim Meyer
FOR EDITORS:
The Quantum Diaries web site was developed and is jointly maintained by the InterAction Collaboration whose members represent the world's particle physics laboratories in Europe, North America, and Asia, with funding provided by the science funding agencies of many nations. The mission of InterAction is not only to support the international science of particle and nuclear physics but also to set visible footprints for peaceful collaboration across all borders. See http://interactions.org.
TRIUMF is Canada's national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics. Physically located on the south campus of the University of British Columbia, TRIUMF is owned and operated as a joint venture by a consortium of the following Canadian universities, via a contribution through National Research Council Canada and supported by the Province of British Columbia: University of Alberta, University of British Columbia, Carleton University, University of Manitoba, l'Université de Montréal, Simon Fraser University, University of Toronto, and University of Victoria. See http://www.triumf.ca.