Physics outreach

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Physics outreach encompasses facets of

Ongoing efforts to expand the understanding of physics to a wider audience have been undertaken by individuals and institutions since the early 19th century. Historic works, such as the Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, and Two New Sciences by Galileo Galilei, sought to present revolutionary knowledge in astronomy, frames of reference, and kinematics in a manner that a general audience could understand with great effect.

In the mid-1800s, English physicist and chemist, Michael Faraday^[4] gave a series of nineteen lectures aimed towards young adults with the hopes of conveying scientific phenomena. His intentions were to raise awareness, inspire them and generate revenue of the Royal Institution. This series became known as the Christmas lectures, and still continues today. By the early 20th century, the public notoriety of physicists such as Albert Einstein and Marie Curie, and inventions such as radio led to a growing interest in physics. In 1921, in the United States, the establishment of Sigma Pi Sigma physics honor society at universities was instrumental in the expanding number of physics presentations, and led to the creation of physics clubs open to all students.^[5]

Museums were an important form of outreach but most early

In August 1969,

In the ensuing years, physics outreach, and science outreach more generally, continued to expand and took on new popular forms, including highly successful television shows such as Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, first broadcast in 1980.

As a form of outreach within the physics education community for teachers and students, in 1997 the US

Many contemporary initiatives in physics outreach have begun to shift focus, transcending traditional field boundaries, seeking to engage students and the public by integrating elements of aesthetic design and popular culture. The goal has been not only to push physics out of a strictly science education framework but also to draw in professionals and students from other fields to bring their perspectives on physical phenomena. Such work includes artists creating sculptures using ferrofluids, and art photography using high speed and ultra high speed photography.

Other efforts, such as University of Cambridge's Physics at Work program^[10] have created annual events to demonstrate to secondary students uses of physics in everyday life and a Senior Physics Challenge.^[11] Seeing the importance these initiatives, Cambridge has established a full-time physics outreach organization, an Educational Outreach Office,^[12] and aspirations for a Center of Physics and expanded industrial partnerships that "would include a well equipped core team of outreach officers dedicated to demonstrating the real life applications of physics, showing that physics is an accessible and relevant subject".^[13]

The French research group, La Physique Autrement (Physics Reimagined),^[14] of the Laboratoire de Physique des Solides,^[15] works on research about new ways to present modern solid-state physics and to engage the general public. In 2013, Physics Today covered this group in an article entitled "Quantum Physics For Everyone" which discussed how with the help of designers and unconventional demonstrations, the project sought out and succeeded to engage people who never thought of themselves as interested in science.^[16]

The

• Montreal Science Centre (Montreal, Quebec) displays many hands-on activities involving various physics phenomena.

Finland

• Heureka (Helsinki) is an NPO
  science center run by the Finnish Science Centre Foundation with a broad spectrum of physics-related exhibits.

• Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie (Paris) is the largest French science museum, and contains permanent exhibits and hands-on experiments.
• Palais de la Découverte (Paris) contains permanent exhibits and interactive experiments with commentaries by lecturers. It includes a Zeiss planetarium with 15-metre dome. It was created in 1937 by the French Nobel Prize physicist Jean Baptiste Perrin.
• Musée des Arts et Métiers (Paris) focuses on the preservation of scientific instruments and inventions.
• Other science museums that are part of the Cultural Center of Science, Technology and Industry (CCSTI) exist all across France : Espace des Sciences (Rennes), La Casemate (Grenoble),^[18] the Cité de l'espace (Toulouse).

Germany

• Deutsches Museum (Munich) is the world's largest science museum. One of the most popular events is the high voltage demonstration of a Faraday cage as part of their series on electric power.

Islamic Republic of Iran

• Iran Science and Technology Museum (Tehran) is the largest science museum in Iran. This museum, by holding varied scientific and educational programs, provides the required situation for creation and propagation of scientific thought in the society. One of these programs is the "Physics Show".

Netherlands

• NEMO (Amsterdam) is the largest science center in the Netherlands, with hands-on science exhibitions.

United States

• Exploratorium (San Francisco)^[19] is one of the foremost interactive science and art museums in the United States dedicated to exploring how the world works and consists of interactive exhibits, experiences and curious exploration. The Exploratorium was opened in 1969, and now attracts over a million visitors annually.^[20]
• The American Museum of Natural History in New York City is both a museum and a research facility with a department in astrophysics. As a natural history museum, it focuses on educating the public about human cultures, the natural world, and the universe, and has many interactive programs and lectures all year round.
• The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia is one of the oldest centers for science education and research in the United States.

Scientific institutions and societies with physics outreach programs

Canada

• Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics was founded in 1999 in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, the institute is a center for scientific research, training and educational outreach in theoretical physics.^[21]
• Located in
  Vancouver, British Columbia, TRIUMF is Canada's national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics and accelerator-based science. In addition to its science mission, the laboratory is committed to physics outreach, offering public tours of its facilities, public talks, an artist in residence program,^[22] student fellowships, and other opportunities.^[23]
• The
  legislators of physics issues, sponsoring physics related events, [physics outreach], and publishes Physics in Canada.^[24]

• French Physics Society has a specific section devoted to outreach and popularization of science.
• The European Physical Society (EPS) is based in France, but works to promote physics and physicists in Europe.

Germany

• Federal Ministry of Education and Research. This festival is the largest of its kind in Germany and attracts about 30,000 visitors every year.^[26]

• Institute of Physics is an international charitable institution that aims to advance physics education, research and application.^[27]

United States

• American Association for the Advancement of Science
• American Association of Physics Teachers
• American Institute of Physics (AIP) has an outreach program focused on advocating science policy to the US Congress and the general public.
• American Physical Society (APS) has a program dedicated to "Communicating the excitement and importance of physics to everyone."^[28]
• Leonardo, the International Society for the Arts, Sciences and Technology (Leonardo/ISAST) is a nonprofit organization that serves the global network of distinguished scholars, artists, scientists, researchers and thinkers. The institution focuses on interdisciplinary work, creative output and innovation. Its journal Leonardo is published by MIT Press.

Media and Internet

Media

• The Big Bang Theory is an American sitcom created in 2007 and revolves around the lives of scientists at the California Institute of Technology. This show has been widely recognized for popularizing science and noted by the New York Times as "helping physics and fiction collide".^[29] In 2014, the program was the most popular sitcom and most popular non-sports program on American TV with an average of 20 million viewers. However, the show has been criticized for sometimes portraying the scientific community inaccurately.^[30]
• C'est pas sorcier is a French educational television program that originally aired from November 5, 1994, to present. 20 shows dealt with astronomy and space topics and 13 about physics.^[31]
• particle physicists
  seem human.
• Through the Wormhole is an American science documentary television series narrated and hosted by American actor Morgan Freeman and has featured physicists such as such as Michio Kaku and Brian Cox (physicist).

• Brian Cox (physicist) is a British physicist and musician best known to the public as the presenter of a number of science programs for the BBC.
• Wendy J. Sadler promotes science and engineering as part of popular culture through Science Made Simple,^[39] an educational spin-off company of Cardiff University that reaches students through live presentations. She also trains scientists and engineers to improve their communications skills to enable them to extend their research across a broader audience. Sadler was the IoP Young Professional Physicist of the Year in 2005.^[40]
• Sunday Telegraph
  .

United States

• Richard Feynman was a Nobel-prize-winning theoretical physicist also known as a science popularizer through his books and lectures ranging from physics topics (quantum physics, nanophysics...) to autobiographical essays.
• cosmologist
  who also wrote popular books on science, some of which are still in print more than a half-century after their original publication
• Brian Greene is a theoretical physicist involved in various outreach activities (books, TV shows). He co-founded the World Science Festival in 2008.
• Clifford Victor Johnson
  is a theoretical physicist involved in various outreach activities (blog, TV shows...).
• popularizer of physics. He is most well known for his three New York Times Best Sellers on physics: Physics of the Impossible (2008), Physics of the Future (2011), and The Future of the Mind
  (2014).
• empirical data, of scientific skepticism and of science education and works to reduce the impact of superstition and religious dogma in pop culture.^[41]
• Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. While his research focuses on the Large Hadron Collider, he is known for his efforts to spread public awareness of physics and cosmology. He is the face of the Fermilab YouTube channel,^[42] where he has made over 150 videos. He is also a frequent contributor to CNN, Forbes, and many other online journals.^[43] He is also author of several books, including "Understanding the Universe", published by World Scientific, and "The Large Hadron Collider: The Extraordinary Story of the Higgs Boson and Other Things That Will Blow Your Mind," published by Johns Hopkins University Press
  .
• Jennifer Ouellette is the former director of the Science & Entertainment Exchange, an initiative of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) designed to connect entertainment industry professionals with top scientists and engineers to help the creators of television shows, films, video games, and other productions incorporate science into their work.^[44] She is currently a freelance writer contributing to a physics outreach dialogue with articles in a variety of publications such as Physics World, Discover magazine, New Scientist, Physics Today, and The Wall Street Journal.
• Carl Sagan was an astrophysicist and science popularizer, one of his important contributions being the 1980 television series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage
• Neil deGrasse Tyson is an astrophysicist and science communicator who participated to TV and radio shows and wrote various outreach books.
• Jearl Walker is a physics professor at Cleveland State University. He wrote the Amateur Scientist column in Scientific American from 1978 to 1988 and authored the popular science book The Flying Circus of Physics.

Funding sources

• American Physical Society awards grants up to $10,000 to help APS members develop new physics outreach activities.
• Institute for Complex Adaptive Matter (ICAM) provides grants and fellowships for physics outreach.
• Wellcome Trust, while mostly focused on biological sciences, the Wellcome Trust also touches on physics and encourages physics outreach. They aim to improve biology, chemistry, and physics A levels in the UK.
• Institute of Physics (IoP) The IoP aims to provide positive and compelling experiences of physics for public audiences through engaging and entertaining activities and events. The public engagement grant scheme is designed to give financial support of up to £1500 to individuals and organisations running physics-based events and activities in the UK and Ireland.^[45]

Awards

• Kalinga Prize for the Popularization of Science is an award given by UNESCO
  for exceptional skill in presenting scientific ideas to lay people
• Klopsteg Memorial Award is presented by the American Association of Physics Teachers and given in memory of the physicist Paul E. Klopsteg
• Kelvin Prize
  is awarded by the Institute of Physics to acknowledge outstanding contributions to the public understanding of physics.
• The
  Michael Faraday Prize for communicating science to a UK audience is awarded by the Royal Society
  .
• Prix Jean Perrin for popularization in physics is attributed by the French Physics Society.

References