Session G1: Plenary Session III

Halliday-Resnick Plus 50

Last year marked the 50th anniversary of the publication of Halliday and Resnick's classic introductory textbook ``Physics.'' I used the first edition of the the textbook as an undergraduate students, the second editions as a graduate teaching assistant, the the third edition as a newly hired assistant professor, and I became a co-author for the fourth and fifth editions. In this talk I will offer some views of how this book came to re-define the introductory physics course and how this textbook and other introductory physics texts have changed over 50 years.   

AMS Experiment on the International Space Station

Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS-02) is a general purpose high energy detector which was successfully deployed on the International Space Station on May 19, 2011 to conduct a unique long duration mission of fundamental physics research in space. Among the physics objectives of AMS are a search for the understanding of Dark matter, Antimatter, the origin of cosmic rays and the exploration of new physics phenomena not possible with ground based experiments. This report overviews the performance of the AMS-02 detector on the ISS as well as the first results based on data during the first two months of operation in space.   

Can Accelerators Meet the Medical Isotopes Needs of the World?

Over 80\% of all Nuclear Medicine procedures make use of the radionuclide Tc-99 for SPECT imaging of heart disease, cancer and other disorders. Historically TC-99 has been produced from a generator through the decay of Mo-99 where the Mo-99 is a fission product of U-235. Five reactors around the world supply the market. However, these reactors are aging (many over 50 years old) and governments are reluctant to replace them. Therefore researchers have turned to accelerators as a potential source of this important radionuclide. In Canada the government has funded research project for two accelerator approaches: Mo-100(gamma,n)Mo-99 and Mo-100(p,2n)Tc-99m where the photons are generated from the conversion of high powered electrons into Bremsstrahlung radiation and the protons generated in low energy cyclotrons (15-25 MeV). The goal of these project is to provide the Government with sufficient information so that an informed decision can be made with respect to future supplies of medical isotopes for Canada. International interest has been expressed by the IAEA as a way to allow Member States with existing cyclotron programs to take advantage of the direct production route. This talk will describe the challenges with the approaches and the progress to date.