Department of Physics and Astronomy - Minnesota State University Moorhead

Department of Physics and Astronomy
College of Health, Science, & the Environment

Department Seminar (WEDNESDAY, May 7 at 2pm in Hagen Hall 325)Senior Project Presentation by Meredith McLinn (MSUM)
Source Extraction for Astronomical Images: Source extraction is the process of finding and locating stars (or other objects) in an astronomical image. A script has been written that locates very bright objects in a well-spaced, low-noise image. The resulting locations output from this script have been compared to those found by SExtractor, a well-established Source Extraction tool. Two out of three of the locations that were found were within 2 pixels of those found by SExtractor, though the third was about 10 pixels off. Only the brightest three objects were located and identified, while SExtractor found 106. I’ll be discussing how this code works, and why there are differences between its and SExtractor’s output.

Department Opportunities

Be gainfully employed doing Physics at MSUM! Applications have opened up for learning assistant positions in the Fall semester of 2014. Please download and fill out the application here and give them to Joy Lindell in Hagen 307

Department News

Physics and Astronomy presented Expanding Your Horizons workshops: If you thought you saw rockets being launched in the parking lot last Saturday, you did. Faculty and students from the department of Physics and Astronomy presented Expanding Your Horizons workshops on April 12 for girls in 7th, 8th and 9th grade (more) (April 18, 2014)
Sigma Pi Sigma Inducts Three New Members: The MSUM chapter of Sigma Pi Sigma, the Physics Honors Society, inducted three new members during a ceremony on April 5. The inductees were chosen based on academic excellence, research and service to the community. (More) (April 7, 2014)
Our Physics Majors are Going Places... for the Summer!
- Kyle Salk (Sophomore) is going to University of Maine’s Laboratory for Surface Science and Technology (March 28, 2014)
- Iwnetim Abate (Junior) has accepted an internship with IBM Research-Almaden located in Silicon Valley in San Jose, CA (March 28, 2014)
- Loza Tadesse (Sophomore) will be a summer research assistant at an MIT summer biotechnology research program (March 27, 2014)
- Laura Herzog (Sophomore) has accepted a summer research position at University of Wyoming Depart of Astronomy (March 21, 2014)

Mission Statement

Our mission is to provide excellent undergraduate instruction in physics and astronomy. In lower division courses, faculty use lecture demonstrations, cooperative learning methods, hands-on activities, and field trips to develop a broad working knowledge of physics. In upper division courses, in addition to the above methods, students learn through cooperative projects, research with faculty, and hands-on instrumentation and computation projects.

About the Department of Physics and Astronomy

The MSUM Physics and Astronomy program is a student-centered program. We provide students with educational opportunities in the classroom and outside it in order to improve their preparation for a career using physics.

We have facilities including a nanotechnology and robotics lab, a student-built NMR machine, and the Paul P. Feder observatory.

Our faculty have high quality research programs in space physics, robotics, extragalactic, galactic, and solar system astrophysics, and physics education. Our undergraduate students participate in these research programs and gain experience to prepare them for careers in physics and related fields.

Contact Information
Office: Hagen Hall 307
Phone: (218) 477-2141
Email: lindellj@mnstate.edu

Send ground mail to:
Department of Physics and Astronomy
Minnesota State University Moorhead
1104 7th Avenue South, Hagen Hall 307
Moorhead, MN 56563

An interactive campus map of Minnesota State University Moorhead is available to find Hagen Hall.