In its 21-year history, the Summer Student Theoretical Physics Research Session (SSTPRS) led by Brown Theoretical Physics Center (BTPC) Director S. James Gates Jr. has been held at either the University of Maryland, the University of Iowa, or since 2017 at Brown University. Every year up until 2020, this unique opportunity for undergraduate and graduate students was held in person.

In the wake of George Floyd’s brutal killing, physicists and students from Brown took to the web to discuss strategies for increasing diversity and inclusion in the physics community across the nation.

To mitigate the pandemic’s impact, the University will allow undergraduates back for two terms in a three-term model, reduce the density of students in campus housing, offer instruction in person and remotely, and implement extensive testing, tracing and public health measures.

The discovery of the Higgs particle by the international CMS and ATLAS collaborations is the most famous discovery made to date at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. The scientists made the announcement on July 4, 2012, and it was later recognized with a Nobel Prize: The theorists who predicted the Higgs mechanism received the award in 2013.

The five-year, $750,000 award will help Kemp Plumb study exotic states of matter that emerge in certain magnetic materials.

Kemp Plumb, an assistant professor of physics at Brown University, is one of just 76 scientists nationwide selected to receive a 2020 Early Career Award from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).