Gintaras Duda

Dark Matter: A Primer

Dark matter is one of the greatest unsolved mysteries in cosmology at the present time. About 80% of the Universes gravitating matter is nonluminous, and its nature and distribution are for the most part unknown. In this paper, we will outline the history, astrophysical evidence, candidates, and detection methods of dark matter, with the goal to give the reader an accessible but rigorous introduction to the puzzle of dark matter. This paper targets advanced students and researchers new to the field of dark matter, and includes an extensive list of references for further study.

Blogging in the physics classroom: A research-based approach to shaping students’ attitudes toward physics

Although there has been much research on how to help students learn physics, students still come away without a deep understanding of how physics has transformed the world around them and almost all leave with decreased expectations and a more negative attitude toward physics. We discuss an experiment to address this problem: a course weblog which discusses real-world applications of physics and engages students in discussion and thinking outside of class. Students’ attitudes toward the value of physics and its applicability to the real-world were probed using a 26-question Likert scale survey over the course of four semesters in an introductory physics course. We found that students who did not participate in the blog generally exhibited a deterioration in attitude toward physics as seen previously. Students who read, commented, and were involved with the blog maintained their initially positive attitudes toward physics. Student response to the blog was overwhelmingly positive, with students claiming that the blog made the subjects studied in the classroom come alive for them and seem more relevant.

Expected signals in relic neutrino detectors

Here we estimate the magnitude of the signals expected for realistic cosmic neutrino backgrounds in detectors attempting to measure the mechanical forces exerted on macroscopic targets by the elastic scattering of relic neutrinos. We study effects proportional to the weak coupling constant

Indirect detection of a subdominant density component of cold dark matter

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Detectability of a subdominant density component of cold dark matter

and to

Problem-based learning in upper division courses: Student successes, perceptions, and reactions

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Probing Student Online Discussion Behavior with a Course Blog in Introductory Physics

for Dirac and Majorana neutrinos, either relativistic or nonrelativistic, both gravitationally bound or not.

Student Epistemologies in Project-based Learning Courses

We examine the detectability through indirect means of weakly interacting dark matter candidates that may constitute not all but only a subdominant component of galactic cold dark matter. We show that the possibility of indirect detection of neutralinos from their annihilations in the Earth and Sun is not severely hampered by decreasing the neutralino relic density. Upward-going muon fluxes in underground detectors from neutralino annihilations in the Sun can remain above the threshold of detectability of

Coadsorption of two monomer species on a square lattice with first- and second-neighbor interactions

10{\mathrm{m}\mathrm{u}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{s}/\mathrm{k}\mathrm{m}}^{2}/\mathrm{yr}

Using Technology to Facilitate and Enhance Project-based Learning in Mathematical Physics

for neutralinos composing