THE BOSTON AREA PHYSICS CALENDAR
Week of Monday, April 27 - May 3, 1997
 
The Boston Area Physics Calendar is published weekly during 
the academic year by the Department of Physics and Astronomy 
at Tufts University.  You may send your announcements by 
e-mail (bapc@tuhepa.phy.tufts.edu) or FAX:(617-627-3878).  
We cannot accept announcements by telephone.  Entries should 
reach us no later than 11:00am on the Monday preceding the week 
of the event. ENTRIES RECEIVED AFTER THE DEADLINE WILL NOT 
BE PUBLISHED.

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Monday, April 28, 1997
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Monday, April 28, 2:00 p.m.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Monday Research Seminar 
Center for Theoretical Physics Seminar Room
Building 6, Third Floor
``Solutions of Einstein-Yang/Mills Equations''
JOEL SMOLLER
University of Michigan

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Monday, April 28, 3:30 p.m.

Tufts University
Special Cosmology Seminar 
Robinson Hall, Room 152
``Cosmic Microwave Background Fluctuations and 
Fundamental Issues in Cosmology''
PROFESSOR JOSEPH SILK
University of California, Berkeley 

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Monday, April 28, 4:00 p.m.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Nuclear Theory Seminar 
Center for Theoretical Physics Seminar Room
Building 6, Third Floor
``Compton Scattering and Hadron Polarizabilities''
PROFESSOR BARRY HOLSTEIN
University of Massachusetts

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Monday, April 28, 4:00 p.m.

Worcester Polytechnic Institute
Colloquium 
Olin Hall, Room 107
``Hot Gas and Dark Matter in Galaxies and Clusters''
DR. CHRISTINE JONES-FORMAN
Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Refreshments will be served in Olin 118 at 3:40 p.m.

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Monday, April 28, 4:30 p.m.

Brown University
Colloquium 
Barus & Holley Building, Room 168
``Hard Spheres in Space: Colloidal Crystallization on the
Shuttle''
PROFESSOR PAUL CHAIKIN
Princeton University
Refreshments will be served at 4:00 p.m.

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Tuesday, April 29, 1997
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Tuesday, April 29, 12:00 p.m.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Seminar on Modern Optics and Spectroscopy 
Marlar Lounge (37-252)
Ronald E. McNair Building
``Ultrafast Condensed Phase Dynamics''
ROBIN HOCHSTRASSER
University of Pennsylvania 
Refreshments will be served following the seminar.

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Tuesday, April 29, 2:30 p.m.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Joint MIT-Tufts-CfA Cosmology Seminar 
CTP Seminar Room
Building 6 - Third Floor
``Modeling Thermal Fluctuations: Nucleation and Symmetry Restoration''
PROFESSOR MARCELO GLEISER
Dartmouth College 

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Tuesday, April 29, 3:40 p.m.

Boston University
Dean S. Edmond, Sr. Lecture 
Room SCI-107, 590 Commonwealth Avenue
``Plectics: The Study of Simplicity and Complexity''
PROFESSOR M. GELL-MANN
Santa Fe Institute 
Refreshments will preceed the talk at 3:15 p.m.

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Tuesday, April 29, 3:45 p.m.

Northeastern University
Center For Interdisciplinary
Research on Complex Systems (CIRCS)
Seminar 
Dana Research Building, Room 114
``Modeling Approaches to Understanding the Genesis of a Behavior-Related
Cortical Rhythm: Single Neurons or Synaptic Network?''
XIAO-JING WANG
Brandeis University 
Center for Complex Systems 

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Tuesday, April 29, 4:15 p.m.

Boston College
Special Physics Seminar 
Higgins Hall, Room 354
``Electronic Instabilities in Heavy-Electron Compounds''
PROFESSOR A. DE VISSER
Van der Waals-Zeeman Institute
University of Amsterdam 

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Wednesday, April 30, 1997
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Wednesday, April 30, 4:00 p.m.

University of Massachusetts, Lowell
Spring Colloquia 
Olney 428
``Is Turbulence Universal?''
BIRIS SHRAIMAN
Lucent Technologies
Refreshments will be served at 3:30 p.m.
Contact Prof. Albert Altman [altmana@woods.uml.edu] for more information.

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Wednesday, April 30, 4:15 p.m.

Boston College
Physics Colloquium 
Higgins Hall, Room 354
``The New Environment: Opportunity and Threats for Physics''
JOHN S. RIGDEN
Director of Physics Programs
American Institute of Physics
Tea will be served at 3:30 p.m.

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Wednesday, April 30, 4:30 p.m.

Boston University
Joint Theory Seminar 
Physics Research Building, (3 Cummington Street) Room 593
``Light Quarks in Lattice QCD''
DR. ESTIA EICHTEN
Fermilab
Refreshments will be served at 4:00 p.m.

Please call (353-2600) one day in advance for parking.

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Wednesday, April 30, 5:00 p.m.

Harvard University/Center for Astrophysics
Joint Atomic Physics Seminar 
Jefferson Laboratory, Room 356
``Rydberg Atoms in Crossed Fields: Order, Chaos, and Nonspreading 
Wave Packets''
DR. TURGAY UZER
Georgia Institute of Technology
Tea will be served at 4:30 p.m.

Please call (353-2600) one day in advance for parking.

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Thursday, May 1, 1997
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Thursday, May 1, 1:30 p.m.

Harvard University
Materials Science Seminar 
McKay Laboratory 402
``Nucleation and Growth of Metastable Phases in Undercooled Melts
of Metals and Semiconductors''
DR. DIETER HERLACH
Institute of Space Simulation
DLR - German Aerospace Research Establishment 

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Thursday, May 1, 2:00 p.m.

Harvard University
Condensed Matter Theory Seminar 
Pierce 100F
``Localization and Non-Compact Spin Models''
MICHAEL STEPHAN
Rutgers University 

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Thursday, May 1, 4:00 p.m.

Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Scientific Colloquium 
60 Garden Street (Phillips Auditorium)
``Present and Future of Microlensing Searches''

Abstract:

    At least three groups of observers: DUO, MACHO, and OGLE, detected
dozens of gravitational microlensing events monitoring millions of stars
in the Galactic Bulge and in the Large Magellanic Cloud.  The reality of
detection is beyond any doubt, with the most spectacular case provided by
the MACHO 95-30 event.  Preliminary estimates of the optical depth, which
is proportional to the probability of microlensing, towards the Galactic
Bulge and the LMC are surprizingly high, possibly indicating some unrecognized
systematic problem with the calibration of the detection efficiency.

    A variety of simple theoretical predictions was verified observationally.
These include: binary lenses with caustic crossings, resolution of sources
in the very high magnification events, the effect of Earth orbital motion,
chromaticity as a consequence of image blending,  The complexity of the problem
became apparent, and the next challenge is to make the quantitative analysis
of microlensing results more reliable.

    In a few years the data rate generated by various observing projects
will increase substantially, and the rate of detection of new microlensing
events will increase accordingly.  This will be accompanied with the
corresponding improvements of software, and will lead to robust results for
the mass distribution and space distribution of the lensing objects, and in
the long run will lead to detection of earth-mass planets, and will provide
the answer to the important question: are there dark objects among the lenses.

DR. BOHDAN PACZYNSKI
Princeton University Observatory
Tea will be served at 3:30 p.m.

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Thursday, May 1, 4:15 p.m.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Physics Colloquium 
MIT Room 10-250
``Granular Gases, Fluids and Solids:  What is Sand Anyway?''
PROFESSOR SIDNEY NAGEL
University of Chicago 
Refreshments will be served in MIT Room 26-110 at 3:45 p.m.

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Thursday, May 1, 4:30 p.m.

Northeast Regional Center of the National Institute
for Global Environmental Change 
in conjunction with the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology for Global Change Science

NIGEC/MIT Seminar 
Building 54, Room 915
``Cycles Rule OK: An Integrated Perspective on the Earth System''
PROFESSOR COLIN PRENTICE
Lund University, Sweden
Drinks and Dinner will be served at the Cambridge Mariott at 6:00 p.m.
Please contact Karen Woodward no later than April 27th for reservations. 

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Friday, May 2, 1997
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Friday, May 2, 2:00 p.m.

Harvard University
Joint Seminar for the History of 20th Century Science 
Science Center, Room 226
``The Archeology of I.I. Rabi's Relics''
DR. PAUL FORMAN
Smithsonian Institution
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Friday, May 2, 4:00 p.m.

Harvard University Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences
Condensed Matter Seminar 
Pierce Hall, Room 209
``X-Ray Specks: Looking at Nanoscale Dynamics with Coherent X-Rays''
SIMON MOCHRIE
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Refreshments will be served in the Brooks Room following the seminar.
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	A Friendly Reminder: 
 
	The Deadline for the May 4 - May 10, 1997 Issue is: 
 
	MONDAY, April 28, 1997 at 11:00 a.m. 
 
	NO ENTRIES WILL BE ACCEPTED 
	AFTER THE DEADLINE.