1. Northern Hemisphere 2022 Physics Exam paper is available.
The exam paper can be downloaded from here from the VCAA website

Detailed solutions prepared by Vicphysics will be available on the Vicphysics website next week. The solutions are written for students for when they use the exam as a practice paper later in the year.  The solutions include a suggested marking scheme and the average score for each question.  There is also at the end, a set of extra revision questions based on the information provided in the stem of some of the exam questions.

Vicphysics will also be providing a review of the exam paper to VCAA.  If you would like to comment on specific questions, etc, please use our new Forum.  Your comments will be useful in formulating our response.  Check item 5 below.

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2. Lab Techs' Workshops on Years 7 - 10 Physics, 1st Dec, Camberwell Grammar School
The program of workshops for Lab Techs returns.  It will be on Thursday, 1st December and held again at Camberwell Grammar School.  The program includes:

• Learning new skills
• Setting up demonstrations
• Quick Tests on Equipment to see it is working or not plus a few hints on fixing stuff with Harvey Edwards from Principles and Practice
• Electronic data methods with Doug Bail from Ciderhouse, and
• Laboratory management hints

The cost is $70 and includes lunch.
For more information and to book click here.

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3. Teaching Resources:
a)  Models of the Atom: A resource from Perimeter Institute
Perimeter Institute's newest resource – Beyond Bohr: A Quantum Approach to the Atom – is almost ready. It will take students through the development of the quantum model of the atom and culminates with a practical application of model building. Students will be challenged to examine the limitations of the Bohr model and to construct a more robust model.
 
The resource will be available to download in late August – but in the meantime – their new classroom poster comparing the models is available here. A cropped extract is displayed on the right. b). Synchrotron Board Game for Middle School
The UK Synchrotron, the Diamond Light Source, has produced a board game in which the students 'become a scientist, undertaking various projects.  Completing a project will require visiting a beamline to do experiments. .... Completing projects will enhance your reputation as a scientist and the most famous scientists will win the game, but some projects are more prestigious than others, so it isn't always who completes the most projects wins!' 
The game does not explore the physics of the synchrotron, but focusses on the many areas of science for which synchrotron radiation is a valuable experimental tool.  It is relevant to 'Science and Human Endeavour' in the Science Understanding strand.
The resources can be downloaded from here and printed at school.  The game includes 12 different science areas and associated roles, and 36 different project cards along with the usual broad game paraphernalia.


c) Video: Skaters moving in a circle together
There is an article in the recent edition of the IOP's Physics Education by Ann-Marie Tendrill, who is the acknowledged expert on using amusement parks to teach physics. This article is about circular motion on the skating rink. 

The article is titled 'From skating rink to physics assignment'.  This image shows the potential for analysis.  The video can be viewed here. 

Ann-Marie is one of a number of authors who publish in Physics Education and who make their articles 'Open Access'.

You can access this and other articles by opening this IOP website and clicking on 'Open Access' on the left side of the screen. Ann-Marie's article is fourth in the list and there are another 120 open access articles, most are esoteric, but there are some gems. 4.Seeking a Physics teacher? Seeking a new position?
The Vicphysics Teachers' Network has a Job Ads page to assist schools in finding a physics teacher.
There is two (2) schools seeking a physics teacher:

• Victorian College of the Arts Secondary School (Closes 9th July)
• Mount Eliza Secondary College (Closes 20th July)

The webpage is updated every weekend.  The webpage also has a link on how schools can register a position and lodge a payment for this service. 6. Events for Students
a)  Girls in Physics Breakfasts in 2022

There are three events open for bookings, other will follow later this term.  They are:

• Friday, 22nd July at Bendigo.  The speaker is Dr Dianne Ruka and her topic is 'STEM from Science/Maths to Technology and Engineering'
• Thursday, 28th July in Central Melbourne.  The speaker is A/Prof Katarina Miljkovic, the AIP Women in Physics lecturer for 2022 and her topic is 'Impacts! Rocks from space colliding with Planets'
• Friday, 19th August at Mildura.  The speaker is Dr Judy Hart and her topic is 'Developing new materials for Renewable Energy'

Click here for more details of each event, such as promotional flyers, speakers' bios and abstracts of their talks.  There are also links for make a booking.

Cost: $15 per student if booking with a credit card through Trybooking and $25 if using bank transfer with an invoice .  There is a discount for low ICSEA schools.

b) Physics Gymnasium: Lectures for students - University of Melbourne
Formally known as the VCE lectures, while they do explore the current VCE curriculum, these lectures are open to students of all ages with a keen interest in Physics, as well as teachers and parents.

• Thursday, 4th August. 5:30pm. Gravity, Dr David Simpson
• Thursday, 18th August, 5:30pm. The photon: a wave or a particle? or both? Prof Harry Quiney
• Thursday, 1st September, 5:30pm.  The Future of Optics with Prof Ann Roberts

Check here for more details and to book. Recordings of previous lectures are now available.
These are Covid-safe events. The lectures will be delivered to a live audience in the School of Physics. The lectures will also be live streamed. The Zoom link will be sent two days before the lecture.

c) Victorian Young Physicists' Tournament for students in Year 10 and 11

VYPT is back this year with a number of changes. For those not familiar with VYPT.  It is a competition for students in Years 10 and 11. During Terms 2 and 3, in teams of 3, the students experimentally investigate a common set of three topics, then on Saturday, 10th September in a series of one-on-one 30 minute contests with other teams, they describe their method, explain their findings, and question and challenge the presentations of others.
For further details, there are four relevant webpages on the Vicphysics website:

• For general information,
• For teachers to register teams, along with advice on planning, including a promotional flyer and a link to the video of Physics Teachers' Conference workshop with a discussion among a panel of teachers who have participated before.
• For students, with guide questions, hints and links to useful resources.
• For University students, interested in being judges and mentors.

d)  Other Vicphysics Competitions

• Poster Competition for Unit 2 Practical Investigation   The Poster Competition is designed to award quality student work and to provide exemplars of quality investigations. Check this webpage.
• Physics Photo Contest For details click here
• Physics Video Contest For details click here.

e) Free AstroTours for Year 10 – 12 students

Swinburne's Hawthorn campus is offering free Astro Tours to school groups of students in Years 10 - 12.  The tours are hosted by a professional astronomer, students learn about astronomy using innovative virtual reality technologies developed by Swinburne's Centre for Astrophysics and Supercomputing.

Students will have the opportunity to ask questions, and discover the universe through movies, animations and simulations — all produced by the in-house team of astronomers, visualisation researchers, animators, artists and programmers.   Teachers are also invited to customise the AstroTour to suit the interests of their students. 

The session runs for 50 minutes and the venue can take 55 students. Click here for more details and to book.
There are also tours for the general public during the school holidays ($10 per person).

f) New Scientist Festival of Ideas and Discoveries.  Weekend 8th and 9th October.  Online and On Demand
New Scientist is organising an event with over 50 speakers across four stages over two days.  The event can be viewed live (held during the day UK time) or viewed on demand for 12 months afterwards.
The four stages are: Universe, Mind and Body, Our Planet and Future, each with five 40 min presentations each day.
The Super Early Bird online price of 20 pounds gives you on demand to all talks for 12 months.

For more details of the speakers and to book click here.

g) Prof Brian Cox. Horizons: A 21st Century Space Odyssey, 7:30pm, 15th October
Venue: Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre
Cost: Full time students $56
To Book: click here

7. Events for Teachers
a) July Lectures in Physics: Fridays in July at the University of Melbourne

The theme of this year's series of lectures is 'Quantum Worlds: from the cosmos to future computing'. The remaining lectures are:

• Friday, 15th July at 6:30pm:  Quantum computers -  approaching fast with Prof Lloyd Hollenberg.  Click here to book and for details of the abstract, the speaker's bio and the venue.
• Friday, 22nd July at 6:30pm: Quantum Chemistry: quantum effects in our everyday lives with Prof Katya Pas.  Click here to book and for details of the abstract, the speaker's bio and the venue.
• Friday, 29th July at 6:30pm: Thermonuclear quantum mechanics: the elusive promise of fusion with Prof David Jamieson.  This lecture is dedicated to the memory of Professor Tony Klein.  Click here to book and for details of the abstract, the speaker's bio and the venue.

Drinks and refreshments are provided before the lecture.

b) EduTECH Conference and Expo, 10th - 11th August, Melbourne Exhibition and Convention Centre.
The event has over 300 speakers across 12 different conferences including: i) School leaders, ii) Teachers, iii) Digital Technologies, iv) ICT, v) Vocational Training as well as Apple, Microsoft and Google conferences.  There is also a large number of exhibitors.  Passes cost $300, discounts are available.  For details of the various conferences and speakers, please click here.

c) International Conference for Physics Education (ICPE 2022) 5th - 9th December
This year's conference will be an online conference based in Australia, Singapore and Indonesia, which mean it will be held in our time zone. 

It is an event for physics teachers both secondary and tertiary, teacher educators and teaching researchers.  As an online conference, the registration fee is quite low, $60 and $50 early bird.  Currently the program features many speakers including Dr Derek Muller with details of workshops to come.  

The conference proceedings will be available prior to the event so that you can decide which lectures and workshops to attend that fit around your working day.  Local academics are on the planning committee so there will be sessions relevant to Australian Physics Curricula.

For more details and to register, click here.

d) New Scientist Physics talks: Online and On demand
The magazine New Scientist is organising a series of talks on physics, titled The Big Thinkers.  They can be viewed live, but can also be viewed any time for 12 months. The topics are:

• The Origin of the Universe by Will Kinney, University of Buffalo, Thurs, 14th July
• Space, Time and Motion, Sean Carroll, Caltech, Thurs 20th October

Individual tickets are available for 15 pounds.  Series tickets are available for 80 pounds and include these earlier lectures:

• A brief history of time keeping with Chad Orzel, author of 'How to teach Quantum Physics to Your Dog'
• Physics at the End of the Universe with Katie Mack
• What we don't know about Gravity with Claudia de Rham
• Reality+: from The Matrix to the Multiverse with David Chalmers

8.   Physics News from the Web
Items selected from the bulletin of the Institute of Physics (UK).
Each item below includes the introductory paragraphs and a web link to the rest of the article.

a) Gorilla Glass: the unsung hero of the smartphone
The wonders of Gorilla Glass – an invention that protects billions of smartphones, tablets and laptops around the world from unwanted damage

"I have a soft spot for accidental discoveries that inadvertently have a profound impact on our lives. Think of the glue that didn’t stick, which was developed by researchers at 3M and led to the ubiquitous Post-it Note. There was Wilhelm Röntgen’s discovery of X-rays, which revolutionized diagnostic medicine. And there was Percy Lebaron Spencer, a physicist at Raytheon in the US, who invented a new type of oven after noticing that microwaves from his radar set melted a chocolate bar in his pocket." James MacKenzie.

b) Elusive tetraneutron is discovered at Japanese lab
A four-neutron particle called a tetraneutron has been observed in Japan by researchers who collided highly neutron-rich nuclei with protons. The detection was made at a statistical significance greater than 5σ, putting it over the threshold for a discovery in particle physics. This answers conclusively the long-standing question of whether or not uncharged nuclear matter can exist, and it will motivate searches for more exotic – and potentially longer-lived – neutral particles.

Free neutrons decay to protons, electrons and antineutrinos via the weak interaction in around 15 min. However, neutrons in bound systems will not decay under certain conditions. In atomic nuclei, for example, neutrons are kept stable by the strong nuclear force. Neutron stars are also stable thanks to effects of intense gravity on their constituent neutrons. As a result, physicists have wondered for decades whether nucleus-like particles made solely of neutrons could exist, even if fleetingly.

c) Eileen Collins, NASA astronaut: commanding missions and making history
Eileen Collins was the first woman to pilot, and later command, NASA’s Space Shuttle. She logged over 38 days in space and, as the commander of mission STS-93 in 1999, her legacy includes deploying the Chandra X-Ray Space Observatory. The story told in Collins’ autobiography Through the Glass Ceiling to the Stars is one of triumph over adversity, one that can inspire and excite the reader – but there is also a poignancy to reading it at this point in history.