A blog about the Universe, and all that surrounds it
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Yesterday I attended my last two Examination Boards for the year at Maynooth University. one for graduating MSc students and another for undergraduate repeat students in Engineering (which I attend because I’m teaching a mathematics course they do). That, more or less, is the end of the business (for me) for the 2025/6 academic year. […]
I don’t often post anything about matters pertaining to the Irish Federation of University Teachers (IFUT), of which I am a member, but there is something very important going on so I thought I would make an exception. In what follows, I of course speak for myself as an IFUT member and not for IFUT […]
The following is a guest post by William Barter, who recently finished a term as the ‘physics coordinator’ of LHCb-UK. –o– The European particle physics community recently undertook a two-year process to update our strategy – setting out the things that we, as a field, choose to prioritise. The highest priority in that update was “the full […]
I was taken aback by the description “QUANTUM DRY” but then I remembered Chapter 40 of the Feynman Lectures on Physics on the topic of The Flow of Dry Water, by which is meant the flow of a fluid with zero viscosity (i.e. inviscid flow). I therefore infer that the material of which this product […]
I thought I’d pass on a little amusement arising from last week’s Eclipse Event in Maynooth. I gave a very short and non-technical talk about the famous 1919 Eclipse Expeditions which I have mentioned many times on this blog. As you probably know there were two expeditions, one to Sobral in Brazil and the other […]
I read the terrible news about the death of Jason Arday on Friday evening. The first thing I want to do is express heartfelt condolences to his family – especially his wife and two children – and his friends and former colleagues and my hope that the media who hounded Prof. Arday to his death […]
Since the last update we have published a further four papers, bringing the number in Volume 9 (2026) to 171 and the total so far published by OJAp up to 619.
I know many people think that University staff are on holiday all the way through the summer, particularly August, but this week has been very busy indeed, not only because of the Eclipse Event. It is somewhat cooler today, but the heat this week has also contributed to my general sense of exhaustion. For a […]
With everything else that has been going on recently, I forgot to share this cartoon from the latest Private Eye:
Today been a very busy but hugely enjoyable day. We had a big turnout for the Eclipse Event at Maynooth University – I don’t have attendance figures right now, but will update when I do – and good weather in the build-up to the eclipse. Unforunately just as maximum coverage approached, clouds intervened. That was […]
I'd like to offer my personal congratulations to Wyn on the success of his case. I know this has been a very stressful episode for him and he deserves credit for pursuing the case to its conclusion.
