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- Dalhousie University. Faculty of Science. Department of Physics (1988-2001)
- Dalhousie University. Faculty of Arts and Science. Department of Physics (1922-1988)
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Description area
Dates of existence
History
Natural philosophy (physics) was on the curriculum of the "first" Dalhousie College in 1838, and when the college reopened in 1863 as a university, Thomas McCulloch, Jr. was appointed Professor of Natural Philosophy. After his premature death in 1865, it was a decade before another such appointment was made. In 1876 J. Gordon MacGregor was appointed Lecturer in Natural Philosophy and taught classes in experimental physics and mathematical physics, while Charles MacDonald taught hydrostatics, optics and astronomy. In 1879 MacGregor became the first George Munro Chair of Physics. One of the first female faculty members hired at Dalhousie was Merle Colpitt, who started as a physics demonstrator during World War One, was promoted to an instructor in 1918, and retired in 1926, a year after she married H.L. Bronson, who had been appointed first head of the newly named Physics Department in 1922.
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s the department offered a general BSc, a BSc with Honours in Physics, and a BSc in Engineering Physics. In the 1980s, Engineering Physics moved from Dalhousie and a Diploma in Meteorology (DMet) was added. In the 1990s, the Honours Co-op program was instituted. The design, organization, and instruction of undergraduate teaching laboratories, as well as a Physics Resource Centre for first-year students, was enhanced by the work of senior instructors, including Mr. F.M. Fyfe (1974-2001) and Mr. W. P. Zukauskas (1982-2008).
J.H.L. Johnstone was the department's first graduate student, earning an MSc in Physics in 1914, joining the department as a faculty member in 1920, and appointed Head and Munro Professor in 1945. The first woman to receive a MSc was Elizabeth Torrey in 1930. The PhD program in Physics was initiated in 1961 and the first recipient of a PhD in Physics was Dr. Peter Gacii in 1966. The first woman to receive a PhD in Physics was Dr. Nahomi Fujiki of Japan, whose degree was awarded in 1989.
The Dalhousie University Meteorology program was established ins 1984. Administered by the Physics Department, it offers a Diploma in Meteorology (DMet) in conjunction with a BSc in Physics. In 1989, the Atmospheric Sciences program was established in conjunction with AES and NSERC and run jointly between Dalhousie's Departments of Physics and Oceanography. In 2001 the program was absorbed into the physics department, whose name changed to the Department of Physics and Atmospheric Science.
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The Department of Physics and Atmospheric Science offers a course of study leading to a BSc in Physics in one of nine streams of interest, including Astrophysics; Computational Physics; Biophysics; Environmental Physics; Materials Physics; Applied Materials; Theoretical Physics; Leadership in Physics. A Diploma in Meteorology and Diploma in Engineering can be combined with a BSc in Physics. Graduate research programs leading to MSc and PhD degrees cover all major areas of physics including computational, experimental and theoretical research in atmospheric physics, geophysics, quantum optics, condensed matter physics, novel materials, applied physics, subatomic physics and astrophysics, and biophysics.
Research avenues in medical physics include precision radiotherapy and radio surgical techniques in the treatment of cancer patients, image guidance, and innovation in magnetic resonance and nuclear medicine imaging. Graduate students conduct their work in hospital treatment and imaging facilities and within dedicated laboratories. Coursework in medical physics meet the standards defined by the Commission on Accreditation of Medical Physics Education Programs (CAMPEP).