Dear Physics Community,

Fake news – continues, now pandemic related. It’s a problem and here is how it works.

Useful – some analysis and advice on what to avoid as things reopen.

Advisories

• Town Hall – over 600 FAQ, answers here.

Academics Continuity Meeting

UROPs – The UROP office received 1,071 UROP applications for direct funding, compared with a typical year in which they receive about 700.

Inventing the Fall – the Administration has been digesting the input from the departments on the five scenarios submitted last week and is planning further engagement with the MIT community in the next few weeks.  The plan is to convene students, faculty, and staff in discussions, charettes, and other fora.  At the same time, the heads of student houses are working as a group on how to operate in the fall should some or all students return.  All of this will result in a recommendation to the senior administration who will make the decision of what to do.

If you have the opportunity, please participate.  Deciding how students will come back to MIT in the coming year is probably the most important and difficult decision MIT has had to make in the 25 years I have been here, so let your voice be heard.

Physics Department 

Little’s law – the cornerstone of queuing theory, this simple-seeming law was not proven until 1960 by Jack Little, a Physics alumnus, and still active Sloan professor. Proof here.

Anti-deSitter space – in unstable?  Apparently so, according to Quanta.

Los Endos

Spaceplane launch – the Air Force space plane, the X-37B, will launch Saturday for its seventh highly classified mission.  Nobody quite knows what it does.  It makes you wonder why the Air Force announces X-37B launches to the press.

Peter