Dear Physics Community,

In the past week, there has been much discussion about how we re-open MIT and society at large.  This article from Science does a good job of laying out the issues and levers administrators and governments can pull.

There was no Academic Continuity Meeting today

Physics Department

Neutrino and anti-neutrinos work differently – has been shown by the T2K experiment in Japan at 95 % confidence level.  The paper is here.  There is a pretty good video explanation of the science here.

Ball lightning – a reported phenomenon in which a roughly 1-meter sphere of air ignites and remains glowing for several seconds.  I always thought the whole thing was b.s., despite a Physics Reports article on it. I just stumbled across a paper that claims to have measured the spectrum of ball lightning and shows the discharge is from elements found in the soil.  There is a Physics Focus article about the paper, with video.

Los Endos

I am now really intrigued by ball lightning.  Stay tuned.  Have a good holiday and stay safe.

Peter