Minutes of the 2024 CAP DNP Annual Business Meeting
The virtual meeting was called to order by DNP Chair Liliana Caballero (LC) circa 10:05 PDT on Thursday, July 11th, 2024. Eight DNP members attended the online meeting.
The Chair’s motion to approve the agenda was seconded by Zisis Papandreou (ZP), and in the absence of objections or additions the agenda was adopted. LC introduced the 2023-2025 CAP DNP Executive Committee:
Liliana Caballero, Guelph, Chair
Greg Christian, St. Mary’s, Vice Chair
Michael Gericke, Manitoba, Past Chair
Barry Davids (BD), TRIUMF, Secretary-Treasurer
The Vice Chair presented a slide describing the 2023-2024 DNP Thesis Prize Competition. There were five entries, including one thesis entered in the 2022 competition (which was not held due to a lack of entries). The theses were reviewed by a panel of four judges, Alan Chen (McMaster), Erica Caden (SNOLAB), Stephan Malbrunot (TRIUMF), and Jason Holt (TRIUMF). The prize was awarded to Yukiya Saito (UBC) for his thesis entitled “Development of Statistical Tools for Studies of the Rapid Neutron Capture Process.” He was co-supervised by Reiner Krucken (UBC) & Iris Dillmann (TRIUMF). Yukiya received a $1,000 cash prize and an invitation to speak at the 2025 CAP Congress. The Chair and Vice Chair thanked the judges and congratulated the winner, who was present at the meeting. The Chair asked about the numbers of theoretical and experimental theses entered into the competition and the Vice Chair replied that all 5 were experimental this year.
The Secretary-Treasurer presented a financial and membership report that is summarized below.
The Division started 2023 with an opening bank balance of $4122. During the year it spent $750 on student prizes for the Winter Nuclear and Particle Physics Conference and $550 for CAP Congress student prize winners Lilianna Hariasz, Sean Vanbergen, Brynne Blaikie, and Louis Croquette; the division received $1335 in membership dues, resulting in an operating surplus of $35 and an ending balance of $4157. The Division agreed in 2016 that a bank balance of approximately $2000 should be maintained. Hence we have a surplus of ~$2200.
As of July 2nd, 2024 the DNP had 408 members, of whom 230 are classified as student members.
This being an even-numbered year, there will be elections for Secretary-Treasurer and Vice Chair next year.
ZP asked if there were a plan to synchronize the membership terms of all members, as had been discussed by the Council. BD replied that he was not aware of these plans. LC asked if we had any demographic information on our members and BD replied that we have very little info, less than we used to receive from the CAP office, and don’t even know how many paying, full members we have.
The Chair summarized the Division’s participation in the 2024 Congress at Western University in London. 12 DNP students entered the competition for best student talks and 3 entered the poster competition. There were 9 invited talks in the regular DNP sessions. A computational advances in astrophysics and cosmology symposium had 16 talks. A social and trivia session for students and postdocs was organized by Robin Coleman, a PhD student. The Chair solicited ideas for next year’s Congress social event and volunteers to serve as judges in the student competition.
Three DNP student prizes were awarded at the Congress for oral presentations:
1. Robin Coleman of Guelph won first prize in the DNP and $200. He won 3rd place in the overall congress competition.
2. Paul Deguire of Guelph won the $100 2nd prize in the DNP competition.
3. Thomas Heworth of Winnipeg won the $50 3rd prize in the DNP competition.
Jennika McIntosh of Guelph won the DNP poster competition, won the competition for best poster from a gender minority, and took 1st place in the overall competition.
LC thanked the judges of the CAP Congress student competitions, Corina Andreoiu (SFU), Andrea Capra (TRIUMF), Konstantin Mastakov (Guelph), and Jeff Martin (Winnipeg).
The Chair reported on the 3 DNP members who were elected Fellows this year. They were recognized as follows.
- Corina Andreoiu (SFU)
In recognition of her influential contributions to subatomic physics, particularly in advancing the understanding of collective behavior and shape co-existence in nuclei, and for dedication to the Canadian physics community through tireless service to the CAP, the CINP, and TRIUMF. - Rituparna Kanungo (Saint Mary’s)
In recognition of her contributions to experimental subatomic physics and groundbreaking discoveries in rare isotopes and nuclear shells; and for leadership of international collaborations in Japan, Germany, and Canada’s TRIUMF, and service to national and internationals organizations. - Gwen Grinyer (Regina)
In recognition of her outstanding research contributions of ultra-high precision measurements to test the Standard Model description of electroweak interactions and designing of state-of-the-art instrumentation to study the structure of rare isotopes; and for championing equity, diversity and inclusion, and challenging the barriers faced by women and 2SLGBTQ+ people in STEM.
The 2024 CAP Vogt Medal in Subatomic Physics was awarded to Douglas Bryman of UBC in recognition of his remarkable contributions to particle physics through his work and leadership on a broad range of experiments testing fundamental phenomena at the precision frontier.
The Chair raised a topic that came up in connection with this year’s thesis prize competition. According to the criteria, a nomination letter must be submitted by the thesis supervisor. It was suggested that we might want to loosen this criterion to allow designates of the thesis supervisor or members of the examination committee to write such nomination letters. There was some support for this but BD raised the question of whether this was a real or hypothetical problem. The criterion does not seem to have prevented a thesis from being nominated, so BD suggested that those who wish to see the rule changed offer written suggestions to the Chair via email for consideration by the Executive.
Next the Chair brought up a subject that was discussed at last year’s business meeting, the possibility of appointing a student member to the DNP Executive. A number of questions were raised, including the role and term of the putative student member, as well as whether self-nominations would be allowed. BD suggested that we open nominations for a student position on the executive, an at-large position with no special responsibilities, for next year’s elections. ZP said that a 1 or 2 year term would be fine and that a candidate statement/biography should be solicited.
The Chair next sought feedback from members regarding the possible broadening of the award criteria for the Vogt Medal to include outreach and HQP training.
David Morrissey, who sat on the evaluation committee for the medal (2024) said “Applicants were evaluated based entirely on their direct research contributions. Before reviewing the applications, we met to decide on a set of specific criteria within several categories: letters of recommendation (30%), research quality (35%), research impact (35%).”
Marcello Pavan reported that “Erich Vogt was known as a passionate teacher, especially for first-year students. He taught the honours first year class at UBC for some 45 years, last while for free! For that reason we created the First-Year Summer Research Experience (FYSRE) In Erich’s honour, with a substantial endowment he contributed.”
Those who have views on this possible criteria change should email David Morrissey or LC directly.
There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned circa 10:40 PDT.