Speaker to discuss ?The Physics of Sports?

On Thursday, Sept. 17, Chang Kee Jung, a physics professor at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, will deliver a presentation on “What’s Physics Got to do with Sports?” at 5:45 p.m. in Meier Hall at Black Hills State University. The talk will focus on the effects of spinning and non-spinning balls in popular sports, including baseball, football, soccer, and volleyball. A reception will be held at 5:15 p.m. The event, jointly sponsored by Sanford Underground Research Facility and Black Hills State University, is free and open to the public.

“Sports occupy an important part of American life and life in other parts of the world,” Jung said. “Surprisingly, many intriguing and often spectacular sports feats can be explained using basic physics concepts.” An expert in sports physics, Jung was called upon several times to discuss the “Deflategate” controversy involving the New England Patriots.

Jung’s presentation grew from a course he developed at Stony Brook for non-physics majors: The Physics of Sports. “This course is the first such course of its kind in the United States and, possibly, in the world,” Jung said.

Jung currently is the Research Coordinator for the Long Baseline Neutrino Facility and associated Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (LBNF/DUNE) at Sanford Lab and Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab). The experiment will send neutrinos through the earth from Fermilab in Batavia, Ill., to a detector on the 4850 Level of Sanford Lab in Lead, S.D.

“I’ve had the privilege of working with Chang Kee on the LBNF/DUNE project,” said Mike Headley, Executive Director of the South Dakota Science and Technology Authority. “He’s an accomplished neutrino physicist, and a dynamic speaker. His presentation will provide an interesting perspective on physics.”

Jung has participated in various particle physics experiments based on high energy particle accelerators at Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) and Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (FNAL). In 1991, he started a research group, Nucleon decay and Neutrino (NN), at Stony Brook to study the properties of neutrinos and search for proton decays. This led to the group’s participation in the Super-Kamiokande experiment in Japan, which was instrumental in the historic discovery of the neutrino oscillation phenomenon. It was this discovery that proved Dr. Ray Davis’ assertions in his solar neutrino experiment were correct and earned him a share of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2002.

Jung was part of the K2K experiment, the first accelerator-based long baseline neutrino project; and T2K, the long baseline neutrino experiment that discovered the appearance of electron neutrinos from a muon neutrino beam.  He also led an effort to build a deep underground science and engineering laboratory in Colorado.

For an interview with Dr. Chang Kee Jung, you may call him at 631-632-8108 (office); 631-707-2018 (cell); or e-mail him at chang.jung@stonybrook.edu

The Sanford Underground Research Facility’s mission is to enable safe and compelling underground research and to foster transformational science education. For more information, please visit www.SanfordLab.org.