CAT | Resources
Students considering continuing in academia or adding some ’science of education’ instruction to their vita, should consider the Minor in College Teaching. The requirements are fairly minimal: a 3 hour core course, a teaching practicum, and 3-6 elective hours. Read about at: http://gradschool.missouri.edu/programs/minor-college-teaching/
MU Libraries offers faculty and graduate student workshops with topics ranging from creating bibliographies with various software (Zotero, Endnote, …) to searching effectively with Google Scholar. There is a wide selection of topics to choose from and they are free. They are only offered once per semester. Browse them here.
International students may be interested in “Library Workshops for International Students“.
EndNote has become so popular that the library now offers “EndNote Fridays” for students and faculty to learn how to use the bibliographic citation management software.
Science has published a Career Basics Booklet, providing “advice and help on preparing CVs and resumes, writing grants and scientific papers, networking, and much more” as stated in the description of the book.
Optics.org has published a small guide, Optics Careers, which they claim is “The essential careers resource for optical scientists and engineers”. Their website also lists recent job openings.
Beginning LaTeX Math – Matt Mower – Nov 2008
General information on LaTeX packages for Windows and Linux are in the LaTeX Resources document. The presentation is in PDF format and is accompanied by source code.
LaTeX Reference Guides:
- AMS Math Guide – The de-facto guide for proper math formatting using the amsmath package. Link (Local Mirror)
- Basic LaTeX by Julie Mitchell – A Terrific quick reference, but does not include amsmath formatting. Link (Local Mirror)
- The Not So Short Introduction to LaTeX 2e by Tobias Oetiker – Very complete reference for how to do most anything in LaTeX. There’s a great list of commonly used mathematical symbols starting on Pg.63. Link
- TeX Cookbook – Strictly a symbol reference and how to format those symbols. Link (Local Mirror)
Publishing Guidelines
- Nature International Weekly Journal of Science
- Science Magazine
- American Physical Society (APS) Journals
A LaTeX skeleton is available which should conform to the MU graduate school’s thesis/dissertation document formatting requirements. Do check for yourself, as guidelines may have been updated by the time you download this. Thanks go out to Hakim Meskine for providing the original framework, as well as Michael Mayo and Matt Mower for subsequently updating it.
Courses are available for free through MU for many software titles and web languages. To quote them, “All IT Training courses are available to faculty, staff and students. Courses are free if you attend, but if you cancel within 48 hours of the start of the course, or if you don’t show up for the class session, you will be charged a fee.” You can view the current course catalog at: http://doit.missouri.edu/training
If you’re interested in one of the following research areas, you should consider taking some or all of the listed courses beyond the core requirements. Realize that these are meant to give students a gernal idea about courses available to different specializations, your advisor will help you select the right mixture. Course descriptions can be found in the Graduate Student Handbook.
- Astrophysics (Recommendations thanks to Dr. Angela Speck)
- Physics/Astronomy/Geology 7180: Solar System Science
- Physics 7450: Introduction to Cosmology
- Physics/Astronomy 7550: Cosmochemistry
- Physics/Astronomy 8550: Stellar Structure and Evolution – This course has not been offered for a long time, and can only be offered if we teach it with the 4250 class (not enough faculty to teach it!). This would not be ideal, but is doable if students want an 8000-level astro course.
- The following courses should be cross-listed as 7000-level, but the paperwork hasn’t been done. Grad students can sign up for “Phys 7085: Problems” to get credit.
- Physics/Astronomy 4250: Stellar Astrophysics
- Physics/Astronomy 4350: Galactic Astronomy
- There is also a course on Interstellar medium, but the paperwork still needs to be done.
- A special note from Dr. Speck: “I would argue that Solar System Science (7180) is the most important, because the physics and environments discussed should give students all they need to transfer to other astrophysical environments, because this course is multidisciplinary, and because it teaches the nature of science and the importance of evidence.”
- Theoretical Condensed Matter Physics
- Physics 8160: Condensed Matter Physics II
- Physics 8730: Quantum Mechanics III
- Physics 8801: Topics in Solid State Theory
- Physics 7400: Physics of Electronic Devices
- Physics 7600: Semiconductor Optics
- Physics 8400: Low Energy Neutron Scattering
- Physics 8660: Methods in Mathematical Physics
- Experimental Condensed Matter Physics
- Physics 8160: Condensed Matter Physics II
- Physics 7400: Physics of Electronic Devices
- Physics 7190: Physics and Chemistry of Materials
- Physics 7230: Scanning Electron Microscopy and X-Ray Microanalysis
- Physics 8400: Low Energy Neutron Scattering
- Physics 4050: Electronic Lab – This course would either need to be cross listed as 7000-level or taken as “Phys 7085: Problems” for credit
- Bio-optical Imaging
- Physics 7110: Light and Modern Optics
- Physics 7230: Scanning Electron Microscopy and X-Ray Microanalysis
- Physics 7310: Physics in Cell and Developmental Biology
- Biol En 7170: Biomaterials Interfaces of Implantable Devices
- Biol En 7380: Applied Electronic Instrumentation
- Biol En 7770: Biomedical Optics
- Biol En 8270: Principles and Applications of Fluorescence
- Biol En 7570: Biomedical Imaging
- Biol En 7670: Photonics and Nanotechnologies in Optical Biosensors
- Biol En 7070: Bioelectricity
- ECE 8620: Introduction to Fourier Optics
- ECE 7630: Introduction to Optical Electronics
- ECE 8530: Advanced Photonics
- (Biol En = Biological Engineering; ECE = Electronics and Computer Engineering)
