In the movie Gravity, American astronaut and scientist Dr. Stone (Sandra Bullock) is on a spacewalk when tragedy suddenly strikes. An ever-increasing field of debris caused by a destroyed spy satellite damages the Hubble and Space Shuttle and quickly wipes out their mission. Dr. Stone spends the rest of the movie trying to find a ride back home.

Recently I took a walk through the physics demonstration room at Kenyon College, where I first started teaching in 1964. On an upper shelf was the little home-built apparatus in Fig. 1. This was used for one of two short single-concept films that I made in the 1970s. Both "The Magnus Effect" and "Optical Barrier Penetration"…

According to Einstein's general theory of relativity, a clock runs more slowly if it is close to a large gravitating object. This principle was highlighted in the movie "Interstellar," in which the main character spends several hours on a planet orbiting a massive black hole, and returns to find that his young daughter has become an…

For the past 20 years, a constant effort has been made by physics teachers and communication specialists to promote the use of characters from comics or science fiction films in physics teaching practice, because of its positive impact on student motivation and attention. This implementation often comes up against the problem of obtaining…

Have you ever taught "head on the table" physics students and wondered how to increase engagement? If so, I have two stories for you! Davon and Cynthia--both case study students--struggled with traditional physics but showed great promise with developing personalized physics problems.

As part of a public education outreach effort, an introduction to the health effects of ionizing radiation and the field of medical physics was developed by a clinical medical physicist. The presentation was delivered to a broad public audience in 2019 (prior to COVID-19 safety concerns) through a community outreach science literacy program that…

In the entertainment world, people usually like, and find memorable, novels, short stories, and movies with surprise endings. This suggests that classroom teachers might want to present to their students examples of surprising facts associated with principles of physics. Possible benefits of finding surprising facts about principles of physics are…

References to everyday life are important for teaching physics. Discussing polarization phenomena, liquid crystal displays (LCDs) and 3D cinemas provide such references. In this paper we describe experiments to support students' understanding of linearly polarized light as well as the phenomenon of inverted colors using a secret LCD screen.…

Thin film interference manifests itself in a wide range of visually pleasing situations in everyday life (in the colored effects caused by a drop of oil on water, in soap bubbles, etc.) and is also involved in important technical applications (semi-reflecting mirrors, anti-reflection lenses, etc.). Yet, despite its familiarity, high school…

This month marks the 75th anniversary of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapse. During a gale on Nov. 7, 1940, the bridge exhibited remarkable oscillations before collapsing spectacularly (Figs. 1-5). Physicists over the years have spent a great deal of time and energy studying this event. By using open-source analysis tools and digitized footage of…

Movies are mostly viewed for entertainment. Mixing entertainment and physics gets students excited as we look at a famous movie scene from a different point of view. The following is a link to a fragment from the 2010 motion picture "Inception": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3tBBhYJeAw. The following problem, based on images in facing…

The classic film "Frames of Reference" effectively illustrates concepts involved with inertial and non-inertial reference frames. In it, Donald G. Ivey and Patterson Hume use the cameras perspective to allow the viewer to see motion in reference frames translating with a constant velocity, translating while accelerating, and rotating--all with…

In the third movie ("At World's End") in the "Pirates of the Caribbean" series, Jack Sparrow and his crew need to roll their ship (the "Black Pearl") over in order to bring it back to the living world during a green flash at sunset. They do so by running back and forth from one side railing to the other on the top deck. In addition, Captain…

Magic tricks are very popular, and they can and should be used in teaching when the underlying principle is easily explained by physics. Such tricks often fall in the realm of hands-on experiments, which are considered to be potentially very effective in raising interest and motivating students. Unfortunately, many hands-on experiments are easy to…

Books, cartoons, movies, and video games provide engaging opportunities to get both science and nonscience students excited about physics. An easy way to use these media in one's classroom is to have students view clips and identify unusual events, odd physics, or list things that violate our understanding of the physics that governs our universe.…