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NPA POSTDOCket Newsletter

To see current and past issues of the National Postdoctoral Association's quarterly newsletter The POSTDOCket, click here. Access to the NPA's newsletter is for members only. Because our office is a sustaining member of the National Postdoctoral Association (NPA), all postdoctoral scholars may apply for a free affiliate membership. If you are interested in becoming a member, please email postdocs@stonybrook.edu.

Dr. Shlomo Razamat receives SBU’s first Postdoctoral Achievement Award

“He is a brilliant theoretical physicist … and the depth of his work is such that it takes many years of study to understand his work.” – Professor Jac Verbaarschot

Dr. Shlomo Razamat, a Postdoc in the Yang Institute for Theoretical Physics, has won this year’s Stony Brook University Postdoctoral Achievement Award. This award is given annually to a Postdoc in theoretical physics for groundbreaking work initiated at Stony Brook, and it comes with a cash prize of $1,000. Dr. Razamat’s work can best be described in laymen’s terms as looking for new ways to understand a natural phenomenon - gravity.

“I almost deleted the email,” Shlomo said about being notified that he had won the award. “It is a big honor to be nominated. I was surprised because I didn’t know such an award existed.”

He joined the Yang Institute in Fall 2007 after earning a PhD from the Technion Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa. He is working in the field of string theory and already has 20 papers published. His work has attracted the attention of the scientific community, and as a result he has spoken at a number of top universities in the US. In the fall, after declining an offer from Harvard, he will start a second postdoctoral position at the prestigious Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton.

“In my field it is customary to hold more than one postdoc position before getting a faculty job. I am usually working with collaborators, but most of the time I’m by myself so whenever I’m available, I work, sometimes into the night.” Dr. Razamat’s research is related to the main theme of theoretical high-energy physics, which is the construction of a quantum theory of gravity. “In high school I was interested in math, not physics, but I had a very good physics teacher who made the connection for me.” It turns out that there are deep mathematical relationships between quantum field theories in four dimensions and the theory of gravity in five dimensions, and in some cases they actually may be equivalent. The reasons for this duality have not been well understood, and Dr. Razamat is developing tools to address this question.

A remarkable feature of the duality between quantum gravity and quantum field theory is that a strongly coupled system in one description becomes a weakly coupled system in the dual description. Using this principle, Dr. Razamat is able to analyze the properties of strongly coupled systems that cannot be studied otherwise. This goes back to one of the finest traditions in theoretical physics of using simplicity as a guiding principle to describe natural phenomena.

This year is the first time the award has been given, courtesy of an anonymous donation that is sufficient to keep the award active annually for Postdocs from the Yang Institute for Theoretical Physics, the Simons Center for Geometry and Physics and the Nuclear Theory Institute. Dr. Razamat received the award at a ceremony held on May 10 after a committee had reviewed his nomination from three faculty members. “His research has been tremendously creative, innovative, and productive,” said one nominator, Professor Martin Rocek from the Institute of Theoretical Physics. “I have no doubt that he will go on to be a leader in the field and his time here will bring credit to Stony Brook.” According to committee member Professor Jacobus Verbaarschot from the Physics and Astronomy Department, the prize was awarded to Shlomo because “he is a brilliant theoretical physicist … and the depth of his work is such that it takes many years of study to understand his work.”

ICE announces expanded list of science, technology, engineering, and math degree programs
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) 05/12/2011

Qualifies eligible graduates to extend their post-graduate training

WASHINGTON - U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) today published an expanded list of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) degree programs that qualify eligible graduates on student visas for an Optional Practical Training (OPT) extension-an important step forward in the Obama administration's continued commitment to fixing our broken immigration system and expanding access to the nation's pool of talented high skilled graduates in the science and technology fields. The announcement follows President Obama's recent remarks in El Paso, Texas, where he reiterated his strong support for new policies that embrace talented students from other countries, who enrich the nation by working in science and technology jobs and fueling innovation in their chosen fields here in the United States, as a part of comprehensive reform. By expanding the list of STEM degrees to include such fields as Neuroscience, Medical Informatics, Pharmaceutics and Drug Design, Mathematics and Computer Science, the Obama administration is helping to address shortages in certain high tech sectors of talented scientists and technology experts-permitting highly skilled foreign graduates who wish to work in their field of study upon graduation and extend their post-graduate training in the United States.

Under the OPT program, foreign students who graduate from U.S. colleges and universities are able to remain in the U.S. and receive training through work experience for up to 12 months. Students who graduate with one of the newly-expanded STEM degrees can remain for an additional 17 months on an OPT STEM extension.

From the National Postdoctoral Association - April 27, 2011

The National Institutes of Health has increased the Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award (NRSA) Stipends by 2 percent for 2011. The Tuition and Fees, Training Related Expenses for trainees, and the Institutional Allowance for individual fellows remain unchanged.

"Given that the NIH's Fiscal Year (FY) 2011 funding was cut by $260 million below FY 2010 spending levels, we are very pleased to see this increase in the stipends," said Cathee Johnson Phillips, NPA's executive director, speaking on behalf of the NPA Board of Directors. "We will continue to advocate for a greater increase in 2012 and the following years. This advocacy is important, because the NRSA stipend schedule sets the standard for postdoc compensation across the country."

The NPA Advocacy Committee led the efforts to advocate for an increase in the FY 2011 stipends and continues its efforts for FY 2012. The President's Budget requests a 4-percent increase in NRSA stipends for FY 2012.

The National Postdoctoral Association supports an NRSA entry-level postdoctoral stipend of $45,000, as recommended by the National Academy of Sciences’ (NAS) Personnel Needs Committee in its report Addressing the Nation’s Changing Needs for Biomedical and Behavioral Scientists (2000).

Postdoctoral Scholar of the Month

The Office of Postdoctoral Affairs wants to recognize the important work accomplished by all Postdoctoral Scholars on campus. One way we can 'get the word out' is by highlighting a different Postdoc on campus every month. Our goal is to make Postdoctoral Scholars aware of what their colleagues are working on in order to facilitate networking opportunities and to create a sense of community. If you are a Postdoctoral Scholar and would like to be featured in our monthly column, or if you would like to nominate a Postdoc to be interviewed, please email Assistant Dean Lynn Allopenna. Interviews roughly run about 15-20 minutes and can be scheduled at your convenience.

To view past articles on our Postdoctoral Scholars of the Month, visit our Archives.


Dr. Martin Kaczocha	Dr. Ann Erlanger	Dr. Qiong Zeng	Dr. Velasco Cimica	Dr. Kathleen Howard	Dr. Fu Lin	Dr. Gretchen López

Dr. Devi Ekayanake	Dr. Pramod Avti	Dr. Lidia Sobkow	Dr. Ezio Bartocci	Dr. Ete Chan

Meet Peter Love

Dr. Peter Love
Postdoctoral Associate
Marine Sciences

As a young boy in Adelaide Australia, Dr. Peter Love always knew he wanted to be a scientist, but he thought his work would be in astronomy and space exploration. Today he is doing his Postdoc in the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences under the tutelage of Professor Marvin Geller.

How did you get involved in your present field of science?

“Atmospheric science wasn’t my first choice. As an undergrad I originally planned on going into Astrophysics, but circumstantially I began working on a project with an atmospheric physics group, and the appeal grew. Atmospheric science is very satisfying in that you can relate to what you are studying in terms of day-to-day experience. You can see the direct benefits to society of doing climate related work improving forecasting models. It happens to be topical at the moment, but you can see directly where your efforts are leading. I guess you could say it is very practical, and that appeals to me.”

What brought you to Stony Brook University?

“I had always anticipated coming to the US to work because of the job opportunities. Having done some collaborative work with some other US researchers during my PhD made this increasingly likely. Toward the end of my PhD, which was in experimental physics, I was at a conference in Adelaide and my supervisor at that time invited Professor Marvin Geller to give a talk. Coincidentally he was looking for a Postdoc, so we arranged an informal interview. I guess it was good timing, being in the right place at the right time. I’ve been here for about two years now.”

Can you explain in laymen’s terms what work you are doing?

“I study atmospheric dynamics, in particular I look at waves in the atmosphere which behave quite similar to waves in the ocean. What we’re interested in is the energy and momentum transport associated with these waves. Generally, although not exclusively, they get excited in the lower part of the atmosphere and some then travel upwards through the atmosphere. As they reach higher altitudes they become unstable and they break, just like waves break on the beach. They deposit their energy at these points, which causes the atmosphere in these regions to heat up and the winds to accelerate or decelerate. This is happening all the time throughout the atmosphere, and it’s very important to be able to include those effects in our climate models. It has profound implications for large-scale circulations in the atmosphere.

But the problem with getting this into the models is that the resolution of the computer models people are using to forecast the climate is not actually sufficient to resolve the waves, to capture the details of the waves, so we have to find ways to include these effects through other parameters. We’ve made some significant developments through observing the waves using satellite measurements, so we’re now getting a global distribution of wave energy to form a better picture.”

What accomplishments are you most proud of since you arrived here?

“I’ve contributed to a couple of grant proposals, one of which was recently awarded from the NSF. I wrote a part of it, and it was a good experience.”

What are your future goals?

“I haven’t decided yet if I want to go down the teaching path or just do research. I’m doing a little lecturing now which is helping me determine if that’s what I want to do, but I think my main interest will remain in doing research.”

What advice might you have for other Postdoctoral Scholars?

“I would say write as much as you can. Produce as much tangible output as possible, and enjoy the opportunity. I think doing a Postdoc is the reward for sticking it out through your PhD.”

In the tradition of the French TV host Bernard Pivot who asked a series of questions at the end of every interview, we ask our Postdocs the following questions:

What is your favorite sound?
“The wind in the trees or the waves in the ocean.”

What is your favorite word or phrase?
“Carpe Diem.”

What is your favorite hobby?
“I’ve always liked the outdoors; hiking, biking, skiing, rock climbing. I’d say it’s more of a lifestyle for me rather than a hobby.”

Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB)
FASEB is an organization that legislators, federal agencies, and the media turn to for information on policies related to biomedical science and engineering. At FASEB, policy development begins with the working scientists representing their member societies and reflects the views of a broad cross-section of the research community. Their full-time presence in Washington allows them to monitor the latest legislative and regulatory developments, news, and events affecting scientists, and their staff provide analytic, communications, and technical support for their initiatives. The combination of volunteer action and staff professionalism ensures that their advocacy efforts are designed for maximum effectiveness.

Science Careers monthly journalist Beryl Lieff Benderly

Science Careers columnist Beryl Lieff Benderly writes an article on the first Friday of every month entitled "Taken For Granted," which deals with issues relevant to Postdocs. Benderly is a Washington-based journalist who writes on science policy and careers for the website of Science magazine. Recently elected a Fellow of the American Society for the Advancement of Science, Benderly has written eight books and hundreds of articles for national magazines and Web publications.