A Major Contribution
Jason Alexander ('92), an engineer at Lightwave Electronics in Mountain View, recently arranged for the donation of a number of diode lasers to the SSU Department of Physics and Astronomy. The lasers range in power from a few hundred milliwatts to more than a watt and in wavelength from visible to infrared. Some of the donated lasers have thermoelectric coolers built in, which will be quite useful in demonstrating diode laser properties.
Jason maintains a high level of interest in physics, higher education, and his alma mater. He has been advising Dr. Saeid Rahimi concerning gas, solid state, and diode lasers that are important in industry. After graduating from SSU, Jason earned a master's degree in physics at Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis. He gave an exciting guest lecture in the lasers and holography course, Physics 447, this spring, and he has promised more involvement in the new optics programs currently being discussed. The department wishes to thank Jason and his employer for more than $22,000 worth of equipment, and for his active interest in its present and future activities.

SPS Activities
Willie Rodriguez
The Society of Physics Students at Sonoma State University remained active during the past year, even with the large load of courses most members were taking. Fall semester president Susan Webster made sure that SPS did not disappear into the ether. SPS continued with fund-raising bake sales, toured the Stanford Linear Accelerator and partied at Dr. Cominsky's.
As spring semester president I sensed fund-raiser burnout among our members. As a result we decided to have a bit of fun with the money we had earned. SPS members were treated to pizza at Mary's and Cybelle's, and played pool at Buffalo Billiards' reserved VIP room. SPS also attended Great America's Physics Day, where we helped high school students with their experiments and questions. With this relaxing semester behind us, we will be back on course for the fall.

SPS Visits SLAC
Susan Webster
Last fall the SSU Society of Physics Students (SPS) chapter visited the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center. Our first stop was GLAST  (Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope), where our own Dr. Lynn Cominsky, a member of the GLAST  team, gave a talk on high energy astrophysics with models of the telescope detectors.
Eric Weiss ('91) gave an exciting introduction to particle physics. Since leaving SSU Eric has been a graduate student at the University of Washington, and he is now doing high energy physics research at SLAC for his Ph.D. We were fortunate to have him as our guide. As we toured the site on a SLAC bus, Eric explained the old equipment on the grounds. He showed us the control center for the SLD (SLAC Large Detector) and explained how it detected Z particles.
The last part of the field trip was on the Stanford campus at the W.W. Hansen Experimental Physics Lab, where we saw work on Gravity Probe B . Under way for more than twenty years now, the project is still a few years away from launching the satellite that will test Einstein's General Theory of Relativity to unprecedented precision. We again had a lecture explaining the goals of the mission and how the probe was made. Then we were led in small groups to look at the areas where the different pieces of the probe were being made. From time to time throughout the day Stanford physics graduate student Mallory Roberts ('94) joined us and answered any questions we might have had.
The field trip was now finished, and Dr. Cominsky invited everyone to a party at her house. With a hot tub, food, nice music, and drinks, it was a perfect day.