Spotlight: The Making of a Particle Physicist

Name:Jianchun Wang
Job Title:Research Assistant Professor of Physics, Syracuse University

Educational Background:
B.S. University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China

Ph.D. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA

How long have you been working in the field of high energy physics? About 15 years.

Why did you choose high energy physics as a career path? This is a very challenging field. It provides better understanding of the fundamental elements of the world.

Were there any barriers that you had to overcome in order to pursue high energy physics as a career? Not really. It is a quite enjoyable career. If I really need to make one, I would consider this as a barrier. Nowaday's high energy physics research requires collaboration of hundreds of scientists over the world. Internet makes it much easy to communicate via virtual conference system. However, one can do nothing to reduce the time difference, at least for now. Sometime one has to get up very early or stay up very late in order to have a real time conference with scientists from the other side of the world.

Before coming to SU, what other types of experience in this field did you have? I worked on one of the LEP experiments at CERN for my Ph.D, dissertation before I came to Syracuse. The experiment is similar to the LHCb experiment that I am working on now, and at the same site.

Is there any advice you may have for today's high school students regarding a career in the sciences? This is a challenging and exciting career. It not only requires knowledge in physics but also math, computing, etc. Don't give up on any courses even if you have “decided” for your future. There is science everywhere. Always ask yourself or your friends questions like “how” and “why” when you see interesting phenomena. If you do so you will enjoy much more when you visit a science museum.