· May 2008 Newletter is online

May 2008 AKPA Newletter is currently online.

· New (Next) President and Auditor Elected

The new (Next) President and Auditor of AKPA were elected by an email ballot in March, 2007. Fourteen members cast their votes.

With the second presidential candidate having withdrawn, Professor Cheung Ryong Ji of North Carolina State University in Raleigh, North Carolina, was elected unopposed with all 14 votes. Professor Ji will serve as Vice President from May 2007 through April 2009, and then as President from May 2009 through April 2011.

The vote for the Auditor was much closer. Dr. Yong-Hyun Kim of National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, Colorado, received 8 votes, defeating Dr. Jiyeong Gu of California State University at Long Beach, who received 6 votes. Dr. Kim will serve as Auditor from May 2007 through April 2009.

Congratulations and our best wishes to Professor Ji and Dr. Kim!

· Joint Award Ceremony and the Annual Meeting

As announced in our February newsletter, Dr. Tuson Park of the Los Alamos National Laboratory was selected for this year’s Outstanding Young Researcher Award (OYRA). The award ceremony took place at the Forum on International Physics (FIP) reception at the APS March meeting in Denver, Colorado, at 6:00-8:00 p.m. on March 6, 2007. This was the first FIP reception cosponsored by the organizations of overseas physicists working in the U.S.  The groups that cosponsored the reception are the American Chapter of the Indian Physics Association (ACIPA), the Association of Korean Physicists in America (AKPA), the Overseas Chinese Physics Association (OCPA) and Iranian-American Physicists (IrAP) Network Group. Professor Paik, AKPA’s President, briefly explained the activities of AKPA, read the OYRA citation, and handed over the OYRA plaques and cash award to Dr. Park in front of about 100 physicists who attended the event.

Following the FIP reception, the annual meeting of AKPA was held in an adjacent room in Adam’s Mark Hotel. The meeting was attended by only six members, which included three ex-presidents of AKPA. Professor Paik, the current President, reported on the progress AKPA has made in holding public lectures since 2005. Altogether 8 lectures have been given so far, 3 in 2005, 5 in 2006, and 1 in 2007, in major cities of U.S. The public lectures have been very successful and have generated much publicity in Korean news media. Professor Paik related his unique experience of co-hosting the public lecture event with the Korean Association of Atlanta. The attendees also discussed how AKPA may increase its membership and encourage younger members to participate and take more active roles.