Meet the Mentors

Being someone who is interested in both physics and coding, I have been trying to find a way for myself to integrate both of those subjects into a career path in my future. Through my courses in the physics department, I have been lucky enough to get to study under Professor Brent Corbin. Corbin is a professor who above all else, looks to inspire curiosity in students that carries on both in and out of the classroom.

I have had Corbin as a professor for the coding components of my upper division mechanics courses and have found that he seems to be someone who knows where I can take my interests for both physics and coding as I go forward.

The following are some of the things I found impactful from my time talking to Professor Corbin:

1. At what moment did you realize this was the path you wanted to take?

“Well I discovered physics in high school when I decided to take a physics class my freshman year. The class was taught by an astronomer, who was an incredibly exciting professor. I remember getting so excited about waking up at 4 am - I am not a morning person - to look at Jupiter’s Galilean moons in the freezing cold and the passion never faded from there.

“In the heart of your heart, you know when some things are meant to be.”

2. How did you see your interests develop during your college time?

“Well, I saw a big difference between the lower div. and upper div. physics classes, you know? Turns out everything you thought you knew was only the first or second order expansion of some function. Nothing looked like the exciting physics you saw when you first started. It always felt like there was a possibility of getting lost in the math of upper division physics and I can definitely say it was a fairly brutal process.

“But I Survived. One thing I did was take all the cool things that inspired me to study physics in the first place and kept them ‘packed up’ inside and I would use it to remind myself of the cool things that I was working through the tough stuff to understand.

“And you know, it was inspiring to be somewhere in public and get to look around and think, ’How many people in this grocery store get the opportunity to know about world works and do what I am able to do?’ It was things like that that got me through the hardest parts of my time studying. Just knowing that I had such a great opportunity to be learning what I was learning was enough.

“You can take the physicists out of the physics but you can’t take the physics out of the physicists. And I learned I would rather stay in physics because this was something I was destined to pursue.”

3. What’s your day to day schedule here look like?

“Well as a researcher, I had a pretty flexible schedule, but I was never truly off the clock. Most of the work I did included lots of coding. It was trying to validate an idea that you would see arise in theory, you know, seeing if the math makes sense by having Mathematica (a physics coding engine) run it.

“It was also lots of waiting to do your research while others were using the facility. In that time, we did a lot of simulations to try to get everything validated before actual testing. After the tests, it was lots of work to clean and understand the data; almost a year of analysis for single tests.

“Particle physics is good for the adrenaline junkie, if you enjoy having a laid back schedule for most of the time and then being up for two weeks at a time when you had use of the particle beams, then it’s for you.”

4. What are the hardest parts of your job? Most disliked?

“There really have not been many downsides to my job. The biggest would be all of the administrative details. They are a pain! Also the bureaucrats. Academia is known for its ‘Personalities’ should I say. A lot of frustrations arise from dealing with those individuals.

“There have been scary moments though. During one project, we were down to the last 24 hours of our time window for operating the high energy particle beam we were working with. When we powered up the beam, no data was being read. Turns out the undergrad on our team blew out different circuits and devices due to having wires in the wrong configurations. Trying to fix that before our time was up was not a fun experience.

“The biggest drag though? When students only try to memorize the equations that are found in the textbook. It feels like I am trying to beat it into students with a bat - how to approach physics from a much more curious point of view.”

5. What is the most rewarding part of your job?

“It’s a lot of fun! I would still be doing research if I didn't discover that I really felt I made a bigger impact by teaching and trying to inspire as many students as I can.

“I loved having the opportunity to do the things that I was good at and loved to do. In a way it was like having an excuse to play with the rules of the world and how things work. As a researcher, the best part was getting paid to try to find answers to things that keep you up at night.

“As an instructor, getting to keep students up at night with questions has been my favorite part. Trying to lead the students down a path that helps them to be curious and want to use the tools that they are here to learn is probably the most rewarding.”

6. What is something you wished you knew at my age?

When asked this question, Corbin thought for a second and replied with three different answers that all largely were all following the same theme:

“Part of the fun of life is not knowing - If I knew then what I know now, it might have sent me down a different path.”

“I am who I am and I am here by virtue of who I am, and I am okay with not knowing the things that were to come.”

And the last which summed up his general feelings best:

“I don’t want spoilers!”

After another few moments of conversation, Corbin imparted his last bit of wisdom he wished he knew when he was my age:

“Understand the importance of maintaining your health throughout the years - It’s so easy to get focused on the knowledge and seeking all of that out that you can easily neglect your own health.”