Exclusive: 2015 Nobel Prize in Physics Recipient, Professor Emeritus Art McDonald Stops by ‘The Big Bang Theory’

7 April 2016

 

The cast and crew had a very special visitor on set during the last taping cycle of The Big Bang Theory (for episode 9.22, which taped Tuesday, April 5).   Nobel Prize Co-Winner in Physics in 2015,  Professor Emeritus Art McDonald stopped by to visit and meet the cast of the show that often takes real world scientific discoveries and fits them into their story arcs in a comedic fashion, The Big Bang Theory.

An astrophysicist, McDonald performed research in subatomic physics at Queens University’s Arts & Science and is director of the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory Institute.  He holds the Gordon & Patricia Cray Chair in Particle Astrophysics at Queen’s University.

McDonald received his Nobel prize for his discovery that neutrinos have mass.   Since the late 1960’s experiments have hinted that neutrinos may have mass and physicists have been investigating whether or not it was true for some time.   Based on theoretical models of the sun, predictions show that neutrinos should be made in “staggering” numbers, however, neutrino detectors on Earth have repeatedly seen fewer than expected number of neutrinos.   Since neutrinos come in electron, muon, and tau varieties and because solar neutrino detectors have been primarily sensitive to only electron neutrinos, one explanation over the years was that those “missing” neutrinos had changed, or oscillated, into a variety for which the detectors had little or no sensitivity.  If true, modifications to the standard model for elementary particles would be required and if neutrinos do change their type in this fashion, it would imply they have a mass greater than zero.

August 2001 a collaboration at the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO), led by McDonald, checked in with a direct observation suggesting that solar electron neutrinos were oscillating into muon and tau neutrinos.  Based on the work and published article that resulted from their study (see August 13, 2001 issue of Physical Review Letters), McDonald was co-recipient of the Benjamin Franklin Medal in Phyics in 2007, then awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for the discovery of neutrino oscillations and demonstrating that neutrinos have mass in 2015, and received the 2016 Breakthrogh Prizein Fundamental Physics.

The following clip is courtesy of Queen’s University Researchers of Arts & Science.

The cast and crew of The Big Bnag Theory were honored to have such an esteemed visitor stop by and take a few photos with them. It was a special treat for recurring guest star Brian Thomas Smith who was lucky to be on set at the time McDonald visited the gang.