How to Plan a Physics Party

It's June, the academic year is over, it's time to celebrate! For those of you mad about physics or graduating with a physics degree at any level, how about a physics-themed party? We've compiled a few ideas below, but feel free to get creative and let us know your ideas in the comments. The world has far too few physics parties.

Decorations

Credit: Marvin via Flickr

• Scatter some chalk boards covered in equations around the room (or make your own with black paper and a silver sharpie). Better yet, leave the most famous equations half blank and challenge your guests to complete them. 
• Red, green, and blue balloons can be quarks of different colors. Balloons are also great for creating static electricity, and demonstrating buoyancy (if some are filled with helium and some with air).
• Lava lamps to demonstrate buoyancy (or make your own!)



Credit: Wicker Paradise via Flickr

• Black lights give off ultraviolet light and cause phosphor-containing objects to glow. These objects include white t-shirts, teeth, fingernails, and tonic water. 
• Glow sticks.
• Place heavy objects on a trampoline to demonstrate the curvature of space and time.
• If the party is outside, hang CDs in the trees and let them diffract light from the sun.

Food

Credit: Galaxy Zoo blog

• Make a black hole cake complete with accretion disk, high-energy jets, and clouds of ionized gas. For further cake inspiration, check out this amazing spacetime cake made by Physics Buzz bloggers last year.
• Serve alongside homemade liquid nitrogen ice cream.
• Pi pie!
• Bowls of mixed nuts to demonstrate the Brazil nut effect.
• Radioactive cupcakes. 
• String cheese theory.
• Bobbing for Newton's apple.
• Jello for a substance that spans the range from liquid to solid.
• If it's a party for adults, serve beer with different amounts of head (for example, Guinness vs ale) and note how the foam dampens sloshing.
• And so on. Let us know if you come up with more ideas!

Games

• Make a tub of non-Newtonian oobleck out of cornstarch and water. It's a solid if you jump on it and a liquid if you stop.

Credit: Tamela Maciel

• Play the Heads Up/Post-It/Who Am I game with a physics twist. Write the names of famous physicists on post-its and stick them to people's foreheads. The player has to guess who they are based on the answers to yes-or-no questions.
• Play Cards Against Science.
• Have guests compete to complete the equations you've left partially blank on your chalkboards.
• Create color-mixed dancing silhouettes with spotlights and colored filters.
• Bocce ball, croquet, or pool billiards are all great games to demonstrate conservation of momentum.
• See who can make the best water rocket.
• Turn your smartphone into a spectrometer or accelerometer and do some science.

Music

• The amazing and nerdy "AstroCappella" music of The Chromatics. Check out their Sun Song, Doppler Shifting, and Cosmic Radio Show songs.
• Strum a guitar to demonstrate how strings vibrate. 
• Not strictly physics, but the Elements Song by Tom Lehrer is always sure to draw a crowd. Especially if you can sing it from memory!
• More physics songs and lyrics are available from Walter Smith's archive at Haverford College.

Happy June and Happy Physics!



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By Tamela Maciel, also known as "pendulum"

Top image credit: Shaun Fisher via Flickr