49th International Physics Olympiad, IPhO2018
The 49th edition of the International Physics Olympiad (IPhO2018) took place in Lisbon, from 21 to 29 July. The IPhO is an annual competition in physics for secondary school students, aiming at promoting physics and the development of international contacts in physics education, involving individual theoretical and experimental exams. The IPhO began in Warsaw, Poland, in 1967, with 5 participating countries. Since then, IPhO has grown to worldwide coverage and this year 396 competitors from 86 countries attended the competition in Lisbon, organised by the Portuguese Physical Society on behalf of the Portuguese Ministry of Education.
The theory part of the competition consisted of three problems. In the first, the students analysed the signal of gravitational waves first detected in the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory. In the second problem, the students used real data from the Large Hadron Collider to determine the neutrino momentum and the mass and lifetime of the top quark in a collision of two protons. The third problem addressed the physics of blood flow and tumour growth.
The experimental part of the competition consisted of two problems. In the first, the students had to characterise a silicon junction gate field-effect transistor and a ‘’paper’’ thin-film transistor. The latter is a device using a paper membrane as both the dielectric and the substrate, and gallium indium zinc oxide as the semiconductor, a technology developed at the New University of Lisbon. The second experimental problem involved the study of the viscoelastic properties of a polymer thread.
The absolute winner of the IPhO2018 was a Chinese student, Yang Tianhua, who obtained a score of 46.8/50 points. He also achieved the best score in both the theoretical and experimental exams. This year, two special prizes sponsored by EPS were awarded, namely for the best male and female performers from EPS member countries. The winners of these prizes were Grigorii Bobkov (Russian Federative Republic) and Sabina Drăgoi (Romania).
It should be noted that the number of girls participating in the IPhO is quite small (<10%) and it has not been significantly increasing in the last few years, reflecting the fact that in most countries there is a reduced participation of girls at the national Physics Olympiads. Also, the number of female team-leaders is small. It is urgent that this problem be addressed with positive measures to motivate girls to participate.
