The Physics of Baseball: What Newton said to the Billygoat

Opening Day may seem far in the distant future, but that doesn’t stop us from counting down the days until pitchers and catchers report for the spring season, and for the official start of spring training.

But there is no better way to celebrate the Cubs’ World Series than taking a closer look at what happens on the ballfield: Why does Jon Lester’s curveball curve? How did David Ross handle all those fastballs? And what’s the quickest way for Dexter Fowler to run around the bases?

There’s a huge amount of interesting physics and science happening on the baseball diamond that can be understood without any math or formulas. Digging into the physics behind baseball can help bring new appreciation for the beauty of the game–no matter what team you root for.

Jahred Adelman, Ph.D., earned his BSc from Brown University and completed his graduate studies at the University of Chicago, with a thesis was a measurement of the mass of the top quark, using the CDF experiment (one of the main experiments at Fermilab’s Tevatron). He did postdoctoral research at CERN, in Switzerland, while working for Yale University, before coming to NIU in 2014. Dr. Adelman’s current research area is Higgs boson physics using the ATLAS experiment at CERN. Adelman grew up in New York City, where he (for better or for worse) learned to become a Mets fan.

This program presented in partnership with Northern Illinois University.