China, Russia Win Top Results in Physics Olympiad in Iran (2/2)

The physics competition is one of the International Science Olympiads held around the world. The American Association of Physics Teachers and the American Institute of Physics choose members of the United States team. Physics teachers across the country nominate" class="hjdict" word="nominate" target=_blank>nominate students and committees choose about 200 of them. The students take additional tests to choose the 24 members of the team.

In May the members attend the United States Physics Team Training Camp at the University of Maryland. They go through 9 days of intensive" class="hjdict" word="intensive" target=_blank>intensive studying, testing and problem solving. At the end of the camp, five members of the team are chosen to travel to the Olympiad.

The five this year were Kenan Diab of Ohio, Rui Hu of Delaware, Jenny Kwan from California, Jason LaRue of Florida and Haofei Wei from Oklahoma. All five won medals.

The first International Physics Olympiad took place in Warsaw, Poland, in 1967. Until the early 1980s it was held only in the former communist countries of eastern Europe. The United States organized a team for the first time in 1986.