Cambridge University Physics Society
Stay
Curious
Big ideas. Brilliant people. Physics beyond the lecture theatre—open to everyone curious enough to ask why.
Who we are
Cambridge has shaped physics for centuries.
From Newton to Hawking, physics at Cambridge has shaped how people think for centuries. The Cambridge University Physics Society (CUPS) keeps that going: world-class scientists speaking with our members about their work, open to everyone from undergraduates to senior fellows.
In the past we’ve had the pleasure of hosting speakers ranging from Nobel laureates to bestselling authors and Fellows of the Royal Society.
Beyond the talks, there’s an annual society dinner, QUIRK (our conference with other UK physics societies) and socials that keep the community close.
- founded
- 1942founded
- talks on this year’s card
- 10talks on this year’s card
- members
- 500+members
Since 1942
CUPS was founded in 1942. Every year since, the format has stayed close to what it started as: a weekly talk, open to anyone curious enough to turn up, followed by a chance to actually talk to the speaker over dinner.
The crocodile on the logo isn’t ours originally. Pyotr Kapitsa - the physicist Rutherford brought to the Cavendish, and later a Nobel laureate himself - nicknamed Ernest Rutherford "the Crocodile," and Eric Gill carved one into the wall of the Mond Laboratory in 1933 to mark it. The apple beside it is a more direct reference: Newton’s, drawn mid-bounce.
The speakers list over the years runs from Nobel laureates (Gerard ’t Hooft, Didier Queloz) to Fellows of the Royal Society (Stephen Hawking, Sir Richard Friend, Carlos Frenk) to authors who’ve made physics genuinely popular (Simon Singh MBE) - alongside figures like Giovanni Losurdo on gravitational waves and Stephen Wolfram, who gave the Society’s Maxwell Talk in 2025–26.
This year’s card continues that run: Geoffrey Hinton (Nobel Prize in Physics, 2024) and Ferenc Krausz (Nobel Prize in Physics, 2023) both speak, and Carlo Rovelli, the physicist and author, gives the Maxwell Talk.
Cambridge University Physics Society
15
Thu · Oct 2026
Free · open to all · no ticket needed
Soft condensed matter & biological physics
Speaker: Julia Yeomans, University of Oxford
Date:
Venue: Cavendish Laboratory
Time: 19:00