UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH OPPORTUNITIES WITH PHYSICS FACULTY

The Department of Physics at The University of Texas at Austin is one of the foremost research institutions in the nation. The Department consists of internationally recognized faculty members who specialize in a wide variety of fields. Physics Majors can find research opportunities in almost any area of physics.



Faculty Research Programs Accepting Undergraduates

Name      Min. class.   Req.    P, V, B     Min. W H            Special Req.

Antoniewicz   So.       RPT        V         10
Bengtson      Jr.        N         B         10
de Lozanne    Fr.        N         V          5    Good Prog. Skill(Win32) in						                     C++,Visual Basic
Fink          Fr.        N         B         10
Fitzpatrick   Sr.       HTS        V         10
Frommhold     Jr.  HTS,STS,For.    V         10
Gentle        Jr.       RPT        B         10
Heinzen       F          N         B         10
Kas           So.        N         B          6
Keto          So.        N         V          5
Koop          So./Jr.   RPT        B         15  C++, FORTRAN, LabView or Linux           	                                          experience a plus.
Lang          So.        N         V         15    
Marder	      F.         N         B         10
Markert       So.        N         B          8   Prefers Junior intending to do   	                                                  Honors Thesis as Seniors
Matzner       F.         RPT       V          3  Computer Experience Preferred
Martinez      So.        N         V         10
Moore         Fr.        N         B        None
Oakes         Jr.       RPT        V         10
Raizen*       So.       RPT, C     P         12 
Ritchie       Jr.       RPT        V         10
Schwitters    Jr.       RPT        B          5    Facility with PCs
Sitz          Fr.        N         B          8
Swinney       So.    RPT, HAS      B         12    Preferred:C, Unix, Some Lab	                                             Experience(electronics, 	     			                                 mechanical, optics, ...)
Tajima        Jr.  HTS,STS,RPT     V        None   Computer Literacy
Yao           Jr.        N         B          5    Electronic Skills         

*Currently no openings available


Information About Physics Faculty Who Work With Undergraduates:

Peter R. Antoniewicz
Professor - B.S., North Carolina State, 1959; M.S., Purdue University, 1964; Ph.D., 1965. Surface and interface physics, electromagnetic wave propagation, transport properties in solids and liquids.

Roger D. Bengtson
Professor B.S., University of Nebraska, 1962; M.S., Virginia Polytechnic Institute, 1964; Ph.D., University of Maryland, 1968. Experimental plasma physics, plasma spectroscopy.

Todd Dittmire
Professor., B.A. Harvard University. M.S., Ph.D. University of California-Davis, AMO Experimentalist. Intense Ultrafast Laser Interactions

Alejandro de Lozanne
Professor B.S., Purdue University, 1976; Ph.D., Stanford University, 1982. Scanning tunneling microscopy, nanostructures, thin films and devices, high temperature superconductors.

Cecile DeWitt-Morette
Professor Licence des Sciences, Caen (France), 1943; Doctorat d'Etat, Paris (France), 1947. General relativity, mathematical physics, Feynman path integrals.

Michael C. Downer
Professor B.A., University of Rochester, 1976; M.A., Oxford University, 1978; Ph.D., Harvard University, 1983. Femtosecond spectroscopy in condensed matter.

James L. Erskine
Trull Centennial Professor B.S.E.E., Washington University (Seattle), 1964; M.S.E.E., 1966; Ph.D. (Physics), 1973. Experimental solid-state physics, thin film magnetism, surface phonons.

Manfred Fink
Professor Vordiplom, Diplom, Dr. Technische Hochschule Karlsruhe, 1958, 1963, 1966. Electron diffraction, neutrino physics.

Richard Fitzpatrick
Associate Professor. Ph.D., Sussex University. Theoretical Plasma Physics. MHD stabiltiy of tokamak plamas.

Lothar W. Frommhold
Professor Dipl., Ph.D., Dr. Habil, Hamburg, 1956, 1961, 1964. Atomic and molecular physics.

Kenneth W. Gentle
Professor B.S., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1962; Ph.D., 1966. Plasma confinement and heating.

Austin M. Gleeson
Professor B.S., Drexel Institute of Technology, 1960; M.S., University of Pennsylvania, 1963; Ph.D., 1965. Field theory of strong interactions and the physics of superdense matter, high energy acoustic sources.

Richard Hazeltine
Professor & Director, Institute for Fusion Studies, A.B., Harvard University, 1964; M.S., University of Michigan, 1966; Ph.D., 1968. Plasma physics theory.

Daniel J. Heinzen
Associate Professor B.S., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1981; Ph.D., 1988. Trapped ions, Bose-Einstein Condensation.

Gerald W. Hoffmann
Professor B.A., Occidental College, 1966 Ph.D., University of California (Los Angeles), 1971. Experimental medium and high energy physics and chemistry.

C. Wendell Horton, Jr.
Professor B.S., The University of Texas (Austin), 1963; M.S., University of California (San Diego), 1965; Ph.D., 1967. Microinstabilities, nonlinear theory.

Joseph A. Kas
Associate Professor, Diplom Technische Universität München 1990; Ph.D. Technische Universität München 1993. Soft condensed matter physics and biophysics. Projects focus on polymer aspects of motility and elasticity of biological cells and on nonlinear pattern formation in cell membranes.

John W. Keto
Professor B.S.E., University of Michigan, 1968; Ph.D., University of Wisconsin, 1972. Reactions and radiative processes of excited atoms and molecules, laser spectroscopy, high power lasers.

Sacha Koop
Assistant Professor A.B., A.M., PhD The University of Chicago Experimental HEP, CP violation, Weak decays of Heavy Quarks, Neutrino Oscillations.

Karol Lang
Professor M.S., Warsaw University (Warsaw Poland), 1979; Ph.D., University of Rochester, 1985. Experimental high energy physics, rare decays.

Michael P. Marder
Professor A.B., Cornell University, 1982; Ph.D. University of California (Santa Barbara), 1986. Theoretical investigations of pattern formation, nonlinear dynamics, especially the dynamics of fracture, phase transitions..

John T. Markert
Professor B. A., Bowdoin College, 1979; M.S., Cornell University, 1984; Ph.D., 1987. Magnetism and superconductivity in oxides and heavy fermion systems, high temperature superconductivity, high pressure research.

Robert E. Martinez
Assistant Professor Ph.D., Harvard University. Experimental Condensed Matter Physics, semiconductor surface physics, low-temperature epitaxy.

Richard A. Matzner
Professor Director, Center for Relativity, B.S., University of Notre Dame, 1963; Ph.D., University of Maryland, 1967. General relativity and cosmology, kinetic theory, black hole physics, gravitational radiation.

C. Fred Moore
Professor B.S., University of Notre Dame, 1959; M.S., University of Louisville, 1961; Ph.D., Florida State University, 1964. Experimental medium energy meson-nucleus physics and chemistry.

Philip J. Morrison
Professor B.S., University of California (San Diego), 1972; MS., 1974; Ph.D., 1979. Basic nonlinear plasma dynamics, tokamak modeling.

Qian Niu
Professor B.Sc., Peking University, 1981; M.S., 1983, Ph.D., University of Washington, 1985. Condensed Matter Theory. Quantum Hall Effect, Nanostructures and quantum devices, quasi-periodic systems, vortex dynamics.

Melvin E. L. Oakes
Professor B.S., Louisiana State University (Baton Rouge), 1958; Ph.D., Florida State University, 1946. Plasma heating.

Sonia Paban
Assistant Professor B.S. 1984, Ph.D., University of Barcelona, 1988; Particle Phenomonology and String Theory, Particle Physics.

Mark Raizen
Professor B.Sc., Tel Aviv, 1980; Ph.D., The University of Texas (Austin), 1989. Experimental quantum optics, ion trapping.

Peter J. Riley
Professor B. A.Sc., University of British Columbia (Canada), 1956; M. A. Sc., 1958; Ph.D., University of Alberta (Canada), 1962. Experimental medium energy physics with emphasis on nucleon-nucleon and few nucleon interactions.

Jack L. Ritchie
Professor B.S.(Hon.), The University of Texas (Austin), 1977; M.A., University of Rochester, 1979; Ph.D., 1983. Experimental high energy physics, rare decays.

Roy F. Schwitters
Sid W. Richardson Foundation Regents Professor, S.B., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1966; Ph.D., 1971. Experimental high energy physics, large scale detectors. Director, Center for Particle Physics.

Chih-Kang Ken Shih
Professor B. S., National Tsing-Hua University, 1977; M.S., University of Oregon, 1981; Ph.D., Stanford University, 1988. Experimental Condensed Matter. Nanoscale electronic materials, quantum engineering of metallic nanostructures, fundamental electronic processes in semicanductor quantum dots, nanoscale mechanical properties of soft matter.

Greg O. Sitz
Associate Professor B. A., Rice University, 1981; Ph.D., Stanford University, 1987. Experimental studies of the dynamics of gas-surface interactions.

Harry L. Swinney
Sid W. Richardson Foundation Regents Professor, Director, Center for Nonlinear Dynamics. B.S., Rhodes College, 1961; Ph.D., Johns Hopkins University, 1968. Nonlinear dynamics, instabilities and pattern formation, chaos, phase transitions.

Toshiki Tajima
Professor B.S., Tokyo, 1971; M.S., 1973; Ph.D., University of California (Irvine), 1975. Computational physics, basic and astrophysical plasma theory.

Jack S. Turner
Associate Professor B. S., Duke University, 1964; Ph.D., University of Indiana, 1969. Nonequilibrium statistical and thermal physics, nonlinear dynamics, physics of self- organizing systems, computational physics, computer-based education.

Zhen Yao
Assistant Professor B.S., University of Scienc and Technology of China, 1992; M.S., 1993; Ph.D. 1997, Harvard University Condensed Matter Experimentalist. Nanostructures and Mesoscopic Physics.


Last Updated: April 12, 2001
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