University of California, Berkeley

Research Specialties
University of California, Berkeley

Specialties for Degree Program

Research specialty	Degree type
	PhD (Theoretical/Experimental)	Master (Final degree/Enroute to PhD)
Astrophysics	Both	-
Atmosphere, Space Physics, Cosmic Rays	Both	-
Atomic, Molecular, & Optical Physics	Experimental	-
Biophysics	Both	-
Chemical Physics	Both	-
Condensed Matter Physics	Both	-
Low Temperature Physics	Experimental	-
Nuclear Physics	Experimental	-
Particles and Fields	Both	-
Plasma and Fusion	Both	-

Departmental Research and Staff

THEORETICAL Astrophysics Condensed Matter and Materials Physics Nonlinear Dynamics, Plasma and Beam Physics, and Complex Systems Particles and Fields Relativity & Gravitation

EXPERIMENTAL Astrophysics Atmosphere, Space Physics, Cosmic Rays Atomic, Molecular, & Optical Physics Biophysics Condensed Matter Physics Energy Sources & Environment Nonlinear Dynamics, Plasma and Beam Physics, and Complex Systems Nuclear Physics Particles and Fields Plasma and Fusion

THEORETICAL

Astrophysics

Interstellar medium; star formation; binary stars; stellar convection; pulsars; x-ray sources; active galactic nuclei and quasars; galaxy formation; cosmology.
Jonathan Arons, Wick Haxton, Daniel Kasen, Christopher McKee, Uroš Seljak, Martin White

Condensed Matter and Materials Physics

Uncover new states of matter and understand their physical properties. Theoretical and computational studies of the behaviors of novel materials and nanostructures, including electronic, vibrational, optical, thermal, transport, magnetic and superconducting properties; emergent phenomena, quantum phase transitions, and strongly correlated electron systems; many-body effects in bulk, reduced-dimensional and nanostructured systems; surface, interface, phase transition, and alloy properties.
Marvin Cohen, Dung-Hai Lee, Steven Louie, Joel Moore, Ashvin Vishwanath

Nonlinear Dynamics, Plasma and Beam Physics, and Complex Systems

Dynamics of neutral and nonneutral plasmas with applications to antihydrogen trapping, laser-plasma interaction and particle acceleration; Chaos and approach to chaos;bifurcation theory; pattern formation; fluid dynamics; semiclassical mechanics; climate change.
Robert Littlejohn

Dynamics of ionized gases far from thermal equilibrium and dominated by long-range electromagnetic fields with applications to controlled fusion, astrophysics, and space science.
Joel Fajans, Edgar Knobloch, Robert Littlejohn, Jonathan Wurtele

Particles and Fields

Gauge theory of weak and electromagnetic interactions and perturbative QCD; Theories of physics beyond the standard model, including grand unification, supersymmetry, supergravity and extra dimensions; quantum field theory; string theory; theories of gravity.
Mina Aganagic, Raphael Bousso, Mary Gaillard, Ori Ganor, Petr Hǒrava, Lawrence Hall, Wick Haxton, Hitoshi Murayama, Yasunori Nomura, Bruno Zumino

Relativity & Gravitation

general relativity and quantum gravity.
Raphael Bousso, Robert Littlejohn

EXPERIMENTAL

Astrophysics

Dark Matter Searches, Astroparticle Physics, Observations of the Cosmic Microwave Background, Cosmology, Studies of galaxy clusters, Studies of star forming galaxies, Study of Dark Energy using supernovae, Galaxy counts, and Baryon acoustic oscillations, Studies of astrophysical neutrinos, Solar Physics, and High-Energy Neutrino Astrophysics.
Stuart Bale, Steven Boggs, Marc Davis, Reinhard Genzel, William Holzapfel, Adrian Lee, R. Muller, Saul Perlmutter, P. Price, Paul Richards, Bernard Sadoulet, George Smoot, Charles Townes

Atmosphere, Space Physics, Cosmic Rays

Magnetospheric physics: space plasmas and fields; auroras; isotopic and elemental composition of cosmic rays; search for new particles and antimatter in cosmic rays; spectrum and anisotropy of the universal microwave radiation; infrared astronomical spectroscopy and spatial interferometry; millimeter and submillimeter spectra; the galactic center; star formation; new astronomical detectors; automated supernova search; x-ray spectroscopy and laboratory astrophysics; high-energy gamma-ray astrophysics; experimental cosmology including particle astrophysics.

Atomic, Molecular, & Optical Physics

Precision measurements, ultra-cold quantum gases, quantum information, attosecond physics, x-ray lasers, tests of fundamental symmetries, variation of fundamental constants, quantum phase transitions, ion trapping, hybrid quantum systems, anti-hydrogen trapping and spectroscopy, opto-mechanical systems, magnetometry, low-field NMR, frequency combs, precision spectroscopy of atomic systems near and in bulk materials, NV-centers, novel approaches to microscopy, energy transfer in complex molecules, non-linear interaction of light with matter, hot and dense plasmas.

Biophysics

Molecular biophysics and structural biology. Application of atomic force spectroscopy and optical tweezers to biological problems.
Carlos Bustamante, Michael DeWeese, Jan Liphardt, Daniel Rokhsar, Ahmet Yildiz

Condensed Matter Physics

Synthesis and experimental investigation of novel condensed phase materials, including high-Tc superconductors, low-dimensional materials, strongly correlated materials, thin-film oxides, and topological insulators. Understand the fundamental electrical, magnetic, optical, superconducting, and superfluidic behavior using state of the art experimental techniques, including electrical and magnetic transport, scanning tunneling microscopy, in-situ transmission electron microscopy, ultrafast laser spectroscopy, angle-resolved photoemission and neutron scattering. Applications of superconducting devices for quantum measurements and quantum information; quantum bits; superconducting parametric amplifiers.
Robert Birgeneau, John Clarke, Michael Crommie, Robert Dynes, Frances Hellman, Alessandra Lanzara, Joseph Orenstein, Richard Packard, Zi Qiu, Ramamoorthy Ramesh, Charles Shank, Yuen-Ron Shen, Irfan Siddiqi, Feng Wang, Alex Zettl

Energy Sources & Environment

The Center for Building Science, in the Applied Science Division at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

Nonlinear Dynamics, Plasma and Beam Physics, and Complex Systems

Nonneutral plasmas and antihydrogen synthesis; laser-driven particle acceleration in plasmas; high brightness electron and ion beams.

Nuclear Physics

Neutrino physics, including studies of neutrinos produced in solar, atmospheric and reactor interactions; Nuclear astrophysics; studies of symmetry breaking in nuclear systems; searches for neutrinoless double beta decay; weak interactions in nuclei; heavy ion collisions.
Stuart Freedman, Beate Heinemann, Robert Jacobsen, Yury Kolomensky, Kam-Biu Luk, Gabriel Orebi-Gann, Marjorie Shapiro, James Siegrist

Particles and Fields

Experiments utilizing particle accelerators such as electron-positron and hadron colliders, as well as fixed target machines to test and extend the standard model and to search for physics beyond the standard model; studies of neutrino physics using neutrinos produced in accelerators and reactors; searches for Dark Matter and other experimental studies in the field of particle astrophysics; development and fabrication of detectors appropriately matched to these goals.
Stuart Freedman, Beate Heinemann, Robert Jacobsen, Yury Kolomensky, Kam-Biu Luk, Gabriel Orebi-Gann, Marjorie Shapiro, James Siegrist

Plasma and Fusion

Plasma production and heating; magnetic confinement of high-temperature plasma; development and application of plasma diagnostic methods; atomic physics problems related to controlled fusion, accelerator research for heavy-ion driven pellet fusion; single species plasma.
Joel Fajans, Edgar Knobloch, Robert Littlejohn, Jonathan Wurtele