Past Events

Feb

26

Seminar

Physics Colloquium: "Data-Driven Discovery and Design of Materials’ Surfaces and Interfaces" Presented by Dr. Arunima Singh - Arizona State

Location:

LL 316

February 26, 2026, 4:25 - 5:25pm

Materials, their surfaces, and interfaces are at the heart of modern technology, playing a central role in various fields such as biosensing, energy conversion, quantum computing, and nanoelectronics. Recent advancements in ab initio methods, data science, and artificial intelligence…

Feb

19

Seminar

Physics Colloquium: "Exploring Synthetic Quantum Matter with Superconducting Circuits" Presented by Dr. Alex Ma - Purdue

Location:

LL 316

February 19, 2026, 4:25 - 5:25pm

One of the central challenges in modern physics is to understand how quantum entanglement shapes the behavior of many interacting particles, especially in systems that are open to their surroundings or driven far from equilibrium. We approach this challenge using quantum simulators…

Feb

12

Seminar

Physics Colloquium: "Listening to the Heartbeat of a Weyl Semimetal: Berry Curvature and Anomalous Hall effect in MnBi2Te4" Presented by Dr. Jiun-Haw Chu - Washington University

Location:

LL 316

February 12, 2026, 4:25 - 5:25pm

The concept of Berry curvature - a geometric property of quantum wavefunctions - has revolutionized our understanding of condensed matter physics. In Weyl semimetals, points of singular Berry curvature (Weyl nodes) act as magnetic monopoles in momentum space, leading to exotic…

Feb

5

Seminar

Physics Colloquium: "Angle-resolved transport in rhombohedral multilayer graphene" Presented by Dr. Jia Leo Li - UT Austin

Location:

LL 316

February 5, 2026, 4:25 - 5:25pm

In strongly correlated electron systems, Coulomb interactions often manifest through the spontaneous reduction of rotational symmetry in emergent electronic phases. Understanding how such symmetry breaking intertwines with other collective phenomena—and how it shapes experimental…

Jan

29

Seminar

Physics Colloquium: "Strategy configuration determines interaction patterns in partner-switching evolutionary games" Presented by Dr. Hsuan-Wei Lee - Lehigh

Location:

LL 316

January 29, 2026, 4:25 - 5:25pm

According to prior research on partner-switching games, altering partners could stabilize cooperation. Yet the role of per-edge (interactive diversity, ID) vs. per-node (interactive identity, II) strategies under a single co-evolutionary rule remains deficiently understood. In this…

Jan

22

Seminar

Physics Colloquium: "Decoding Mechanical Signals at the Subcellular Level" Presented by Dr. Zheng Shi - Rutgers

Location:

LL 316

January 22, 2026, 4:25 - 5:25pm

The surface of a cell experiences frequent stretching and compression. The resulting membrane tension is converted to intracellular electrochemical signals via mechanosensitive proteins such as Piezo channels. However, our understanding of the subcellular sorting and activation of…

Dec

4

Event

Physics Colloquium: "DNA-assembled molecular aggregates as materials for quantum information science" Presented by Dr. Ryan Pensack - Boise State University

Location:

Lewis Lab 316

December 4, 2025, 4:25 - 5:25pm

Materials composed of conjugated organic molecules mediate energy conversion essential to life on earth, as in photosynthesis, and have great potential in quantum information science (QIS). For example, Josephson junctions based on superconductors, which are currently the primary…

Nov

20

Event

Physics Colloquium: "Vacuole membranes of hungry yeast are tiny, living, phase-separating thermostats" Presented by Dr. Sarah Keller - University of Washington

Location:

Lewis Lab 316

November 20, 2025, 4:25 - 5:25pm

Liquid-liquid phase separation in living biological membranes is usually described as occurring on sub-micron length scales. A stunning counterexample occurs in S. cerevisiae. When the yeast shift from the log stage of growth to the stationary stage, huge, micron-scale liquid domains…

Nov

13

Event

Physics Colloquium: "High rank multipole order: feeling the strain" Presented by Dr. Ian Fisher - Stanford University

Location:

Lewis Lab 316

November 13, 2025, 4:25 - 5:25pm

Interactions can lead to a wide variety of ordered states in materials. Phase transitions in which local atomic states develop spontaneous high rank multipole order provides a particularly rich arena for new insights. A key element in the study of such systems is the ability to couple…

Nov

6

Event

Physics Colloquium: "Resolving the Proton Spin Puzzle: Insights from RHIC and the Road to the EIC" Presented by Dr. Kenneth Barish- UC Riverside

Location:

LL 316

November 6, 2025, 4:25 - 5:25pm

The proton is a composite object, consisting of quarks and gluons, that possesses an intrinsic angular momentum, or spin. As a fundamental quantum mechanical property, spin profoundly influences the proton’s physical characteristics, including its optical, electrical, and magnetic…

Oct

30

Event

Physics Colloquium: May the Force Be with Her: Nuclear Envelope Dynamics in C. elegans Oocyte Development" Presented by Dr. Chenshu Liu - Lehigh University

Location:

Lewis Lab 316

October 30, 2025, 4:25 - 5:25pm

Sexual reproduction depends on meiosis—the specialized cell division that halves the chromosome number—and the successful maturation of oocytes into viable eggs. In humans, this is an unusually prolonged process that can take up to 50 years to complete. Errors during meiosis or oocyte…

Oct

23

Event

Physics Colloquium: “Phases: Geometric, topological and localized” Presented by Dr. Rahul Roy - UCLA

Location:

Lewis Lab, 316

October 23, 2025, 4:25 - 5:25pm

What makes one phase of matter different from another? For much of physics, the answer has been guided by symmetry and its breaking. Yet we now know that this is only part of the story. Topological phases of matter defy this framework: they can have no local order parameter and yet…