News

Penn Researchers Give the ‘Rap’ on Liquid Science

video series  (6:30 mark) in partnership with Red Bull follows American rapper, GZA on his visit to Penn’s Center for Nanotechnology.  Teaming up with Professor A.T. Charlie Johnson and his lab group, they journey on a quest for knowledge hoping to discover new materials that will take us into the modern world. 

 

Penn Researchers Establish Universal Signature Fundamental to How Glassy Materials Fail

Penn Physicists Douglas Durian, Andrea Liu and Arjun Yodh were part of an LRSM-MRSEC team that published a recent Science paper exploring connections between particle rearrangements and microscopic structure in glasses.

Physics and Astronomy Professor Featured in Forbes

Professor Liang Wu of Physics and Astronomy has been selected in the annual Forbes ‘30 under 30’ in Science list in recognition of his influential work on electrodynamics of topological insulators. This new class of materials, which was theoretically proposed by Prof. Kane and Prof.

Principal of Condensed Matter: A Symposium in Honor of Tom Lubensky

A special symposium to honor of Professor Tom Lubensky was held at the Laboratory for Research on the Structure of Matter, November 3/4, 2017. The symposium, which boasted well over 100 attendees comprised of researchers, former students, colleagues, and friends, celebrated Lubensky’s many contributions to Soft Matter Physics and recognized over 45 years of dedicated service to the Department of Physics and Astronomy. Congratulations, Tom!

 

Penn Researchers Demonstrate How to Control Liquid Crystal Patterns

Graduate Student Lisa Tran leads a study demonstrating new ways to control and organize patterns on the micron scale.  Not only does this demonstrate the complexity of ordered liquid crystal phases on curved surfaces, but it also paves the way for new optical and mechanical materials.

https://news.upenn.edu/news/penn-researchers-demonstrate-how-control-liquid-crystal-patterns

Physics and Astronomy Professor Awarded $450K from Air Force Research Program

Physics and Astronomy Professor Bo Zhen is honored as a recipient of the Air Force Young Investigator Research Program award for his anticipated research in Non-Hermitian Topological Photonics.Image and video hosting by TinyPic The winners of this award will receive a grant tot

Third Annual Women in Physics Public Lecture

On Friday, October 27, the Physics and Astronomy Department will host the Third Annual Women in Physics Public Lecture, to be delivered by Dr. Jill Tarter, Bernard Oliver Chair at the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Institute. The event is made possible by a Fund to Encourage Women grant.

Women in Physics Public Lecture
Co-hosted by the Department of Physics & Astronomy

Laboratory for Research on the Structure of Matter Awarded $22.6M NSF Center Grant

The Laboratory for Research on the Structure of Matter (LRSM) was awarded a new NSF Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (MRSEC), one of eight selected nationwide, for cutting-edge interdisciplinary materials research.

Physics and Astronomy Grad Student Wins Award in Nikon Competition

PhD candidate, Lisa Tran is awarded 5th place in the 2017 Small World in Motion competition. Tran’s entry on cholesteric liquid crystal shells, encapsulating water droplets at a 10X magnification, gave off psychedelic colors under polarized light.  The competition which is hosted annually by Nikon features digital photomicrographs of life as seen through a light microscope.

To read more about the competition, visit Nikon Small World

Penn Physicists Help Garner NSF-MRI grant for X-Ray Facility

Professor Paul Heiney and collaborators, Karen Winey, Arjun Yodh, Eric Detsi, and Zahra Fakhraai, were awarded a Major Research Instrumentation grant from the NSF for the LRSM's X-Ray Scattering Shared Experimental Facility. Briefly, the new instrument will offer structural information at both high and low spatial resolution across a wide range of length scales (0.09 to 600 nm) and thereby facilitate the study of hierarchical structures in a wide range of hard and soft materials. The MRI award also received matching funds from the LRSM and SEAS.