News

PSD’s September spotlight is Dave Schmitz, Associate Professor in the Department of Physics and the Enrico Fermi Institute and newly appointed Deputy Dean of Diversity and Inclusion for the PSD. Dave has been with the University of Chicago since September 2012.

An interview with Prof. David DeMille, Department of Physics and JFI, recent winner of the Cottrell Plus SEED (Singular Exceptional Endeavors of Discovery) Award for 2021. DeMille discusses the broader questions he is trying to answer with his SEED project, "Developing a New Tabletop-scale Approach to Detect Particles One Million Times More Massive than the Higgs Boson.”

Professor Benoît Roux of the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and Department of Chemistry, has been elected a Fellow in the Royal Society of Canada. Benoît, who has been at UChicago since 2006 and is Canadian, uses theoretical and computational methods to advance our understanding of the structure, dynamics, and function of biological macromolecular systems at the atomic level.  

Two University of Chicago faculty in the Department of the Geophysical Sciences were among 28 honorees selected for 2021 early career awards by the American Geophysical Union. Associate Professor Malte Jansen, a physical oceanographer, was selected for the 2021 Ocean Sciences Early Career Award for “significant contributions to oceanography.” Assistant Professor Clara Blättler, an isotope geochemist, was selected for the Nanne Weber Early Career Award recognizing “significant contributions to paleoceanography and paleoclimatology.”

Mathematicians have expanded category theory into infinite dimensions, revealing new connections among mathematical concepts. Among them is Prof. Amie Wilkinson, whose commentary on symmetry and "moves" in category theory is helping to shape modern mathematics.

Prof. Young-Kee Kim, an eminent experimental physicist at the University of Chicago, has been elected future president of the American Physical Society. She will assume the position in 2024, when she will become the ninth UChicago scientist to do so.

Prof. William Irvine, of the Department of Physics, James Franke Institute, and Enrico Fermi Institute, and collaborators at New York University have created a way to make tiny mechanical capsules that can pick up, carry, and release cargo on cue. The results, published Sept. 8 in Nature, could potentially have applications in medicine, pollution cleanup, or robotics.

Dam Thanh Son, the University Professor of Physics at the University of Chicago, laid out the argument that aloof neutrons may actually ‘talk’ to one another briefly in new kind of symmetry in a study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, which he co-authored with Hans-Werner Hammer of the Technical University of Darmstadt in Germany. Their findings propose a new realm of ‘unnuclear physics.'

Aaron Elmore, assistant professor at UChicago Computer Science, develops database models that use intermittent query processing (IQP). The approach grafts machine learning prediction to database processing, providing more efficient computation to systems working with bursty data or intermittent monitoring. As a new recipient of the CAREER award, the National Science Foundation's most prestigious award in support of early-career faculty, Elmore will continue designing these innovative systems for data-driven applications.

This month PSD researchers have been featured for their efforts to bring software that makes quantum computing faster to the market, to speed up development of materials that can harness energy from sunlight, and to pioneer US quantum research and design a new internet protocol that manages different types of quantum information encoding.

Prof. Bozhi Tian’s group has a newly patented method for fabrication of carbon-based bioelectronic devices and interfaces that could shape therapeutics of the future. The discovery demonstrates electrical biosensing that is more flexible, efficient, and stable.

As part of a nationwide initiative to boost research in quantum science, the National Science Foundation will establish a $25 million institute in Chicago to investigate quantum sensing for biology and train the quantum workforce. Headquartered at the University of Chicago and in partnership with Chicago State University, the University of Illinois at Chicago and Harvard University, the institute will be funded for five years.

The University of Chicago will award two PSD alumnae for their professional achievements in a Nov. 5 ceremony. Katherine Freese, PhD’84, is a professor of physics at the University of Texas at Austin—where she holds the Jeff and Gail Kodosky Endowed Chair in Physics—and professor of physics at Stockholm University in Sweden. Zhenan Bao, SM’93, PhD’95, is department chair and K.K. Lee Professor of Chemical Engineering, and by courtesy, a professor of chemistry and a professor of material science and engineering at Stanford University.

UChicago chemists specializing in mathematical physics, materials chemistry, and physical chemistry are part of a team of scientists who have received $3 million in funding to support three years of quantum information science research. Working with Harvard University and Purdue University, the collaboration will try to build the foundations for using quantum computers to model molecules at the atomic level—yielding not only insights that could lead the way to new chemical discoveries, but potentially laying the groundwork for quantum computing as a whole.

A new data science major will help UChicago undergraduates learn how to analyze data and apply it to critical real-world problems in various disciplines. Students also have the option to combine data science with a second major.