News

In a year of compressed academic calendars and virtual conferences, the Duke Materials Initiative (DMI) pivoted from holding the first Triangle Hard Matter Workshop in person to hosting the event virtually. Over 300 faculty, postdoctoral associates and PhD students from not only Duke, North Carolina State and the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, but also from across the U.S. and overseas, including Germany and China, attended the event. Each of the sessions, focused on one of three tracks: Energy Materials,… read more about 2020 Triangle Hard Matter Workshop Was a Resounding Success »

read more about 37 From Duke Included in Most Cited List »

When you run scientific studies that include infants, something will always go wrong. Families will be late or sick. The babies won’t behave. Or maybe, as happened at the Wilbourn Infant Laboratory at Duke (WILD), you’ll have to make a last-minute run to the store to buy a big pack of toothbrushes. In an interactive study, 20-month-old infants played with a variety of objects—things like a fake cookie and a toy apple, all of which the researchers had ensured were safe for infants. “We had it down,” said Makeba Wilbourn,… read more about Undergraduates Are Doing Real Research in Trinity College, And Everyone Benefits »

In July 2021, Marko Cetina will join Duke University’s Department of Physics as an Assistant Professor. An atomic, molecular and optical physicist, Cetina has used his wide-ranging research in light, lasers and atoms to both explore the basic physics of quantum phenomena and support the development of improved technology necessary for today’s leading quantum machines. Cetina will come to Duke from the University of Maryland, where he worked at the Joint Quantum Institute alongside Chris Monroe, who joined the Duke faculty… read more about Marko Cetina: Building Quantum Machines to Understand Physical Processes »

ACTIVE FACULTY ROBERT J. LEFKOWITZJames B. Duke Distinguished Professor of Medicine  Robert Lefkowitz, M.D., has been a member of the Duke faculty since 1973 as a professor of medicine and a professor of biochemistry and chemistry. He won the 2012 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, sharing the award with Brian Kobilka, who did postdoctoral work with Lefkowitz at Duke. The two were recognized for their work on a class of cell surface receptors that have become the target of prescription drugs,… read more about A Look at Duke's Nobel Laureates »

May 6, 2021 Update: Jonathon Yuly and his co-authors, including Peng Zhang and David Beratan, were awarded Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences's 2020 Cozzarelli Prize for their paper on electron bifurcation. The award is given annually to six research teams whose articles have made "outstanding contributions to their fields." You can hear Yuly describe the paper in the video above or in an episode of PNAS's Science Sessions… read more about PhD Student Solves 40-Year Bioenergetics Mystery »

Duke University researchers Jungsang Kim and Christophe Monroe will join peers from the national labs, universities, federal agencies and industry on a new National Quantum Initiative Advisory Committee (NQIAC) recently announced by the U.S. Department of Energy and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). The NQIAC’s mission is to “counsel the Administration on ways to ensure continued American leadership in quantum information science” and was established by Executive Order as part of the… read more about Duke Joins Peers on New National Quantum Initiative Advisory Committee »

Alfred Goshaw, James B. Duke Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Physics, surveys his career studying elementary particle physics for those "who are curious about how the field has evolved from the dawn of the Standard Model in the 1960s to activities today that require the use of mega particle detectors." Read the article at Innovation News Network. read more about Research in the Field of Elementary Particle Physics »

An international leader in quantum computing, architect of the U.S. National Quantum Initiative, and member of the National Academy of Sciences, Chris Monroe will join longtime long-distance collaborators at Duke to build practical quantum computers for use in fields from finance to pharmaceuticals Chris Monroe, one of the world’s leading experts in trapping atoms and manipulating their quantum state for applications in quantum information science, has joined the faculty at Duke University. With a dual appointment in the… read more about Chris Monroe: Realizing Ion-Trap Quantum Computers to Solve Unsolvable Problems »

ATLAS Postdoctoral Associate Katherine Pachal was excited to get the chance to discuss searches for the LHC Run 3 with Symmetry Magazine. The next five years will be a very interesting time to search for new particles which travel a measurable distance in the detector before decaying. Although well-motivated, these signatures are historically under-explored due to the experimental challenges they pose. The Duke ATLAS group has invested significant effort in developing this research area and… read more about Postdoc Pachal Discusses LHC Experiments with Symmetry Magazine »

read more about Research Offers Visible Proof That Masks Work »

Michael Troxel has always liked puzzles, especially challenging ones. Which is fortunate, since his job is solving some of the most perplexing, fundamental mysteries of the universe. “At some point in middle school I asked myself, What’s the hardest thing that I could try to do?” he said. “And at that point the hardest thing I knew about was astrophysics, so I think that was probably the first motivation for choosing this career, if I’m honest. But that was before I understood what it actually meant.” A cosmologist and… read more about Exploring the Mysteries of the Universe by Seeing the Invisible »

On June 10, 2020, over 70 members of the Duke Physics Department set aside their research, instructional, and administrative activities to participate in a nationwide strike called #ShutDownSTEM, organized by a multi-identity, intersectional coalition of STEM professionals. Participants used the day to reflect on the ways in which American physics communities, from small research groups, to undergraduate classes, university departments, multi-university collaborations, and national… read more about Duke Physics Community Anti-Racism Forum »

While the Duke Community celebrates this unprecedented graduating class of 2020, we would like to highlight two Duke Physics graduate and undergraduate team members for their successful development, coordination and commitment to our faculty, staff and students and first ever virtual graduating class. Katherine Siler and Timothy Fields, Jr. would have been planning their normal annual graduations with their respective graduate and undergraduate students, but instead during… read more about Department of Physics Staff Spotlight – June 2020 »