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Physics

Physics Illinois alum Awschalom, world expert in spintronics, delivers colloquium

4/16/2013 Siv Schwink

Wednesday, April 17, the Seventh Annual Charles P. Slichter Colloquium will feature world-renowned research scientist in spintronics and quantum information engineering, David Awschalom. His research holds great promise for the advancement of quantum computing, medical imaging, encryption, and other technologies. The talk starts at 4 p.m. in 141 Loomis Laboratory; for an abstract, please follow this link. 

Awschalom, who was recently elected to the European Academy of Sciences—a rare honor for a U.S. scientist—received his bachelor's degree from Physics Illinois in 1978 before going on to earn his master's and doctoral degrees at Cornell University. He is a faculty member at UCSB's Institute for Molecular Engineering, but will soon move to the University of Chicago, where he has accepted a position. He holds several patents, including one in quantum computing,

 

Written by Siv Schwink

Wednesday, April 17, the Seventh Annual Charles P. Slichter Colloquium will feature world-renowned research scientist in spintronics and quantum information engineering, David Awschalom. His research holds great promise for the advancement of quantum computing, medical imaging, encryption, and other technologies. The talk starts at 4 p.m. in 141 Loomis Laboratory; for an abstract, please follow this link. 

Awschalom, who was recently elected to the European Academy of Sciences—a rare honor for a U.S. scientist—received his bachelor's degree from Physics Illinois in 1978 before going on to earn his master's and doctoral degrees at Cornell University. He is a faculty member at UCSB's Institute for Molecular Engineering, but will soon move to the University of Chicago, where he has accepted a position. He holds several patents, including one in quantum computing,

Awschalom is also a member of the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Sciences, and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the American Physical Society. His other honors include the American Physical Society’s Oliver Buckley Prize, the European Physical Society’s Europhysics Prize, the AAAS Newcomb Cleveland Prize, the Materials Research Society’s Turnbull Award, and, from the International Union of Pure and Applied Research, the International Magnetism Prize and the Néel Medal.

Madeline Stover is a physics doctoral student at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign studying atmospheric dynamics applied to forest conservation. She interns as a science writer for Illinois Physics, where she also co-hosts the podcast Emergence along with fellow physics graduate student Mari Cieszynski. When Stover is not doing research or communications, she enjoys hosting her local radio show, singing with her band, and cooking with friends.

Daniel Inafuku graduated from Illinois Physics with a PhD and now works as a science writer. At Illinois, he conducted scientific research in mathematical biology and mathematical physics. In addition to his research interests, Daniel is a science video media creator.

Karmela Padavic-Callaghan, Ph. D. is a science writer and an educator. She teaches college and high school physics and mathematics courses, and her writing has been published in popular science outlets such as WIRED, Scientific American, Physics World, and New Scientist. She earned a Ph. D. in Physics from UIUC in 2019 and currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.

Jamie Hendrickson is a writer and content creator in higher education communications. They earned their M.A. in Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 2021. In addition to their communications work, they are a published area studies scholar and Russian-to-English translator.

Garrett R. Williams is an Illinois Physics Ph.D. Candidate and science writer. He has been recognized as the winner of the 2020 APS History of Physics Essay Competition and as a finalist in the 2021 AAAS Science and Human Rights Essay Competition. He was also an invited author in the 2021 #BlackinPhysics Week series published by Physics Today and Physics World. 

 

Karmela Padavic-Callaghan, Ph. D. is a science writer and an educator. She teaches college and high school physics and mathematics courses, and her writing has been published in popular science outlets such as WIRED, Scientific American, Physics World, and New Scientist. She earned a Ph. D. in Physics from UIUC in 2019 and currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.

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This story was published April 16, 2013.