Lu Chen

Education

• Ph.D., Physics, University of Michigan Ann Arbor, 2020
• Bachelor of Science, Physics, Peking University, 2014

Biography

Lu Chen was born and raised in Lanzhou, China. She received her bachelor’s degree from the School of Physics at Peking University in 2014. Then she moved to the United States to pursue her graduate study at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and got her PhD in 2020. During her PhD, she worked in the lab of Professor Lu Li where she studied the electrical, thermal, and magnetic properties of various quantum materials. Subsequently, she moved to the Institut Quantique at Université de Sherbrooke in Québec, Canada, and worked there as a Prize Postdoctoral Fellow in the lab of Professor Louis Taillefer. During her postdoc, she obtained expertise in conducting thermal Hall effect measurements in novel quantum materials. She is now a postdoc in Professor James Analytis’s group at the University of California Berkeley and is expected to start her new position as an assistant professor at the Department of Physics at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in Jan 2026.

Academic Positions

• Assistant Professor, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Physics, from 2026
• Postdoctoral Fellow, University of California Berkeley, Physics, 2024 to 2025
• Prize Postdoctoral Fellow, Université de Sherbrooke, Physics, 2020 to 2024

Research Statement

My research interests lie in the field of experimental condensed matter physics, more specifically, quantum materials. The development of modern technologies in all fields highly relies on the properties of materials. The vast majority of materials’s properties can not be fully understood with only classical physics or a single atom’s behavior. Instead, it involves the understanding of collective motions of excitations with strong correlations using quantum physics, which redefines these materials as “quantum materials”. I investigate the thermal, electrical, magnetic, and thermoelectric properties of various novel quantum materials, such as unconventional superconductors, quantum spin liquids, and topological materials at extremely low temperatures down to millikelvin and strong magnetic fields up to 100 Tesla. The experimental approaches that I employ are electrical transport, thermal transport, thermoelectric, and torque magnetometry measurements. I am interested in not only understanding fundamental physics phenomena in quantum materials but also designing new experimental techniques to further advance my research. 

Post-Doctoral Research Opportunities

Now, we are actively recruiting highly motivated postdocs to join our research group. Postdocs who are interested in our research are encouraged to get in touch via email.

Graduate Research Opportunities

Now, we are actively recruiting highly motivated graduate students to join our research group. Students who are interested can apply to the PhD program in the Department of Physics and are encouraged to get in touch via email.

Undergraduate Research Opportunities

We are actively recruiting highly motivated undergraduate students to join our research group. Undergraduates who are interested in our research are encouraged to get in touch via email.

Research Interests

• Strongly correlated materials
• Frustrated magnets
• Unconventional superconductors
• Topological materials
• Electrical transport
• Thermal transport
• Torque magnetometry
• Thermoelectric

Selected Articles in Journals

• Lu Chen, Léna Le Roux, Gaël Grissonannche, Marie-Eve Boulanger, Steven Thériault, Ruixing Liang, D. A. Bonn, W. N. Hardy, S. Pyon, T. Takayama, H. Takagi, Kejun Xu, Zhi-Xun Shen, and Louis Taillefer, Planar thermal Hall effect from phonons in cuprates, Physical Review X 14, 041011 (2024)   
• Lu Chen^*, Étienne Lefrançois^*, Ashvini Vallipuram, Quentin Barthélemy, Amirreza Ataei, Weiliang Yao, Yuan Li, and Louis Taillefer, Planar thermal Hall effect from phonons in a Kitaev candidate material, Nature Communications 15, 3513 (2024)
• Ashvini Vallipuram^*, Lu Chen^*, Emma Campillo, Manel Mezidi, Gaël Grissonnanche, Mark P. Zic, Yuntian Li, Ian R. Fisher, Jordan Baglo, and Louis Taillefer, Role of magnetic ions in the thermal Hall effect of the paramagnetic insulator TmVO₄, Physical Review B 110, 045144 (2024) 
• Lu Chen, Marie-Eve Boulanger, Zhi-Cheng Wang, Fazel Tafti, and Louis Taillefer, Large phonon thermal Hall conductivity in the antiferromagnetic insulator Cu₃TeO₆, Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 119, e2208016119 (2022)
• Ziji Xiang, Lu Chen, Kuan-Wen Chen, Colin Tinsman, Yuki Sato, Tomoya Asaba, Helen Lu, Yuichi Kasahara, Marcelo Jaime, Fedor Balakirev, Fumitoshi Iga, Yuji Matsuda, John Singleton, and Lu Li, Unusual high-field metal in a Kondo Insulator, Nature Physics 17, 788 (2021)
• Lu Chen, Ziji Xiang, Colin Tinsman, Bin Lei, Xianhui Chen, G. D. Gu, and Lu Li, Spontaneous Nernst effect in an iron-based superconductor Fe_1+yTe_1-xSe_x, Physical Review B 102, 054503 (2020) 
• Lu Chen, Fan Yu, Ziji Xiang, Tomoya Asaba, Colin Tinsman, Benjamin Lawson, Paul M. Sass, Weida Wu, B. L. Kang, Xianhui Chen, and Lu Li, Torque differential magnetometry using the qPlus-mode of a quartz tuning fork, Physical Review Applied 9, 024005 (2018)

Invited Lectures

• Planar thermal Hall effect from phonons in Kitaev candidate materials and cuprates
• Planar thermal Hall effect from phonons in cuprates and other quantum materials
• Thermal Hall effect in quantum materials
• Planar thermal Hall effect from phonons in quantum materials
• Phonon thermal Hall effect in Cu₃TeO₆ and doped Sr₂IrO₄
• Planar thermal Hall effect from phonons in Kitaev materials and cuprates

Conferences Organized or Chaired

• 2023 Summer School for CIFAR Quantum Materials Program, Toronto, Canada
• 2023 Summer School for CIFAR Quantum Materials Program, Montreal, Canada