Information Technologies

Innovations at the nanoscale can create enormous opportunities for the improved storage and transmission of information. Traditionally, we have used photons to transmit information at varying wavelengths, and electrons to transmit information through the transport of their electronic charge. As an alternative to electronic charge, the storage and transport of electronic spin in semiconductor devices - "spintronics", may revolutionize the electronic device industry, with spin based transistors , opto-electronic devices, and memory. Nanophotonic and Nanoelectronic technologies promise not only more compact and rapid information processing, but also dramatically new means of accessing and controlling photons and charge. Accessing the nanoscale makes possible new paradigms of computation such as quantum information processing.

Faculty Research

Divykant Agrawal

Computer Science
Distributed systems, databases, digital libraries, scalable and fault-tolerant access to multimedia data and digital libraries.

S. James Allen

Physics
Terahertz dynamics in semiconductor quantum structures far from equilibrium, Bloch oscillators, novel terahertz detectors and terahertz circular dichroism and dynamics of bio-polymers.

Kevin Almeroth

Computer Science, Media Arts and Technology
Computer networks and protocols, large-scale multimedia systems, performance evaluation, and distributed systems.

David Awschalom

Physics
Optical and magnetic interactions in semiconductor quantum structures, spin dynamics and coherence in condensed matter, nanometer-scale magnetism, and quantum information processing in the solid state.

Leon Balents

Physics
"Exotic" Order and Criticality, Quasi-One-Dimensional Frustrated Quantum Magnets, Nanowires, Spintronics and Magnetic Semiconductors, Statics and Dynamics of Glasses, Mott Transitions and Competing Orders.

Kaustav Banerjee

Electrical & Computer Engineering
Device-circuit-architecture-process co-design and optimization for overcoming end-of-roadmap CMOS limitations; multi-core designs; variation-tolerant design; ultra high-frequency interconnect modeling and extraction techniques, chip-packaging interconnects; 3-D integrated circuits for high-density information storage and heterogeneous integration; novel circuit and system applications (including fast switch and memory) of beyond-CMOS nanotechnologies.

Guillermo Bazan

Chemistry & Biochemistry
Design of well-defined initiators for polymerization reactions, the study of photophysical processes in advanced organic photonic materials and the design of interconnects for bringing together molecular wires.

Daniel Blumenthal

Electrical & Computer Engineering
Electronics and Photonics: fiber-optic networks, wavelength and subcarrier division multiplexing, photonic packet switching, signal processing in semiconductor optical devices, wavelength conversion, microwave photonics.

Dirk Bouwmeester

Physics
Quantum information processing with entangled photon states. Quantum Dots on Microtubules and DNA. Quantum Dots and Microcavities. Macrosepic Quantum Super Position.

Andrew Cleland

Physics
Nanoscale electronic and mechanical devices, exploring their uses as novel and ultrasensitive sensors and imaging devices.

Glenn Fredrickson

Chemical Engineering
Polymers and Complex Fluids, Fluids and Transport Phenomena.

Michael Gordon

Chemical Engineering
Development and application of hybrid scanning probe microscopes for chemical, electrical, and optical interrogation of surfaces. Focus areas include nanomaterial synthesis, optical spectroscopies, plasmonics, and probing structure-function relationships in a variety of material venues (microelectronics, catalysis, organic PV, and bio).

Arthur Gossard

Materials
Quantum Structure Growth, Science and Technology; High Performance Graded Quantum Structures; Quantum Wire and Quantum Dot Growth and Devices; MBE Technology for Ultrafast, Ultra-high-density Optoelectronic Devices; Smart Optoelectronic Pixel Technology; Cryogenic Lasers for Low-Temperature Electronics; Advanced Infrared Detectors Based on Strained Layer Superlattices.

Craig Hawker

Materials Department and Materials Research Lab
Current interests include design, synthesis and exploitation of nanoscopically defined materials in applications ranging from next-generation microelectronic devices to diagnostic agents for detection and treatment of cardiovascular disease.

Alan Heeger

Physics
Physics of conductive and light-emitting polymers, biosensors.

JoAnn Kuchera-Morin

Music, Media Arts and Technology
Multimedia Composition, 3D Immersive Physical Sound Environments, 3D Immersive Virtual Sound Environments, Auralization, Distributed Multimedia Computing Environments.

John Martinis

Physics
Superconductivity, ultra low-temperature electronic devices, and quantum computation.

Christopher Palmstrom

Electrical & Computer Engineering and Materials
Heteroepitaxial growth of novel materials and structures to form the basis for making new electronic, optoelectronic, magnetic and micromechanical devices.

Pierre Petroff

Materials
Crystal growth of self-assembling nanostructures (quantum dots and quantum rods) and studies of quantum emitters properties coupled to a microcavity field. Novel quantum dot and quantum rod devices for ultra fast single photon emitters and lasers.

Linda Petzold

Mechanical Engineering
Numerical ordinary differential equations, differential-algebraic equations, and partial differential equations, dynamic optimization, nonlinear model reduction, mathematical software and scientific computing.

Nicola Spaldin

Materials Department and Materials Research Lab
The Spaldin group develops and applies state-of-the-art electronic structure methods to design and understand the fundamental physics behind novel multifunctional materials. Current focus areas include optimizing multiferroics (with simultaneous dielectric and magnetic ordering), and engineering new behaviors into complex oxides via interfacial effects.