Graduate Program Overview
| Programs of Study | The Department of Physics offers programs leading to a
Ph.D. with an optional M.A. degree in physics. The department offers research
opportunities in experimental high-energy and medium-energy physics, particle
astrophysics, theoretical particle physics and cosmology, molecular biophysics,
experimental biophysics and condensed matter physics, and theoretical
condensed matter, polymer, and statistical physics.
The Master's degree requires the completion of eight semester courses, passed with a grades of B- or better; evidence of having successfully completed undergraduate courses in a modern language or passing the departmental language exam; and achieving a passing grade on the departmental comprehensive exam or the completion of a Master's thesis. The requirements for a Master's degree may be satisfied as part of a Ph.D. degree. Each student must satisfy a residency requirement of a minimum of two consecutive semesters of full-time graduate study at Boston University. The Ph.D requires the completion of eight semester courses beyond the Master's degree, passed with a grade of B- or better; an honors grade on the departmental comprehensive exam; passing of an oral exam; and the completion of a dissertation and a dissertation defense. The dissertation must exhibit an original contribution to the field. Each student must satisfy a residency requirement of a minimum of two consecutive semesters of full-time graduate study at Boston University. The time it takes to obtain a Ph.D. degree is approximately 5 1/2 years, although students have obtained their degree in as short a time as four years and as long as eight. |
| Research Facilities | The Department of Physics is part of Boston University's $250-million Science and Engineering Complex, centrally located on the main Charles River Campus. Condensed-matter physics facilities include electronic and mechanical nanostructure fabrication and measurement, metastable-helium-atom probes of surface spin order and dynamics, photoemission and soft X-ray fluorescence probes of electronic structure of novel materials, X-ray diffractometers, and the optics and transport of electrons at high fields and low temperatures. Biological physics and polymer physics labs include dynamical light scattering, Raman and Brillouin scattering, and infrared and far-infrared absorption spectroscopy as well as modern facilities for genetically manipulating biomolecules. Physicists at the Center for Photonics Research develop and use near-field-scanning optical and infrared microscopy, entangled photons for quantum information processing and entangled photon microscopy, and a full complement of molecular beam epitaxy and device processing facilities, the latter primarily with InGaAl-nitride wide-band-gap semiconductor materials and devices. The high energy physics labs include facilities for the design, production, and testing of key components of various particle detectors. Collaborations include the D0 experiment at Fermilab, the ATLAS and CMS experiments at CERN, the MuLan experiment at PSI, and the Super-Kamiokande experiment in Kamioka, Japan, including the K2K and JHF neutrino accelerator projects. For computation, workstations are networked to two major departmental SGI servers as well as computer clusters provided by the University for general student use. In addition, students have access to the University's high-end computational resources, which include IBM p690 servers with 112 processors (580 Gflops), an IBM p655 system with 48 processors (210 Gflops), an IBM Linux cluster with 52 dual processor compute nodes and 24 display nodes, and advanced visualization facilities. |
| Financial Aid | Through a combination of teaching fellowships, research assistantships, and University fellowships the department provides stipends and full tuition scholarships for essentially all graduate students. The standard stipend for teaching fellows and research assistants is expected to be $24,000 per calendar year plus student medical insurance. |
| Cost of Study | Tuition and fees are provided for as described above. Books and other expenses cost an additional $400 per semester. |
| Living and Housing Costs | There is limited graduate student housing available on the Boston University campus at approximately $9,000 per year for room and board. However, students generally rent apartments in the Boston area. The cost of apartments varies widely, depending on area. |
| Student Group | Currently, the department has approximately 112 graduate students engaged in work toward the Ph.D. and M.A. degrees, and it prides itself on the close contact maintained between students and faculty members. |
| Student Outcomes | Recent Ph.D. recipients from the Department of Physics have been awarded the Wigner Fellowship at Oak Ridge, National Research Council Postdoctoral Fellowships, and the IBM Supercomputer Research Award, among others. Other graduates have gone on to permanent positions at Bell Laboratories, NEC Corporation, NASA, and NIST, and to tenured faculty positions at major universities. |
| Location | Boston University is located in Boston, Massachusetts, which is a major metropolitan center of cultural, scholarly, scientific, and technological activity. Besides Boston University, there are many major academic institutions in the area. Seminars and colloquia are announced in the Boston Area Physics Calendar. |
| The
University and the Department |
Boston University is a private urban university with a faculty of 3,532 members and a student population of 29,988. The university consists of fifteen Schools and Colleges. The Department of Physics is part of the College of Arts and Sciences, and the Graduate School. The department has a young and active faculty of 34 full-time members, and has experienced significant growth in recent years. Among recent additions to the faculty is Nobel laureate Sheldon Glashow. |
| Application
Information |
The application deadlines are January 15 for fall admission and November 1 for spring admission. Application information and forms are available online at http://physics.bu.edu/grad.html. For admission to the graduate programs, a Bachelor's degree in physics or astronomy is required. Exceptional candidates from other fields will be considered. Official test results of the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) (General Test and Advanced Subject in Physics test) are required. The minimum acceptable score for admission is dependent on the applicant's overall record. Official results of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) are required of all applicants whose native language is not English. The minimum score requirement is 250 (computer-based test) or 600 (paper-based test). |
| Correspondence
and Information | Chair, Graduate Admissions Committee Department of Physics Boston University 590 Commonwealth Avenue Boston, Massachusetts 02215 Telephone: 617-353-2623 Email: dept@physics.bu.edu |
THE FACULTY AND THEIR RESEARCH
Professors
· Steven Ahlen, Ph.D., Berkeley, 1976. Experimental particle physics
and astrophysics, Atlas.
· Rama Bansil, Ph.D., Rochester, 1974. Biophysics, polymers.
· Irving Bigio, joint appointment with the College of Engineering; Ph.D.,
University of Michigan, 1974. Biological physics.
· Kenneth Brecher, joint appointment with the Department of Astronomy;
Ph.D., MIT, 1969. Theoretical astrophysics, relativity, cosmology.
· John Butler, Ph.D., Stanford, 1986. Experimental high-energy physics,
D0.
· David Campbell, joint appointment with the College of Engineering;
Ph.D., Cambridge, 1970. Theoretical physics and applied mathematics.
· Robert Carey, Ph.D., Harvard, 1989. Experimental high-energy physics,
muon g-2.
· Antonio H. Castro Neto, Ph.D., Illinois, 1994. Condensed matter theory..
· Bernard Chasan, Emeritus; Ph.D., Cornell, 1961. Biological physics.
· Claudio Chamon, Ph.D., MIT, 1996. Condensed matter theory.
· Andrew G. Cohen, Ph.D., Harvard, 1986. Elementary particle physics.
· Alvaro DeRújula, joint appointment with CERN; Ph.D., Madrid,
1968. Theoretical particle physics, phenomenology.
· Charles Delisi, joint appointment with the College of Engineering;
Ph.D., NYU, 1969. Elementary particle theory.
· Andrew G. Duffy, Ph.D., Queen's at Kingston, 1995. Physics education
research.
· Dean S. Edmonds Jr., Emeritus; Ph.D., MIT, 1958. Electronics and instrumentation.
· Maged El-Batanouny, Ph.D., California, Davis, 1978. Surface physics,
solitons.
· Shyamsunder Erramilli, Ph.D., Illinois, 1986. Biological physics.
· Evan Evans, joint appointment with the College of Engineering; Ph.D.,
U.C.S.D. 1970. Biological physics.
· Roscoe Giles, joint appointment with the College of Engineering; Theoretical
condensed matter.
· Sheldon Glashow, Ph.D., Harvard, 1958. Theoretical particle physics.
· Bennett B. Goldberg, Ph.D., Brown, 1987. Condensed-matter physics.
· Ulrich Heintz, Ph.D., SUNY at Stony Brook, 1991. Experimental high-energy
physics, D0.
· Emanuel Katz, Ph.D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Elementary
particle physics.
· Edward Kearns, Ph.D., Harvard, 1990. Neutrino physics and particle
astrophysics, Super-Kamiokande.
· William Klein, Ph.D., Temple, 1972. Condensed-matter theory.
· Kenneth D. Lane, Ph.D., Johns Hopkins, 1970. Theoretical high-energy
physics.
· Karl Ludwig, Ph.D., Stanford, 1986. Experimental condensed-matter physics.
· Jerome Mertz, joint appointment with the College of Engineering; Ph.D.,
University of Paris VI joint with University of California, Santa Barbara, 1991.
Biological physics.
·James Miller, Ph.D., Carnegie Mellon, 1974. Intermediate- and high-energy
experimental physics, muon g-2.
· Pritriraj Mohanty, Ph.D., University of Maryland College Park, 1998.
Experimental condensed matter physics.
· Theodore Moustakas, joint appointment in the College of Engineering;
Ph.D., Columbia, 1974. Synthetic novel materials.
· Meenakshi Narain, Ph.D., SUNY at Stony Brook, 1991. Experimental
high-energy physics, D0.
· So-Young Pi, Ph.D., SUNY at Stony Brook, 1974. Field theory, theoretical
elementary particle physics.
· Anatoli Polkovnikov, Ph.D., 2003. Yale University. Condensed matter physics.
· Claudio Rebbi, Ph.D., Turin (Italy), 1967. Theoretical physics, lattice
quantum chromodynamics, computational physics.
· Sidney Redner, Ph.D., MIT, 1977. Statistical physics, condensed-matter
theory.
· B. Lee Roberts, Ph.D., William and Mary, 1974. Intermediate- and high-energy
experimental physics, muon g-2, CP violation.
· James Rohlf, Ph.D., Caltech, 1980. Experimental particle physics, hadron
collider physics, CMS.
· Kenneth Rothschild, Ph.D., MIT, 1973. Biophysics, molecular electronics,
physics of vision.
· Anders Sandvik, Ph.D., University of California, Santa Barbara, 1993.
Condensed matter computational physics.
· William J. Skocpol, Ph.D., Harvard, 1974. Experimental condensed-matter
physics.
. Martin Schmaltz, Ph.D., University of California, San Diego, 1995. Theoretical
particle physics.
· Kevin E. Smith, Ph.D., Yale, 1988. Experimental condensed-matter physics.
· John Stachel, Curator of Einstein papers in the United States; Ph.D.,
Stevens, 1952. General relativity, foundations of relativistic space-time theories.
· H. Eugene Stanley, Ph.D., Harvard, 1967. Phase transitions, scaling,
polymer physics, fractals and chaos.
· James L. Stone, Ph.D., Michigan, 1976. Experimental particle physics
and astrophysics, neutrinos, proton decay, Super-Kamiokande.
· Lawrence R. Sulak, Ph.D., Princeton, 1970. Experimental particle physics,
proton decay, monopoles, muon g-2, neutrinos.
· J. Scott Whitaker, Ph.D., Berkeley, 1976. Experimental colliding-beam
physics, supersymmetric particle searches.
· Charles R. Willis, Emeritus, Ph.D., Syracuse, 1957. Biophysics; nonlinear
physics; statistical physics.
· George O. Zimmerman, Emeritus, Ph.D., Yale, 1963. Low-temperature physics,
magnetism.