PHYSICS

The Department of Physics at Colorado School of Mines is dedicated to high-quality physics education for undergraduate and graduate students and advancing the world’s knowledge in the areas of condensed matter physics, nanophotonics, optical physics, quantum physics, renewable energy physics, and subatomic physics.

Education and Research

Our faculty and students at all levels conduct more than $6 million in externally funded research every year, with many projects associated with Mines’ pioneering research centers.

Research centers with strong connections to Physics include the Mines/NREL Nexus, High Performance Computing (HPC), the Microintegrated Optics for Advanced Bioimaging and Control Center (MOABC), and the Nuclear Science and Engineering Center (NuSEC).

Our faculty are consistently recognized for both their research and their teaching, while our graduate and undergraduate students are often the recipients of awards and grants.

Physics is also heavily involved with Mines’ interdisciplinary graduate programs in Materials Science, Nuclear Engineering, and Quantum Engineering.

Watch the video below to learn more about the varied and exciting physics research taking place at Mines.

News

News

Dr. Tim Ohno awarded Jefferson County Educator of the Year.


Dr. Meenakshi Singh, associate professor of physics at Colorado School of Mines, has won a Fulbright-Nehru Professional and Academic Excellence Award to conduct quantum physics research at one of the top research institutes in India. Read more >>


5 Mines professors named University Distinguished Professors, two from Physics

University Distinguished Professor
Dr. Jeff Squier, Professor of Physics
University Distinguished Teaching Professor
Dr. Kristine Callan, Teaching Professor of Physics

Physics associate professor, Dr. Meenakshi Singh, selected as a Fulbright U.S. Scholar for 2023-2024 for India

Upcoming Events

Announcements & Info

Physics Colloquium

October 10 @ 4:00 PM
Hill Hall 202
For more information, please contact
 
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Dylan Yost

 
Colorado State University
Department of Physics
 
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Precision Spectroscopy of Atomic Hydrogen

More Info

Abstract: Because of atomic hydrogen’s simplicity, its energy levels can be precisely described by theory. This has made hydrogen an important atom in the development of quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamics (QED). While one can use hydrogen spectroscopy to determine the Rydberg constant and the proton charge radius, a discrepancy of these constants determined through different transitions, or in different species, can indicate new physics. Such discrepancies currently persist between different measurements in hydrogen and muonic hydrogen. With this motivation in mind, I will discuss several precision spectroscopy measurements of hydrogen as Colorado State University including a relatively recent measurement of the hydrogen 2S-8D two-photon transition, a measurement of the hydrogen 2S hyperfine splitting, and our future plans to measure several relatively narrow 2S-nS transitions in hydrogen. If these latter measurements are successful, they could provide some of the most precise measurements of the Rydberg constant along with insight into the experimental discrepancies.

Moon, Earth, Webb Telescope images, NASA