Welcome to Hu's group!
To new students:
welcome to join us !!!
Research Interests:
Our research covers a large area of
condensed matter physics from active application like spintronics and nano-physics
to experimental phenomenology of materials such as high-Tc superconductivity to
more abstract topics like application of ideas borne in condensed matter theory
to other fields of research in physics.
- Spintronics and Nano Science: Spin
and charge are the two fundamental quantum numbers of an electron.
Electronics is mainly based on the charge aspect of the electron. In 1988,
a new spin-based electronics, spintronics, emerged from the discovery of
the giant magnetoresistance effect (GMR). This effect has revolutionized
the hard-drive industry in the past several years. Today, spintronics is a
new field of science and technology whereby one manipulates the spin of
the electron to build functional logical and storage devices. It holds the
promise of new technology in the near future. It is envisioned that the
merging of electronics, photonics, magnetics and nanotechnology will
ultimately lead to the new spin-based multifunctional devices which have
great advantages over conventional semiconductor devices.
The importance of Nano-Science does not need to be emphasized further. Currently, we are interesed in the transport properties in Nano structure and devices, in particular, non-equalibrium and spin transport properties.
-
Strongly Correlated Electron
Systems: A condensed matter system
includes billions, billions... and billions of particles. Interactions and
correlations between particles often play such a dominating role that the
systems can manifest themselves in novel states of matter. Our major
mission is to understand the microscopic origins of these novel states, together
with developing theoretical tools and establishing general principles to deepen
our understanding. The interesting systems in this class include
High temperature superconductors (Cuprates), Two dimensional electron gas
at low density, Quantum magnets, Heavy fermions, Organic superconductors,
... .
- Many Body Physics
in Nano Structure and Ultra-cold Atomic systems:
New technological advancements
have allowed us to design and manufacture new
systems in laboratories. In this case, the interaction strength can be
controlled. Different many-body Hamiltonians can be engineered. For
instance, the Kondo effect, a classic many-body physics effect, can be
designed in a single electron transistor. Another example is ultra cold
atoms in optical lattices. Laser and evaporative cooling techniques provide
ultracold temperature. The atoms trapped in this system can not only reach
Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC), but also be designed to exhibit strong
correlation effects. A quantum phase transition between insulator and
superfluid has been reported experimentally . We are witnessing
an exciting time that technologies have provided us to study
fundamental condensed matter physics in a controllable manner.
- High Dimensional
Quantum Hall Effect and Physics in Non-commutative Geometry:
Condensed matter physics has been a major fundamental and original
source for statistical, mathematical and computational physics.
Many models studied in condensed matter physics have their
counterparts in other fields. Two dimensional quantum Hall effect can be
interpreted as a Chern-Simons theory in Non-commutative Space which
is a simple string theory . Recently, a generalization of quantum Hall
effect in high dimensional space has been achieved. It has been
demonstrated that there are many interesting physics in this model
which can be connected to High energy physics and String theory.
However, there are still many open questions. We believe that this field
can be a new frontier of interdisciplinary physics.
Take a look at our current research projects
and
publications
People:
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More information about our group: |
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* Pictures of our group
Last Modified July 16, 2004
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