Research Experience

Research Statement

My research centers on exploring phase competition in correlated and other novel materials, and developing methods to manipulate and control these systems using ultrafast techniques. Light pulses tailored to selectively perturb lattice, electronic, or spin degrees of freedom can tip the balance between competing orders, clarifying the origin of the equilibrium ground state. Targeted excitation can also generate new states that cannot be accessed in equilibrium, offering an avenue of materials control on the femtosecond to picosecond timescale.

Postdoctoral Research
  • University of California, Berkeley, Miller Research Fellow, Fall 2015-present
    Group leader: Alessandra Lanzara
    • Developing mid-infrared and THz pumping capabilities for time- and spin-resolved angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) systems, and utilizing these systems to investigate complex materials.
Graduate Research
  • Max Planck Research Department for Structural Dynamics (MPSD), Center for Free Electron Science (CFEL), Fall 2010-Spring 2015
    Advisor: Andrea Cavalleri
    • Understanding and manipulating phase competition in cuprate superconductors via selective, ultrafast excitation of phonon modes using mid-infrared light.
    • Thesis title: Manipulating superconductivity in cuprates by selective ultrafast excitation
    • Techniques: THz spectroscopy, optical parametric amplification and difference frequency generation, optical stage design, vacuum systems, low temperature optical cryostats, Matlab, Labview, python, OriginPro
  • University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Fall 2009-Spring 2015
    Advisor: Laura Greene
    • Measuring order parameter symmetry and electron-boson coupling in pnictide superconductors using point contact spectroscopy.
    • Techniques: thermal evaporation, sputtering of thin films, dc characterization, AFM, XRD, point contact spectroscopy (PCS), planar tunneling spectroscopy, He-exchange cryostats, superconducting magnets (for characterization), electro-chemical etching in HCl and HF (for developing PCS tips), Matlab
Undergraduate Research
  • Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Gravitation and Cosmology Research Group, MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, Bachelor's thesis, Summer 2007-Spring 2008
    Advisor: Mike Zucker
    • Thesis title: "Baffle material characterization for Advanced LIGO"
    • Techniques: optical stage design, I-DEAS, Excel, Matlab, Solidworks
curriculum vitae