Zoe Bellis

Before coming to the University of Iowa, Zoe received her BS in Physics at the University of Wisconsin - Eau Claire.  She is interested in stellar evolution and cosmology.

Dylan Blend

Dylan is a recent BS Physics graduate from Texas A&M University. Dylan is from Houston, TX and his current research advisors are Professors Jane Nachtman and Yasar Onel. He will be an experimental particle physicist and I am currently involved in the CMS Outer Tracker Phase II Upgrade and DUNE experiment, Liquid Argon TPC. 

Jesse Bluem

Jesse Bluem's research interests have been focused on X-ray astronomy and feedback processes in the Galaxy, as well as working with HaloSat, a CubeSat built at and operated by the university. He is currently working on an X-ray study of the spectra and distribution of material in the Galactic halo using data from HaloSat.

Robert Broadfoot

Robert Broadfoot took a non-traditional path to the doctoral program in physics by first obtaining a master’s degree in music performance. He is now performing research in experimental space physics under the mentorship of Dr. David Miles. His research interests include space weather and auroral dynamics.

Collin Brown

Collin Brown’s research interests involve using high-performance computation and kinetic plasma theory to study the solar wind. He is working with Dr. Greg Howes, Dr. Jimmy Juno, and Dr. Steve Baek to develop a machine learning algorithm that detects key properties of shocks in simulated astrophysical plasmas.

Sanjay Chepuri

Sanjay Chepuri is interested in studying space physics. He is currently working with Dr. Allison Jaynes examining the Earth's magnetosphere using data from MMS and other spacecraft.

Michael Connolly

Michael Connelly is interested in the development of a harmonious understanding of nature between the very large and very small scale systems and the potential applications between. Currently, he does not have any official position in a research group.

James Corona

James Corona is interested in conducting research in the areas of quantum computation and quantum information theory. He is currently working with Dr. Yannick Meurice to simulate quantum systems in various models such as the Abelian Higgs model. He plans to develop new methods for using quantum computers to study systems which are unfeasible for simulation on classical computers.

Andrew Dewald

Andrew Dewald is interested in mathematical physics, gravitation, and quantum field theory.  He is currently working with Prof. Vincent Rodgers to examine the properties of Thomas–Whitehead projective gauge gravity.

Cecilia Fasano

Cecilia Fasano’s research interests lie at the intersection of nanofabrication, technology development, and astrophysics. She is currently working with Prof. Casey DeRoo and Prof. Keri Hoadley on a project designing and fabricating the next generation of x-ray and UV gratings for use in astronomical instrumentation.

David Fehr

David Fehr is interested in condensed matter theory research and currently works with Dr. Flatté, studying the theory of spin coherence of molecules with nanoscale confinement . Before coming to the University of Iowa, David double majored in music and physics as an undergraduate and earned a master's degree in physics at the University of North Dakota.

Connor Feltman

Connor Feltman works with Dr. Craig Kletzing and Dr. Scott Bounds researching Space Plasma as pertaining to auroral phenomena. He engages in testing hardware and processing data for rocket missions launched into the northern hemisphere to observe the connection between auroral events, their composite particles and Earth's magnetic field.

Jacob Fruchtman

Jacob Fruchtman is interested in studying the Martian Magentosphere. He is currently working with Professor Jasper Halekas on a project analyzing the MAVEN spacecraft's data to characterize the Martian Bow Shock to find how it varies by season.

Chase Fuller

Chase Fuller has research interests in high energy astrophysics and galactic structure, with current activities focused on X-ray emitting astrophysical plasmas. He is also interested in making science accessible to general audiences, using it to inform public policy, and its role as a mediator for discussions of national importance.

Diksha Garg

Diksha Garg is interested in the field of particle physics. She is currently working with Dr. Mary Hall Reno on a project to determine tau particle's polarization which are produced from the high energy cosmic neutrinos skimming through the earth. She has also worked with Dr. Usha Mallik in hardware and software development for the upcoming high-luminosity upgrade of the inner tracker of the ATLAS experiment at CERN.

Kenton Greene

Kenton Greene is involved in space physics experimentation and instrumentation research. His current work focuses on the optimization and characterization of a new high-stability fluxgate magnetometer design called the Tesseract Sensor which will fly on the upcoming ACES-II sounding rockets and TRACERS satellite missions to measure the field aligned currents in the magnetosphere.

Tyler Grover

Tyler Grover has research interests in mathematical physics: string theory, gravitation, and quantum field theories. He currently works with Dr. Vincent G. J. Rodgers exploring features of Thomas-Whitehead Projective Gravity. Current projects include search for space-time solutions and predicted corrections for particle physics.

Sean Gunderson

Sean Gunderson’s interest is in the properties and evolution of hot stars. His research is primarily focused on the hypersonic stellar winds of these stars using theoretical models and high energy light spectra. The research is an intersection between high energy astrophysics and plasma physics; particularly the physics of plasma shocks that generate X-rays within the stellar winds.

Kevin Hall

Kevin has interests in simulating how exoplanets would look within simulated data from future Direct Imaging missions and determine what characteristics can be extracted from the system.

Zheyue Hang

Zheyue Hang is currently working with Professor Yannick Meurice on the field of quantum computing. She is also interested in mathematical physics and condensed matter.

Sarah Henderson

Sarah Henderson is interested in studying space plasma physics. She is working under the advisory of Professor Jasper Halekas analyzing various sets of MAVEN data to better understand the many ways in which the solar wind interacts with the Martian atmosphere.

Michael Hite

Michael Hite has been at the University of Iowa since Fall 2019. He is working with Yannick Meurice modeling lattice gauge theories on both classical and quantum computers.

Sarah Horvath

Sarah Horvath does research in computational space plasma physics. This includes running high-resolution simulations of turbulent solar wind plasma in order to better understand the process of Landau damping by electrons: a mechanism that contributes to the heating of the solar wind as it expands outward from the Sun. Characterizing this mechanism within simulations can provide theoretical framework for interpreting data from current and future spacecraft missions.

Rui Huang

Rui Huang is interested in theoretical and computational astrophysics. They are currently working with Professor Greg Howes on a project studying the plasma turbulence theory.

Jayasri Joseph

Before returning to school to conduct research in Space physics, Jaya Joseph worked as a research engineer designing various wireless communication systems and receivers for use in radio astronomy at Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, Australia. She is currently working to better understand some of the anomalous behaviours of Van Allen belts with Prof. Allison Jaynes.

Gürkan Karaman

Gurkan is originally from Turkey and has a BSc degree in Physics from Bogazici University. He is currently doing his research in Electron Irradiation on Particle Accelerator Components. He is also interested in history, anthropology, psychology, philosophy, and medicine. He enjoys outdoors and is actively involved in tennis, volleyball, basketball, soccer, swimming, and billiard.

Ohannes Kamer Koseyan

Ohannes Kamer Koseyan's research interests include experimental data analysis for the decay modes of the Higgs Boson and testing and development of hardware for high energy particle detectors. Before starting his Ph.D. program in the University of Iowa, he worked at the phase 1 upgrade of the CMS experiment at CERN during his MS studies.

Patrick Langer

Patrick majored in Physics with a minor in Math during his undergraduate career. He currently is working with Dr. Skiff, researching kinetic wave scattering in plasmas. His aspirations are to contribute substantial research to the field of plasma physics, and to potentially consider teaching as well.

Mehdi (Kian) Maleki Sanukesh

Kian Maleki is interested in theoretical condensed matter physics. He is working as a research assistant with Prof. Flatté. His current project is about defect-phonon interaction in hBN.

Brady Martin

Brady Martin is currently conducting research for Dr. Wayne Polyzou in the field of theoretical nuclear physics. His research focuses on the study of many-body nuclear scattering events dominated by cluster reactions with particular interest in the effective interactions between clusters. Careful attention is given to the use of partition combinatorics in multi-channel scattering theory.

Ian Masson

Robert Maxton

Robert Maxton is currently working with Prof. Yannick Meurice on efficient simulations of higher-dimensional Ising models, especially through tensor networks and including investigating the boundaries of near-term quantum supremacy. His interests for future work include (but are not limited to) quantum field theory, the mathematical foundation of the same, and quantum gravity.

Jacob McLaughlin

Jacob McLaughlin performs research in experimental plasma sciences, specializing in nonperturbative, laser-based diagnostic techniques.  Working with Dr. Skiff, his current focus is wave-particle interactions and kinetic instabilities.

David Montealegre

David Montealegre works in the field of solid-state physics. David's main research focus is in superlattice structures used in LEDs, lasers, and detectors. The goal for emitters in the mid-IR is to outcompete their blackbody counterparts for detector sources and thermal scene projectors. For Detectors in the far-IR, MCT detectors are the main competitor for light detection and ranging (LIDAR) and free space communication.

Raaman Nair

Before joining the doctoral program at the University of Iowa, Raaman completed his BS in Physics & Astronomy, and MS in Applied Physics at Northern Arizona University. Later on, he was a Physics teacher at schools in Arizona.

Kristie Nault

Kristie Nault is interested in high energy astrophysics and the spectroscopic study of stars.  She is currently working with Professor Casey DeRoo, studying the symbiotic star AG Dra and using spectra obtained with the Chandra LETG/HRC spectrometer in order to determine temperature, flux, and absorption of the dominant blackbody emission produced by the white dwarf component.

Matthew Nelson

As an undergraduate, Matthew earned a Bachelor of Science in Physics, Astronomy, and Mathematics at the University of Iowa. His current research interests are in the fields of condensed matter physics and mathematical physics.

Orgho Neogi

Orgho Neogi is an experimental particle physicist working on the DUNE experiment, focusing on liquid argon TPC event reconstruction and developing machine learning techniques for particle physics analysis. He also works on the CMS experiment, testing prototype detectors for the Barrel Timing Layer upgrade. Before starting the Ph.D. program at Iowa, he earned bachelor's degrees in Physics and Computer Science from Cornell College and worked on DUNE (Wire-Cell reconstruction) and CMS (jet triggers).

Colin Packard

Colin Packard’s research interests center primarily around instrumentation and hardware development, photometry, and observational astronomy. He is currently working with Dr. Philip Kaaret, Dr. Casey DeRoo, and Dr. Jun Wang on both X-ray detection with CMOS sensors, and the development and testing of sensor hardware for an air or space based platform for use in measuring atmospheric pollutants via Earth observing photometry.

Eduardo Palacios

Eddy Palacios has an interest in condensed matter physics due to the interesting properties that arise from novel devices. Previously he has worked with the topic of the quatum hall effect and now looks to research within the realm of quantum communication.

Daniel Pette

Dan is currently employed as an aerospace engineer while he pursues a PhD here at Iowa, part-time. He has lived in four states and enjoys weightlifting, hiking, road trips, craft beer, and classic literature.

Jonatan Posligua

Jonatan is a first-year physics graduate student from Guayaquil, Ecuador. He came to the University of Iowa in 2017 to undertake his undergraduate studies and graduated with a Bachelor in Sciences in Astronomy and Physics in May, 2021. His research interests include gravitation, cosmology, mathematical physics, particle physics and quantum field theory. Outside of physics, his hobbies include sports, playing music, cooking and traveling.

Himani Saraswat

Himani Saraswat is interested in Condensed Matter and Material Physics. She will be working with Prof. Ravitej Uppu and Prof. Thomas Folland on the Quantum dots which involve characterization and fabrication of semiconductor materials.

Katrina Schrock

Katrina Schrock’s research interests cover the vast field of optics, with a focus of LEDs and laser measurements.  She has worked with Dr. John Prineas on the improvement of infrared LEDs.

Punit Sharma

Punit is working on the High Luminosity upgrade of the Inner Tracker detector of the ATLAS experiment currently stationed at the Brookhaven National Lab. He also works on the exotic analysis based on the 2-Higgs doublet model where the pseudoscalar Higgs decays into the heavy CP even neutral Higgs and a Z boson using the run-2 data from the ATLAS experiment.  Punit got his bachelor's and master's degrees from IIT Kanpur. His master's project was on the quantum entanglement in the holographic conformal field theories.

Yueguang Shi

Yueguang Shi is interested in studying computational methods, especially first principle approaches to solid state systems. He is working with Dr. Flatté studying magnetic materials like V(TCNE)2 using density functional theory (DFT) approaches.

Daniel Simons

Daniel Simons tests different models that describe the scattering or decay processes of particles and compares with experimental data to see which model looks most like the data. He was accepted into the Universities Research Association's Visiting Scholars Program to travel to the Fermi National Laboratory throughout the 2021-2022 school year to work with researchers there and to study the scattering of neutrinos off nucleons.

Joe Sink

Joe Sink is working with Dr. Craig Pryor and is interested in modeling the electronic properties of novel Solid-State devices using theoretical models such as Tight-Binding and DFT. His current research is directed towards understanding the unique properties of wurtzite and zinc blende nanowire heterostructures.

Christina Snyder

Jonathan Sullivan-Wood

Jonathan tripled major in Physics, Computational Physics, and Mathematics at Illinois State University. He currently works with Dr. Pryor, computationally modeling boson and fermion energy contributions to the vacuum. After completing his graduate studies, he hopes to return to ISU to teach undergraduate physics.

Dustin Swarm

Dustin Swarm is interested in high energy astrophysics and the application of machine learning in astronomy. He is currently working with Prof. Casey DeRoo studying X-ray sources in the Galactic center found using an outlier detection algorithm.

Jared Termini

Jared Termini is interested in astronomical instrumentation and detector design. He is currently working with Professor Keri Hoadley on the Faint Intergalactic Medium Redshifted Emission Balloon (FIREBall) mission.

Riley Troyer

Originally from Fairbanks, Alaska, Riley has been fascinated by the northern lights (aurora) for his entire life and is currently studying a dim but dynamic type called pulsating aurora. He is also interested in science policy and helped create Connecting Science to Society, a student science policy and communication organization. Riley works for Dr. Allison Jaynes and is funded under a NASA FINESST grant.

Maryam Vaghefi Esfidani

Maryam is interested in condensed matter and her area is understanding the optical properties of polar materials and semiconductor using a combination of experimental methods and numerical model.

Keith Vidal

Keith Vidal is interested in space and plasma physics.  He has studied strongly coupled and magnetized plasmas and is currently studying wave-particle interactions in the Earth's magnetosphere with Prof. Jaynes.

Vitaliy Zhuravlyov

I am interested in experimental plasma physics. In particular, I am studying dusty plasma, which is also considered to be a strongly coupled plasma. Because of strong coupling, dusty plasma can exist in a liquid or gas phases. My research focuses on structural properties of dusty plasma liquids.