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The MIT Department of Physics has over 120 faculty members, is often cited as the largest physics department in the United States, and hosts top-ranked programs. It offers the SB, SM,
PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper ''Piled Higher and Deeper'' (also known as ''PhD Comics''), is a newsp ...
, and ScD degrees. Fourteen alumni of the department and nine current or former faculty members (two of whom were also students at MIT) have won the
Nobel Prize in Physics ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then " ...
.


Academics


Undergraduate academics

There are two paths to earning a
bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Middle Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate academic degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six ...
(SB) in physics from MIT. The first, "Course 8 Focused Option", is for students intending to continue studying physics in graduate school. The track offers a rigorous education in various fields in fundamental physics including classical and
quantum mechanics Quantum mechanics is a fundamental theory in physics that provides a description of the physical properties of nature at the scale of atoms and subatomic particles. It is the foundation of all quantum physics including quantum chemistry, q ...
,
statistical physics Statistical physics is a branch of physics that evolved from a foundation of statistical mechanics, which uses methods of probability theory and statistics, and particularly the mathematical tools for dealing with large populations and approxi ...
,
general relativity General relativity, also known as the general theory of relativity and Einstein's theory of gravity, is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1915 and is the current description of gravitation in modern physics. ...
,
electrodynamics In physics, electromagnetism is an interaction that occurs between particles with electric charge. It is the second-strongest of the four fundamental interactions, after the strong force, and it is the dominant force in the interactions o ...
, and higher mathematics. The second, "Course 8 Flexible Option" is designed for those students who would like to develop a strong background in physics but who would like to branch off into other research directions or more unconventional career paths, such as information theory, computer science, finance, and biophysics. A significant part of the student's third and fourth undergraduate years are left open for relevant electives and graduate classes, which then form a specialization. Both tracks have a strong emphasis on laboratory instruction, with the third year often reserved for two "Junior Lab" courses. Most students partaking in undergraduate research or a research-oriented internship.


Graduate academics

The department offers doctoral degrees in the following divisions
astrophysicsbiophysicstheoretical condensed matter physicsexperimental nuclear/particle physics
theoretical nuclear/particle physics,
plasma physics Plasma ()πλάσμα
, Henry George Liddell, R ...
, an
quantum computing


Research

The department is divided into four main research areas, namely a) astrophysics, b) atomic, biophysics, condensed matter, and plasma physics, c) experimental nuclear and particle physics, and d) theoretical nuclear and particle physics. A large amount of research is conducted the department's 17 affiliated labs and centers, a list which includes the Research Laboratory of Electronics, the Plasma Science and Fusion Center, the Center for Theoretical Physics, the Condensed Matter Theory Group, the MIT–Harvard Center for Ultracold Atoms, and
LIGO The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) is a large-scale physics experiment and observatory designed to detect cosmic gravitational waves and to develop gravitational-wave observations as an astronomical tool. Two large o ...
.


Notable faculty

The Nobel laureates in the faculty are: *
Charles Townes Charles Hard Townes (July 28, 1915 – January 27, 2015) was an American physicist. Townes worked on the theory and application of the maser, for which he obtained the fundamental patent, and other work in quantum electronics associated w ...
(1964) * Samuel C.C. Ting (1976) *
Steven Weinberg Steven Weinberg (; May 3, 1933 – July 23, 2021) was an American theoretical physicist and Nobel laureate in physics for his contributions with Abdus Salam and Sheldon Glashow to the unification of the weak force and electromagnetic inter ...
(1979) * Jerome I. Friedman (1990) * Henry Kendall (1990) * Clifford Shull (1994) *
Wolfgang Ketterle Wolfgang Ketterle (; born 21 October 1957) is a German physicist and professor of physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). His research has focused on experiments that trap and cool atoms to temperatures close to absolute zer ...
(2001) *
Frank Wilczek Frank Anthony Wilczek (; born May 15, 1951) is an American theoretical physicist, mathematician and Nobel laureate. He is currently the Herman Feshbach Professor of Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Founding Direct ...
(2004) *
Rainer Weiss Rainer "Rai" Weiss ( , ; born September 29, 1932) is an American physicist, known for his contributions in gravitational physics and astrophysics. He is a professor of physics emeritus at MIT and an adjunct professor at LSU. He is best known ...
(2017) *


Notable alumni

See also
MIT Department of Physics Alumni The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...
for a larger list Nobel Laureates *
Eric Cornell Eric Allin Cornell (born December 19, 1961) is an American physicist who, along with Carl E. Wieman, was able to synthesize the first Bose–Einstein condensate in 1995. For their efforts, Cornell, Wieman, and Wolfgang Ketterle shared the Nobe ...
(PhD 1990), Bose–Einstein condensate *
Richard Feynman Richard Phillips Feynman (; May 11, 1918 – February 15, 1988) was an American theoretical physicist, known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, the physics of the superf ...
(SB 1939), quantum electrodynamics *
Murray Gell-Mann Murray Gell-Mann (; September 15, 1929 – May 24, 2019) was an American physicist who received the 1969 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on the theory of elementary particles. He was the Robert Andrews Millikan Professor of Theoretical ...
(PhD 1951), quarks * Henry Kendall (PhD 1955), deep inelastic scattering * Robert Laughlin (PhD 1979), fractional quantum Hall effect * William D. Phillips (PhD 1976), laser cooling *
Burton Richter Burton Richter (March 22, 1931 – July 18, 2018) was an American physicist. He led the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) team which co-discovered the J/ψ meson in 1974, alongside the Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) team led by Sa ...
(SB 1952, PhD 1956), J/psi particle *
Adam Riess Adam Guy Riess (born December 16, 1969) is an American astrophysicist and Bloomberg Distinguished Professor at Johns Hopkins University and the Space Telescope Science Institute. He is known for his research in using supernovae as cosmologic ...
(SB 1992), high-Z supernova search team * John Robert Schrieffer (SB 1953), BCS theory *
William Shockley William Bradford Shockley Jr. (February 13, 1910 – August 12, 1989) was an American physicist and inventor. He was the manager of a research group at Bell Labs that included John Bardeen and Walter Brattain. The three scientists were jointly ...
(PhD 1936), transistor * George Smoot (SB 1966, PhD 1970), cosmic microwave background radiation * Carl E. Wieman (SB 1973), Bose–Einstein condensate *
Rainer Weiss Rainer "Rai" Weiss ( , ; born September 29, 1932) is an American physicist, known for his contributions in gravitational physics and astrophysics. He is a professor of physics emeritus at MIT and an adjunct professor at LSU. He is best known ...
(SB 1965, PhD 1962), LIGO * Andrea Ghez (SB 1982), supermassive black hole in galaxy Other major physics discoveries *
Gerald Guralnik Gerald Stanford "Gerry" Guralnik (; September 17, 1936 – April 26, 2014) was the Chancellor’s Professor of Physics at Brown University. In 1964 he co-discovered the Higgs mechanism and Higgs boson with C. R. Hagen and Tom Kibble (GHK). As p ...
(SB 1958),
Higgs mechanism In the Standard Model of particle physics, the Higgs mechanism is essential to explain the generation mechanism of the property "mass" for gauge bosons. Without the Higgs mechanism, all bosons (one of the two classes of particles, the other bei ...
and
Higgs boson The Higgs boson, sometimes called the Higgs particle, is an elementary particle in the Standard Model of particle physics produced by the quantum excitation of the Higgs field, one of the fields in particle physics theory. In the St ...
*
Carl Richard Hagen Carl Richard Hagen (; born 2 February 1937) is a professor of particle physics at the University of Rochester. He is most noted for his contributions to the Standard Model and Symmetry breaking as well as the 1964 co-discovery of the Higgs mechani ...
(SB & SM 1958, PhD 1962),
Higgs mechanism In the Standard Model of particle physics, the Higgs mechanism is essential to explain the generation mechanism of the property "mass" for gauge bosons. Without the Higgs mechanism, all bosons (one of the two classes of particles, the other bei ...
and
Higgs boson The Higgs boson, sometimes called the Higgs particle, is an elementary particle in the Standard Model of particle physics produced by the quantum excitation of the Higgs field, one of the fields in particle physics theory. In the St ...
Breakthrough Prizes in Fundamental Physics *
Alan Guth Alan Harvey Guth (; born February 27, 1947) is an American theoretical physicist and cosmologist. Guth has researched elementary particle theory (and how particle theory is applicable to the early universe). He is Victor Weisskopf Professo ...
(SB & SM 1969, PhD 1972), theory of
inflation In economics, inflation is an increase in the general price level of goods and services in an economy. When the general price level rises, each unit of currency buys fewer goods and services; consequently, inflation corresponds to a reductio ...
*
Cumrun Vafa Cumrun Vafa ( fa, کامران وفا ; born 1 August 1960) is an Iranian-American theoretical physicist and the Hollis Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy at Harvard University. Early life and education Cumrun Vafa was born in Tehran ...
(SB 1981), string theory *
Andrew Strominger Andrew Eben Strominger (; born 1955) is an American theoretical physicist who is the director of Harvard's Center for the Fundamental Laws of Nature. He has made significant contributions to quantum gravity and string theory. These include his ...
(PhD 1982), string theory * Charles L. Bennett (PhD 1984),
WMAP The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), originally known as the Microwave Anisotropy Probe (MAP and Explorer 80), was a NASA spacecraft operating from 2001 to 2010 which measured temperature differences across the sky in the cosmic mic ...
* Charles Kane (PhD 1989),
topological insulator A topological insulator is a material whose interior behaves as an electrical insulator while its surface behaves as an electrical conductor, meaning that electrons can only move along the surface of the material. A topological insulator is a ...
s *
Eugene Mele Eugene John "Gene" Mele is a professor of physics at the University of Pennsylvania, where he researches quantum electric phenomena in condensed matter. Biography Mele graduated from Saint Joseph's University in 1972 and obtained a Ph.D. in physi ...
(PhD 1978), topological insulators In government *
Solomon J. Buchsbaum Solomon J. Buchsbaum (December 4, 1929 – March 8, 1993) was a Polish American physicist and technologist, best known as chair of the White House Science Council under Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, and as a senior executive ...
(PhD 1957), chair of
White House Science Council The President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) is a council, chartered (or re-chartered) in each administration with a broad mandate to advise the president of the United States on science and technology. The current PCAST w ...
under Bush and Reagan *
Shirley Ann Jackson Shirley Ann Jackson, (born August 5, 1946) is an American physicist, and was the 18th president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. She is the first African-American woman to have earned a doctorate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technolog ...
(SB 1968, PhD 1973), chair of US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, president of RPI, second black woman to earn a physics PhD in the U.S. *
Lucas Papademos Lucas Demetrios Papademos ( el, Λουκάς Παπαδήμος; born 11 October 1947) is a Greek economist and academic who served as 12th Prime Minister of Greece from November 2011 to May 2012, leading a national unity government in the wake ...
(SB 1970), prime minister of Greece Astronauts *
Ronald McNair Ronald Erwin McNair (October 21, 1950 – January 28, 1986) was an American NASA astronaut and physicist. He died during the launch of the Space Shuttle ''Challenger'' on mission STS-51-L, in which he was serving as one of three mission spe ...
(PhD 1976), Challenger astronaut * Jerome J. Apt (PhD 1976) *
John M. Grunsfeld John Mace Grunsfeld (born 10 October 1958) is an American physicist and a former NASA astronaut. He is a veteran of five Space Shuttle flights and has served as NASA Chief Scientist. His academic background includes research in high energy astr ...
(SB 1980) * Timothy Creamer (SM 1992) *
Neil Woodward Neil W. Woodward III (born July 26, 1962 in Chicago, Illinois) is an American Naval officer and a former NASA astronaut. Personal He is Married. Activities in his spare time includes reading, computers, sailing, music, wine and cooking. His father ...
(SB 1984)


Fictional alumni

*
Gordon Freeman Gordon Freeman is the silent protagonist of the ''Half-Life'' video game series, created by Gabe Newell and designed by Newell and Marc Laidlaw of Valve. His first appearance is in ''Half-Life''. Gordon Freeman is depicted as a bespectacled C ...
from ''Half-Life'' video games - has a doctorate in theoretical physics from MIT *
Tony Stark Iron Man is a superhero appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character was co-created by writer and editor Stan Lee, developed by scripter Larry Lieber, and designed by artists Don Heck and Jack Kirby. The char ...
from ''Iron Man'' - received degrees in physics and electrical engineering from MIT at age 19


See also

*
Physical Science Study Committee The Physical Science Study Committee, usually abbreviated as PSSC, was inaugurated at a 1956 conference at MIT to review introductory physics education and to design, implement, and monitor improvements. It produced major new physics textbooks, in ...
, a leader in modernization of science teaching in the 2nd half of the 20th century.


References


External links


MIT Department of Physics website


{{Authority control Physics Department Physics departments in the United States