Viewing Alumni - Academic Faculty

November 30, 2017

Professor Benjamin Vest

Benjamin (Benji) Vest joined the Atwater group in November 2017 as a Postdoctoral Scholar. Before coming to Caltech, Benji graduated from the Institut d’Optique in Palaiseau (France) with a M.Sc. in Optical Engineering. He later received his PhD from Ecole Polytechnique in 2015. His dissertation involved the theoretical and experimental study of non-linear processes (namely […]

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September 1, 2017

Prof. Zakaria (Zak) Al Balushi

Zakaria (Zak) Al Balushi joined the Atwater group in 2017 as a Resnick Prize Postdoctoral Fellow in Applied Physics and Materials Science. Prior to joining the Atwater group, Zak received his Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering (2017), his M.S. (2012) and B.S. (2011) in Engineering Science all from The Pennsylvania State University. During his […]

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June 21, 2017

Professor Pin Chieh Wu

Pin Chieh Wu joined the Atwater group in June 2017 as a Postdoctoral Scholar. During his stay at Caltech, he was working on the active plasmonics and metasurfaces for the feasible application of light manipulation. He received his PhD in Applied Physics from National Taiwan University under the supervision of Prof. Din Ping Tsai. Prior […]

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October 11, 2016

Dr. Nina Vaidya

Dr. Nina Vaidya received her undergraduate degree in Electrical & Information Engineering from University of Cambridge, England, UK and a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University, CA, USA, for work on design & fabrication of graded-index optical concentrators and 3D printing to create optics with nanometer smooth surfaces. As a postdoctoral scholar at Caltech, […]

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September 22, 2016

Professor Ognjen Ilic

Ognjen Ilic received his B.A. degree in physics and mathematics from Harvard University and his Ph.D. degree in physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, working with Marin Soljačić and John Joannopoulos. His research interests lie at the intersection of nanoscale photonics, radiative heat transfer, and thermal radiation phenomena in nanophotonic structures. For more information, […]

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June 1, 2016

Professor Joseph (Joe) DuChene

Joe DuChene was a postdoctoral scholar in the Atwater group from 2016 to 2019. Working with the Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis at Caltech, he conducted fundamental studies on the energy distributions and ultrafast dynamics of plasmonic hot carriers in metal nanostructures and pioneered new plasmonic devices for enhancing the selectivity of photoelectrochemical CO2 reduction. He […]

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August 31, 2015

Professor Deep Jariwala

Dr. Jariwala joined the Atwater group as a Resnick Postdoctoral Fellow in 2015. Prior to joining the Atwater group, Deep obtained his PhD in Materials Science and Engineering at Northwestern University where the focus of his research was investigation of opto-electronic properties and electronic circuit applications of heterostructure devices from two-dimensional (2D) materials. At Caltech, […]

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August 19, 2015

Professor Artur Davoyan

Artur is Assistant Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA). Previously, he was a Resnick Sustainability Institute and Kavli Nanoscience Institute postdoctoral fellow for the Atwater group from 2015-2018. Artur received his BS from Saratov State University, Russia (2007) and PhD from Australian National University (2011).

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July 22, 2015

Professor Yu-Jung (Yuri) Lu

Dr. Yu-Jung Lu was a postdoctoral scholar with the Atwater group from 2015-2017.  In 2013, Dr. Lu received her Ph.D. in Physics from National Tsing-Hua University (Taiwan) in the group of Prof. Shangjr Gwo. During her Ph.D. and postdoctoral research in Taiwan, she investigated the optical and electrical properties of III-nitride semiconductor nanostructures. In her […]

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April 6, 2015

Professor Giulia Tagliabue

Professor Tagliabue joined the Atwater Group in April 2015 as a Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) Fellow. Her research at Caltech focused on solar fuels and, in particular, the use of plasmonic nanostructures for hot-carriers generation. She graduated from ETH Zurich in 2014 in the group of Prof. Poulikakos. Her experimental work there was on […]

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January 26, 2015

Professor Muhammad Alam

Prof. Alam joined the Atwater group in January 2015 as a KINI Prize Postdoctoral Fellow. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Toronto, and his M. A. Sc. from the University of Victoria. For his Ph.D. research work he received the Douglas R. Colton Medal for Research Excellence, which is given to one researcher […]

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December 2, 2014

Prof. Wen Hui (Sophia) Cheng

Wen-Hui (Sophia) Cheng received her B.S. and M.S. degrees from National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan, and pursed her Ph.D. from Caltech, all in Materials Science. During her Ph.D. research under the guidance of Prof. Harry Atwater, she focused on mesoscale design of photoelectrochemical fuel cells as part of the Joint Center of Artificial Photosynthesis (JCAP). […]

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July 26, 2014

Prof. Daniel Turner-Evans

Dan received his B.S in applied physicist and electrical engineering from Yale University in 2008. He then joined the lab of Prof. Harry Atwater at Caltech for his Ph.D. in applied physics. During his Ph.D., Dan became fascinated by the brain. After he defended in 2013, Dan decided to turn his fascination into his career. […]

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July 26, 2014

Professor Katsu Tanabe

Dr. Tanabe received his PhD in Materials Science in 2008. He is currently Assistant Professor at Kyoto University in Kyoto, Japan.

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July 26, 2014

Professor Regina Ragan

Dr. Ragan received her PhD in Applied Physics in 2002. She is an Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science at University of California, Irvine.

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July 26, 2014

Professor Domenico Pacifici

Dr. Pacifici was a senior postdoctoral scholar at Caltech from 2005-2009. He is currently Associate Professor of Engineering and Physics at Brown University.

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July 26, 2014

Professor Deirdre O’Carroll

Dr. O’Carroll was a postdoctoral scholar in the Atwater group from 2007 to 2009. She is currently an Associate Professor at Rutgers University, working within the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, and the Institute for Advanced Materials, Devices and Nanotechnology (IAMDN).

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July 26, 2014

Professor Adele Tamboli

Dr. Tamboli is a staff scientist at National Renewable Energy Laboratory and a Research Assistant Professor of Physics at Colorado School of Mines. She was a postdoc in the Atwater group from 2009-2011.

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July 26, 2014

Professor Stefan Maier

Dr. Maier received his PhD in Applied Physics in 2003. He is Lee-Lucas Chair in Experimental Physics and head of the nanoplasmonics group in Condensed Matter Physics at Imperial College London. Maier is the Head of the Experimental Solid State Physics group, as well as director of post-graduate studies for the department.

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