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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, 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 chemistr ...
,
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 approxim ...
,
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 ...
.


Notable faculty

The Nobel laureates in the faculty are: * Charles Townes (1964) *
Samuel C.C. Ting Samuel Chao Chung Ting (, born January 27, 1936) is a Chinese-American physicist who, with Burton Richter, received the Nobel Prize in 1976 for discovering the Subatomic particle, subatomic J/ψ particle. More recently he has been the principal ...
(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 interac ...
(1979) * Jerome I. Friedman (1990) * Henry Kendall (1990) *
Clifford Shull Clifford Glenwood Shull (September 23, 1915 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania – March 31, 2001) was a Nobel Prize-winning American physicist. Biography Shull attended Schenley High School in Pittsburgh, received his BS from Carnegie Institute of Tec ...
(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 ze ...
(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 Direc ...
(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 mo ...
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 Nobel ...
(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 superfl ...
(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 Robert Betts Laughlin (born November 1, 1950) is the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Physics and Applied Physics at Stanford University. Along with Horst L. Störmer of Columbia University and Daniel C. Tsui of Princeton Universi ...
(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 John Robert Schrieffer (; May 31, 1931 – July 27, 2019) was an American physicist who, with John Bardeen and Leon Cooper, was a recipient of the 1972 Nobel Prize in Physics for developing the BCS theory, the first successful quantum theor ...
(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 jointl ...
(PhD 1936), transistor *
George Smoot George Fitzgerald Smoot III (born February 20, 1945) is an American astrophysicist, cosmologist, Nobel laureate, and the 2nd contestant to win the $1 million prize on '' Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?''. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics i ...
(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 Andrea is a given name which is common worldwide for both males and females, cognate to Andreas, Andrej and Andrew. Origin of the name The name derives from the Greek word ἀνήρ (''anēr''), genitive ἀνδρός (''andrós''), that re ...
(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 par ...
(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 be ...
and Higgs boson * Carl Richard Hagen (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 be ...
and Higgs boson 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 Professor of ...
(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 reduct ...
*
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 Tehra ...
(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 Charles L. Bennett (born November 1956) is an American observational astrophysicist. He is a Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, the Alumni Centennial Professor of Physics and Astronomy and a Gilman Scholar at Johns Hopkins University. He is t ...
(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 an ...
s * Eugene Mele (PhD 1978), topological insulators In government * Solomon J. Buchsbaum (PhD 1957), chair of White House Science Council 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 Technology ...
(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 o ...
(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 spec ...
(PhD 1976), Challenger astronaut * Jerome J. Apt (PhD 1976) * John M. Grunsfeld (SB 1980) * Timothy Creamer (SM 1992) * Neil Woodward (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 charac ...
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, inst ...
, 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