Berkeley Physics

09/02/2026

Congratulations to Steven Louie, Distinguished Professor of the Graduate School and Senior Faculty Scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, on his election to the Academia Europaea!
https://physics.berkeley.edu/news/steve-louie-elected-foreign-member-academia-europea

09/02/2026

A tantalizing signal from the LUX-ZEPLIN experiment could point to WIMPs, a leading dark matter candidate. Members of UC Berkeley’s Dan McKinsey group are part of the effort to determine whether the interaction is truly a sign of dark matter.

Key Takeaways Dark matter is the mysterious substance that accounts for the vast majority of matter in our universe. LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) is a world-leading dark matter detector and specializes in searching for WIMPs, or weakly interacting massive particles. A new LZ study found one particle interaction....

08/31/2026

Join us TODAY August 21 at 2:30pm in 141 McCone Hall for the first Condensed Matter Seminar of the semester, featuring Thierry Martin: Detection of anyon scaling dimension and braiding properties in the fractional Quantum Hall Effect

For the almost half of a century, anyons in the FQHE have been proposed as excitations which carry fractional charge and statistics, thus bridging ...

08/25/2026

Quantum research is getting a major boost! NSF is investing $37.5 million over five years to renew the NSF Quantum Leap Challenge Institute for Quantum Computation, led by UC Berkeley and bringing together leading universities across California. The institute will advance quantum computing, quantum information science, and next-generation quantum technologies.

The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) is renewing its support for the NSF Quantum Leap Challenge Institute for Quantum Computation (NSF CIQC), a multi-institutional research center spanning California and led by UC Berkeley.

08/19/2026

In the latest installment of After Office Hours, Saul Perlmutter recounts his team's discovery of our universe's accelerating expansion.

In the latest installment of After Office Hours, Saul Perlmutter recounts his team's discovery of our universe's accelerating expansion.

08/04/2026

Professor Feng Wang and former graduate student Ruishi Qi report the first tunable Bose-Einstein condensate in a semiconductor—a breakthrough with implications for quantum information science, quantum simulation, and next-generation optoelectronics.

The advance establishes a new solid-state platform for studying high-temperature Bose-Einstein condensates in semiconductor devices, and could one day advance quantum information science, quantum simulations, coherent optoelectronics, and future exciton-based devices.

07/28/2026

Congratulations to Professor Dung-Hai Lee, recipient of the 2026 John Bardeen Prize for pioneering theoretical contributions to the understanding of unconventional superconductivity. The award is shared with Andrew J. Millis and Michael R. Norman.
https://physics.berkeley.edu/news/dung-hai-lee-awarded-john-bardeen-prize

07/23/2026

Hats off to the 2026 Segre Interns who are spending the summer upgrading advanced experiments in the Physics 111 Lab—improving hands-on learning for future students! 👏👏👏
https://physics.berkeley.edu/news/segr%C3%A9-interns-enhance-physics-111-laboratory

07/13/2026

🎉 Congratulations to the recipients of the 2026 Physics Student Prizes and Awards! We were proud to celebrate these outstanding students and their achievements at the Berkeley Physics Commencement ceremony in May. 👏🎓
https://physics.berkeley.edu/news/2026-physics-student-prizes-and-awards

07/08/2026

John Clarke has been inducted into the Achievement Museum of the American Academy of Achievement with the presentation of the Golden Plate Award as a Guest of Honor at the 56th Annual International Achievement Summit held in Washington DC.
https://physics.berkeley.edu/news/john-clarke-honored-american-academy-achievement-golden-plate-award