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Graduate

The Department of Physics and Astronomy at Dartmouth offers a unique graduate program leading to the PhD degree. Here the world-class Dartmouth faculty---among the top researchers in the world in the targeted subjects of quantum and condensed matter physics, plasma and fluids, space physics, and astronomy, astrophysics and cosmology---work side-by-side with students.

  • Kevin Wright and Daniel Allman

    At a lab in Wilder Hall, Daniel Allman, Guarini ’23, left, and physics professor Kevin Wright check parts of the laser system used to create the first superfluid circuit of electron-like (fermionic) atoms. (Photo by Robert Gill)

  • Professor Robyn Millan and graduate student Brett Anderson develop new experimental methods to explore the Earth's radiation belts. (photo by: Eli Burakian)

    Professor Robyn Millan and graduate student Brett Anderson develop new experimental methods to explore the Earth's radiation belts. (photo by: Eli Burakian)

Overview

The Department is dedicated to providing graduate students with both a broad background and in-depth training in their field of study. The graduate curriculum includes rigorous core coursework, coupled with an intense program of specialization through close interaction with faculty, advisors and mentors.

As the smallest of the Ivy League institutions, Dartmouth maintains a tradition of close student-faculty interaction, a tradition which is also followed in the Physics and Astronomy graduate program. The graduate program admits eight to ten new PhD students per year, with a total enrollment of approximately 50 students. The department has seventeen full-time faculty members and twelve research and adjunct faculty. In addition, there are typically ten postdoctoral research associates and visiting faculty in the department at a given time.

The best way for students to get involved in research is to directly contact the faculty member whose research most interests them. Come find out about the experimental physics labs, state-of-the-art computing facilities, and access to telescopes and astronomical observatories.

At Dartmouth, students not only push the frontiers of knowledge, they can break boundaries through interdisciplinary research with affiliated faculty in engineering physics at Dartmouth's Thayer School of Engineering and biomedical physics at the Dartmouth Medical School.

Students also participate in the educational directives of the department as teaching assistants. All incoming graduate students receive interactive training in how to teach, how to run a course, and how to be a mentor.

The life of the department centers around an active colloquium program and seminar series, featuring speakers from top universities and research centers. Seminar series in quantum and condensed matter physics, space and plasma physics, and astrophysics and cosmology augment the weekly meetings and journal clubs held by individual research groups. And a weekly tea- and coffee-time brings the department together socially.

For more information about the graduate program, please contact the graduate admissions chair, Chandrasekhar Ramanathan.