The Department of Physics and Astronomy is hosting a workshop at UC Riverside titled “Fundamental Enduring Problems in Quantum Condensed Matter” on Dec. 7-9. Well known physicists in the U.S. and abroad are expected to attend the workshop, which takes place in the Bear Cave, Pentland Hills. Topics include developments in experimental techniques, high temperature superconductors, topological matters, and quantum criticality. Provost Cindy Larive and College of Natural and Agricultural Sciences Dean Kathryn Uhrich will present opening remarks.
Aimed at faculty, graduate students and researchers, the workshop will facilitate a critical review of the assimilated knowledge in condensed matter physics, allow for an exchange of ideas across different branches within the condensed matter community, and propagate current thinking about fundamental problems in this field to the next generation of scientists. More about the workshop here.
The workshop will serve, too, to felicitate Chandra Varma, a distinguished professor of physics and astronomy and an internationally known expert on “superconductivity,” the quantum phenomenon in which metals below a certain temperature develop flow of current with no loss or resistance. Varma, who joined UC Riverside in 2003, has contributed to condensed matter physics for almost 50 years. He is formally retiring from UCR. A reception in his honor will take place for workshop attendees in the Entomology Courtyard on campus at 6 p.m. on Friday, Dec. 8.
After he received his doctoral degree in physics from the University of Minnesota, Varma joined Bell Labs in 1969, one of the most coveted positions at the time for young physicists anywhere in the world. The following year, he became a permanent member of the laboratory. He was the head of the theoretical physics department at Bell Labs from 1983 to 1987, and was awarded the Distinguished Member of Research in 1988. In 2000, he was selected to the Lorentz Visiting Chair at Leiden University, the Netherlands. In 2009, he held a Miller Professorship at UC Berkeley.
He is a fellow of the American Physical Society and of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. A member of the World Academy of Sciences, he is the recipient of the Alexander Humboldt Prize and the Bardeen Prize for theoretical advances in superconductivity.
–Iqbal Pittalwala