The central theme of our research is the fundamental understanding of electronic spin phenomena in semiconductor nanostructures for potential applications in spin electronics ("spintronics") and quantum computation. This research is part of a large national effort involving several academic institutions, as well as national and industrial labs, and is co-ordinated by the Center for Spintronics and Quantum Computation at the University of California-Santa Barbara.

At Penn State, we employ advanced materials synthesis techniques (molecular beam epitaxy, optical/e-beam lithography and nanopatterning) to fabricate a variety of low dimensional "spintronic" systems based upon conventional and magnetic semiconductor quantum wells, quantum wires and quantum dots. Spin polarization is introduced into such nanostructures either through interactions with local moments or by using circularly polarized light. The static and dynamic spin response is then probed using a range of techniques that include steady-state and time-resolved magneto-optical spectroscopy, magneto-transport and ultra-high sensitivity magnetometry. Many of these studies are carried out collaboratively with David Awschalom's group at UC-Santa Barbara and Peter Schiffer's group at Penn State. We also have several other collaborations with researchers at Harvard (Prof. Narayanmurti & Prof. Marcus), Stanford (Prof. Goldhaber-Gordon), Florida State (Prof. Xiong, and Prof. Von Molnar), and the University of Minnesota (Prof. Crowell and Prof. Palmstrom).

This research area provides opportunities for undergraduate research.