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UMBC Department of Physics
Graduate Programs
Recent Thesis Topics
Year Author Title
2012 Junlin Liang "An Experimental Study of Nonclassical Effects in Two-photon Interferometry"
Advisor: Dr. Todd Pittman
2012 Sanjit Karmakar "Ghost Imaging with Sunlight"
Advisor: Dr. Shih
Sanjit is now a post-doctoral researcher at UMBC.
2011 R. Chris Wilson "Multivariate Retrieval of Carbon Monoxide"
Advisor: Dr. Hoff
Chris is now a post-doctoral researcher at the Jet Propulsion Lab.
2011 Debra Wicks Kollonige "The Impact of Upper Tropospheric Dynamics on Surface Air Quality over the United States"
Advisor: Dr. Sparling
Debra is now a post-doctoral scholar at Penn State University.
2011 Aboubakar Traore "Measurement of the nonlinear refractive index of TeO2 fiber by using IGA technique"
Advisor: Dr. Johnson
Aboubakar is working at Sigmaspace Corporation.
2011 Sheng Liu "Investigation of Carrier Dynamics and Nonlinear Effects in Quantum Cascade Lasers using Femtosecond Mid-Infrared Pulses"
Advisor: Dr. Johnson
Sheng is now a post-doctoral scholar at Sandia National Labs.
2011 Samuel Trahan "Multi-Scale Analysis of Observations of Tropical Cyclones with Applications to High-Resolution Hurrican Modeling"
Advisor: Dr. Sparling
Sam is a researcher at NOAA.
2010 Yu Zhou "Multiphoton Coherence of Thermal Light"
Advisor: Dr. Shih
Yu is an Associate Professor at Jiao Tong University.
2010 Hao You "Theoretical Study of Quantum Computation with Non Linear Optics"
Advisor: Dr. Franson
Hao is now a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Georgia.
2010 Vincenzo Tamma "Theoretical and Experimental Study of a New Algorithm for Factoring Numbers"
Advisor: Dr. Shih
Vincenzo is now a post-doctoral fellow at Ulm University in Germany.
2010 Paul Cunningham "Optical Pump Terahertz Probe Studies of Semiconducting Polymers"
Advisor: Dr. Hayden
Paul has accepted an NRC postdoc at the US Naval Research Lab in Washington, DC.
2010 Colin McLaughlin "Electro-Optic Polymers for Terahertz Applications"
Advisor: Dr. Hayden
Colin is a researcher at the US Naval Research Laboratories in Wasnington, DC.
2010 Raymond Edziah "Nonlinear Optical Properties of Novel Forms of Enriched Carbon Disulfide"
Advisor: Dr. Johnson
Raymond is now a post-doctoral researcher in Electrical Engineering at UMBC.
2009 Robinson Kuis "Theoretical and Experimental Study of the Nonlinear Optical and Dispersive Properties of Conventional and Photonic Crystal Fibers"
Advisor: Dr. Johnson
Rob is an R & D Program Manager at IRFlex in Danville, VA.
2009 Nathan Kurtz "Application of satellite laser altimetry data to studies of sea ice properties and processes"
Advisor: Dr. Sparling
Nathan is a PostDoc at NASA
Goddard working in the Cryospheric Processes Branch.
2009 Mengsteab Weldegaber "Investigation of Stable and Unstable Boundary Layer Phenomena Using Observations and a Numerical Weather Prediction Model"
Advisor: Dr. Sparling
Mengs is now a PostDoc Research Associate in the Dept. of Civil & Environmental Engineering at UC Davis.
2009 Jianning Zeng "Extended Emission Surrounding Nearby Seyfert Galaxies"
Advisor: Dr. George
Jianning is currently a software testing engineer for the National Weather Service.
2009 Timothy Bole "A Study of the Effects of Electromigration on Structures at the Nanoscale"
Advisor: Dr. Rous
2008 Antonia Gambacorta "Temperature Change And Water Vapor Feedback In The Atmosphere. A Comprehensive Assessment Using The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder Instrument On NASA Aqua Satellite"
Advisor: Dr. Strow
Antonia is a Research Scientist at NOAA Center for Satellite Applications and Research in Camp Springs, MD.
2008 Jeffrey Warner "Displacement Damage-Induced Electrical and Structural Effects in Gallium Arsenide Solar Cells Following Ion Irradiation"
Advisor: Dr. Summers
Jeff is a Research Scientist at the Naval Research Lab in Washington, DC.
2008 Andrew Bunch "Step Dynamics and the Morphological Evolution of Nanostructures"
Advisor: Dr. Rous
2008 Justin Hackley "Initial HfO2 Growth on Si(100) and GaAs(100) Substrates using TEMAH+H2O and TDMAH+H2O ALD Processes"
Advisor: Dr. Gougousi
Justin is now a post-doctoral researcher at the Laboratory for Physical Sciences in College Park, MD.
2008 Mark Stephen "Fiber-Based Laser Transmitter and Laser Spectroscopy of the Oxygen A-Band for Remote Detection of Atmospheric Pressure"
Advisor: Dr. Hayden
Mark is a research scientist at NASA Goddard in the Lasers and Electro-Optics Branch.

2007

Eric Maddy

"Investigation of Spatial and Temporal Resolution of Atmospheric CO2 from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS)"
Advisor: Dr. McMillian
Eric is a research scientist at QSS Division of Perot Systems in Lanham, MD.

2007

Raymond Rogers

"Raman LIDAR Measurements of Hygroscopic Effects on Aerosol Extinctions "
Advisor: Dr. Hoff
Ray has taken a research scientist position with working with NASA Langley on LIDAR research.

2007

Felicita Russo

"An Investigation of Raman LIDAR Aerosol Measurements and Their Application to the Study of the Aerosol Indirect Effect "
Advisor: Dr. Hoff
Felicita has returned to Italy to take a research position in Napoli.

2007

Jianming Wen

"Transverse Correlation in Entangled Photons and Light-Matter Interactions "
Advisor: Dr. Rubin
Jianming is a Research Associate in the Physics Department at the Univ. of Virginia.

2006

Michelle Comer

"Retrieving Carbon Monoxide Abundance From Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS)"
Advisor: Dr. McMillian
Michelle has taken a post-doc position at UMBC, working on K-12 science education.

2006

Eric Moore

"Plastic Strain and Grain Size Effects in Surface Roughness of a Model Aluminum Alloy"
Advisor: Dr. Reno
Eric is now an Assistant Professor in Physics at Frostburg State University in Frostburg, MD.

2006

Sulakshana Thanvanthri

"Quantum Coherence Effects in Light-Matter Interactions"
Advisor: Dr. Rubin
Sue left UMBC to take up a post-doctoral fellowship at the Department of Physics at LSU in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

2006

Rundong Wan

"Determination of the Structure and Composition of the Low Miller Index Surfaces of NiP and AgAu Binary Alloys Using Low-Energy Electron Diffraction"
Advisor: Dr. Rous
Rundong has accepted a post-doctoral position in the Physics Department at Penn State University in State College, PA.

2006

Hai Zhang

"A Global ETA Model on Quasi-Uniform Grids"
Advisor: Dr. McMillian
Hai Zhang has accepted a research position in the NASA/UMBC GEST center.

2006

Giuliano Scarcelli

"Two-Photon Correlation Phenomena"
Advisor: Dr. Shih
Giuliano left UMBC to accept a post-doctoral position at the Harvard University Medical Center in Boston, Massachusetts.

2006

Megan Leahy-Hoppa

"Terahertz Spectroscopy and Molecular Modeling of Nonlinear Polymers"
Advisor: Dr. Hayden
Megan has taken a post-doctoral position at the Applied Physics Laboratories of Johns Hopkins University in Laurel, MD.

2005

Dylan Powell

"Snow on Sea Ice: Microwave Remote Sensing and Its Impact on Antarctic Sea Ice"
Advisor: Dr. Sparling
Dylan has accepted a position as a research scientist at Lockheed Martin Corporation in Fairfax, VA.

2005

Alexander Sinyukov

"Electro-Optic Polymers for Terahertz Applications"
Advisor: Dr. Hayden
Alex has accepted a post-doctoral position in the Physics Department at NJIT in Newark, NJ.

2005

Alejandra Valencia

"High-Accuracy Timing and Positioning using Entanged Photon Pairs"
Advisor: Dr. Shih
Alejandra accepted a postdoctoral fellowship at the Institute for Photonics Science in Barcelona, Spain.

2004

Milena D'Angelo

"Quantum Imaging"
Advisors: Dr. Shih & Dr. Rubin
Milena left UMBC to take up a Marie Curie postdoctoral fellowship at LENS (the European Laboratory of Nonlinear Spetroscropy) in Sesto Fiorentino (near Florence), Italy.

2004

Daniel Hudson

"Galaxy Cluster Merger Dynamics: Relating Merger Shocks to Cosmic Ray Acceleration and Cluster Substructure"
Advisor: Dr. Henriksen
Danny left UMBC to join the Emmy Noether Research Group at the Institute for Astrophysics, Bonn University, Germany.

2004

Paul Poli

"Assimilation of Global Positioning System Radio Occultation Measurements into Numerical Weather Forecast Systems"
Advisor: Dr. Hoff
After graduation Paul returned to Meteo France as a 'Checheur Scientifique'.

2004

Feng Liu

"Design and Fabrication of Dual-Side Waveguide-Based Optical Demultiplexers"
Advisor: Dr. Worchesky
Feng Liu is now a Research Scientist at Columbia University, New York, NY.

2004

Kurt Lightner

"Tropospheric Ozone Retrievals Using An Uplooking Infrared Interferometer"
Advisor: Dr. McMillan

2003

Bryan Jacobs

"Linear Optics Approach to Quantum Information Processing"
Advisor: Dr. Rubin
Brian is now a Staff Scientist at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Labs in Laurel, MD.

2002

Jason Cheng

"Theoretical and Experiemental Studies of Surface Physics: Theory of Surface Electromigration Wind Force Felt by Na adatom on Na (110) Slipped Surface; Magnetic Order-disorder Phase Transition of Antiferomagnetic Nb Thin Films on Ag (COL)"
Advisor: Dr. Watson

2001

Yoon-Ho Kim

"Two-Photon Quantum Entanglement"
Advisor: Dr. Shih
Yoon-Ho is now an Associate Professor in Physics at Pohang University in Korea.

2000

David N. Whiteman

"Investigaiton of Cloud Properties using a Raman Lidar"
Advisor: Dr. Melfi
David left UMBC to join the Laser Remote Sensing Branch (Raman Lidar Group) of the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD.

2000

David G. Simpson

"Analysis of Low-Energy Electron Diffraction I-V Spectra using Artificail Neural Networks"
Advisor: Dr. Rous
David left UMBC to become Flight Software Senior Designer at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD.

1999

Timothy E. Keller

"Multi-Photon Entanglement from Pulsed Pump Spontaneous Down-Conversion"
Advisor: Dr. Rubin

1999

Shane Strutz

"Dopant Mobility and the Performance of Nonlinear Optical Polymers"
Advisor: Dr. Hayden
Shane left UMBC for a position of Physicist at the Naval Research Laboratory, Washington DC.

1997

Dimitry Strekalov

"Biphoton Optics"
Advisor: Dr. Shih
Dimitry is now a Research Scientist at JPL in Pasadena, CA .

1996

Darren N. Bly

"A Theoretical Study of the Electromigration Wind Force at Metal Surfaces"
Advisor: Dr. Rous
Darren left UMBC to become a Visiting Assistant Professor at Western Maryland College.

1996

Michael J. Panunto

"The Effect of Electric Fields on the Formation and Anealings of Stable Radiation Induced Defects in InP Semiconductor Junctions"
Advisor: Dr. Summers

1996

Shane C. Brower

"Activation Volumes Associated with Chromophore Reorientation in Corona Poled Polymers: Their Physical Significance and Relationship to Stability"
Advisor: Dr. Hayden
Shane is now the Chair of the Physics Department at Grove City College in Grove City, PA.

1996

Todd Pittman

"Two-photon Quantum Entanglement from Type II Spontaneous Parametric Down-conversion"
Advisor: Dr. Shih
Todd is now an Associate Professor in the Physics Department at UMBC.

1996

David Tobin

"Infared Spectral Lineshapes of Water Vapor and Carbon Dioxide"
Advisor: Dr. Strow
David left UMBC to become a Research Scientist at The University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI.

1995

David M. Hartley

"Theory of Negative Ion Resonance in Molecules on Surfaces"
Advisor: Dr. Rous
David left UMBC to become a Research Scientist at Dynamics Techonology, Inc.

1995

Scott R. Messenger

"Electron- & Gamma- Induced Displacement Damage Effects in InP Semiconductor Devices"
Advisor: Dr. Summers
Scott left UMBC to work for SFA, Inc.

1994

Robert J. Walters

"A Study of the Annealing of Radiation-Induced Defects in Indum Phosphide Solar Cells"
Advisor: Dr. Summers
Robert left UMBC to become a Research Physicist at the the Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC

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