Welcome to the Department of Physics

Congratulations on your admission to Cal State Fullerton! We hope that you’ll join us this fall in the department of physics.

entire department posed and excited

Who We Are

We are a tightly knit, friendly department, where faculty, staff, and students know each other well and enjoy interacting in and out of the classroom and lab. Our faculty are internationally recognized as experts in the field and receive national awards and federal funding for research and teaching.

We pride ourselves on being supportive mentors and offering research opportunities at the undergraduate level. We offer generous awards and scholarships each year to support students. Our students often win competitive internships and awards (such as the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship). Our graduates enter excellent PhD, industry, and education positions. Our faculty support graduates with career advice and personalized letters of recommendation.

group of physics students excited for their meeting

A physics student and advisor getting work done

Physics students working in a lab setting

What We Do

Physics students learn a wide range of scientific skills and critical-thinking tools that bridge various industries, including engineering, electronics, communication, defense, and life sciences.

We pursue computational, experimental, and theoretical research. Students work alongside faculty, with opportunities for both course credit and pay. Our research interests include

Atomic and molecular collision science and experiment (Childers, Hargreaves)
Biophysics (Ahmed)
Computational soft-matter physics (Shen)
Experimental soft matter physics (Peshkov, Tanjeem)
Gravitational-wave astronomy, including neutron-star astrophysics (Read), black-hole simulation (Lovelace), and gravitational-wave detector optics and design (Smith)
Observational astronomy (Cheng)
Physics education research (Loverude, Passante)
Surface and condensed-matter science and theory (Tifrea)

Questions?

If you have any questions about being a physics major at Cal State Fullerton, please reach out to Prof. Geoffrey Lovelace by phone at (657) 278-7501 or email ( glovelace@fullerton.edu ).