The ISU Physics Department has a weekly radio show hosted by Janet Moore & Jay Ansher.
Faculty: Learn more about our faculty and emeritus faculty.
Staff: Click here for a listing of administrative staff, support staff, and post-doc researchers.
Resources: Looking for travel reimbursement, college forms, or other links? Click here for links to Resources for Faculty & Staff
Faculty regularly obtain grants from major national agencies such as NSF, NASA, and DOE that support our undergraduate researchers with paid stipends.
C. Robert O'Dell '59, Physics, L.L.D. '01, was a lead scientist in the development of the Hubble space telescope. He served as project scientist for the first 10 years of the telescope's development at NASA. His observations using the Hubble focused on a study of the great nebula Orion, leading to confirmation that all stars have planets or the potential for planetary systems. O'Dell is a Distinguished Research Professor in the Physics and Astronomy department at Vanderbilt Univeristy in Nashville, Tennessee.
The department's Physics Teacher Education program has received national attention in an American Association of Physics Teachers white paper entitled "The Preparation of Excellent Teachers at All Levels", which states that the ISU program is considered one of the most innovative and the largest in the nation (Reference: Lila M. Adair and Christopher J. Chiaverina, AAPT Planning Meeting, July 27-28, 2000, Toronto, Ontario, Canada).
The department has received two national awards from the U.S. Department of Energy for its Computer Physics courses and degree sequence.
Professors Martin (left) and Rutherford jam at the annual spring picnic.
Dr. Shang-Fen Ren was elected Fellow of the American Physical Society in recognition of outstanding contributions to semicondictor nano-physics and her contributions to international physics, including her Undergraduate Research Experiences in China program. Here an ISU student works with a Chinese student at Beijing University. Drs. Martin and Grobe are also Fellows of the American Physical Society.
Rainer Grobe and Charles Su co-direct the Intense Laser Physics Theory Unit. They have received more that $500,000 from the NSF and the Department of Energy, and Research Corporation. Their work, including the discovery of cycloatoms, is featured internationally in elite scientific journals. Their work has placed them as two of the world's premier theoretical atomic and optical physicists. In addition, the U.S. Patent Office awarded a patent to Grobe for his innovations in the transmission of optical signals through an absorbing medium.
