Physics Department

Contact Information

Dr. Xinhua Bai, Graduate Program Coordinator
Department of Physics
Electrical Engineering/Physics 217
(605) 394-5198
E-mail: Xinhua.Bai@sdsmt.edu

Faculty

Professors Corey, Schnee, and Sobolev; Associate Professors Bai, French, Reichenbacher, and Strieder;
Assistant Professors Martinez Caicedo, Paudel, and Wang;
Lecturer Dowding; Emeritus Professors Petukhov, Detwiler, Foygel, and Helsdon.

Graduate Program in Physics

The program prepares students for a variety of career paths, including positions in academia, industry and at national labs. Although degree candidates may pursue research in any field related to the expertise of individual faculty members, the primary goal of the program is to focus on research areas germane to projects at the Sanford Underground Research Facility (SURF). Examples include neutrino detection, dark matter search, particle and nuclear astrophysics, as well as condensed matter physics concentrating on novel materials and devices. Research of the SD Mines physics department in these areas is strongly connected to SURF. In the meantime, research activities are also performed with other renowned national and international laboratories such as Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (FNAL) near Chicago, the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory Laboratory (SNOLAB) in Canada, and the IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the geographic South Pole. Specific research areas of all physics faculty members are summarized in the table below.

Specific Research Areas

Xinhua Bai:	Experimental Astroparticle and Cosmic Ray Physics, High-energy Muon and Neutrino Measurements
Robert Corey:	Solid State Nuclear Magnetic Resonance
Michael Dowding:	Physics Education
Adam French:	Atmospheric Physics, Thunderstorm Dynamics, Mesoscale Weather Systems
David Martinez Caicedo:	Neutrino Physics
Tula Paudel:	Computational Condensed Matter Physics, Materials Science
Matthias Plum:	Experimental Astroparticle and Cosmic Ray Physics, Applied Machine Learning
Juergen Reichenbacher:	Neutrino Physics, Dark Matter Search, Low Background Counting, and Nuclear Forensics
Richard Schnee:	Experimental Particle Astrophysics, Dark Matter Search, Low Background Counting
Vladimir Sobolev:	Condensed Matter Physics, Materials Science of Substances with Spontaneous Polarization (ferroelectrics, magnetoelectrics, and magnetic materials)
Jingbo Wang:	Neutrino Physics, Experimental Nuclear Physics

Degree Options

The principal degree option in the physics graduate program is the PhD. Candidates also have the option to choose between a thesis and a non-thesis MS degree.The principal degree option in the physics graduate program is the PhD. Candidates also have the option to choose between a thesis and a non-thesis MS degree.

Outcomes

The mission of the physics graduate program is to provide students with quality graduate instruction and research experiences preparing them for a number of career options in academia, research, or industry. The outcomes for the graduate programs are:

Students will have deep knowledge of physics.
Students will be able to perform effective research in physics.
Students will communicate effectively.
PhD students will be able to play a leading role in their research.

Financial support

Most graduate students in the Physics Department receive financial assistance in the form of teaching or research assistantships. Students with a qualifying assistantship are entitled to a monthly stipend and significantly reduced tuition rate. Detailed information regarding costs (both with and without an assistantship) is available at: https://www.sdsmt.edu/Academics/Graduate-Education/Tuition-and-Related-Costs/ .

Students wishing to be considered for financial assistance should submit their application by the deadlines stated on the university Office of Graduate Education website.

Background requirements

Students entering the program are expected to have a BS or MS in physics or a related discipline.

Admission requirements

The following items are required to apply for admission:

Official transcripts from all universities attended, including evidence of BS degree
A written statement of purposeGeneral GRE score report
Three letters of recommendation (preferably from parent-institution instructors)
Completed application form
Physics GRE score report (recommended but not required)
Evidence of English proficiency (applicants from countries where English is not the language of instruction)

Applicants must have at least a 3.0 (B) grade point average in their undergraduate work.

Transfer credits

Policies for transferring credits from outside institutions can be found in the requirements and policies applied to all graduate degrees by the university Council of Graduate Education. All transfers are subject to approval by the student’s graduate committee.