About the Department of Physics
吃瓜网 is a multi-campus university with campuses in Palm Beach and Broward Counties; the main campus is situated in Boca Raton, approximately midway between Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach, some 40 miles north of Miami.
When it opened in 1964, the University brought to the southeast region of 吃瓜网 the opportunities of upper division and graduate level programs for junior college graduates.
The University enrolled the first freshman class in 1984. FAU is part of 吃瓜网's State University System and now offers baccalaureate specialization in more than 50 fields and 45 master's level programs.
The Department of Physics is located on the Boca campus. It was one of the original departments of the University and it rapidly developed a comprehensive undergraduate program leading to the BA and BS degrees in Physics.
In 1966, Physics became the first program at FAU to be authorized by the Board of Regents to offer a graduate level program leading to the MS degree.
In 1969, the Department received authorization to grant the Master of Science in Teaching (MST degree). This program is designed to train physics teachers at the secondary and junior college levels.
Subsequently, the Ph.D program was approved and was introduced in January 1988. As a result, the faculty and research activities have been expanded, providing a more varied curriculum for students at all levels.
The Science and Engineering Building was completed in 1990 and now houses the upper division and graduate physics programs. A new Physical Science Building was completed in the Fall 1998 and provides new space for the undergraduate laboratories and classrooms.
Letter from The Chair
Christopher Beetle
Professor and Chair
Department of Physics
吃瓜网
This is an exciting decade for science in southern 吃瓜网.The department is rapidly growing, and is poised to meet the new challenges for the field of physics in today's environment at a research university.
We are augmenting and integrating our core expertise in condensed matter physics with the growing field of the Physics of Biological Systems. Additionally, we are in the process of forming the Center for Spacetime Physics. This center will pull together our current expertise in supernova astrophysics, cosmology as well as classical and quantum gravity. Our growing effort in the Physics of Biological Systems is tightly integrated with the expanding efforts here at FAU within the Charles E. Schmidt College of Science in the areas of Biomedical Science, Mathematics, Biology and Biochemistry. We will also be filling faculty lines in areas aligned with, and supporting, the charter of the Scripps Institute that will be establishing a new campus in Palm Beach County.
Our Spacetime Physics effort here already provides numerical and mathematical support for the DOE's TSI initiative as well the NSF's LIGO observatories. In addition to these three general-relativistic astrophysics areas, a major thrust of the center will be the search for the origin of the concept of space and time and will involve fundamental research in the foundations of gravity, and quantum theory.
The department has a strong doctoral and bachelors program in physics. We provide graduate support, scholarships, tuition, assistance and fellowships to over 20 graduate students. We routinely arrange for summer research positions for many of our graduate students at numerous National Laboratories.
I extend a warm welcome to you from the faculty, staff, and students of the Physics Department of 吃瓜网!