Quantum Materials Leadership

Materials drive the technological world and the future of materials belongs to the quantum realm. UT’s condensed matter physicists are at the forefront of research to tease out what happens at the microscopic level to define, design, and create materials for a new age.

With expertise in theory and experiment and access to powerful tools, our faculty investigate what happens in strongly interacting electron systems and how quantum states of matter emerge and behave. They develop sophisticated computational frameworks for speeding up how to sort and describe subatomic constituents. With advanced instruments both on campus and at partner facilities, they synthesize novel quantum materials and devices and determine their structures and properties.

Our CMP faculty play a defining role in the university’s Quantum Materials for Future Technologies (QMFT) Research Cluster, which won an $18 million award from the National Science Foundation to establish a Materials Research and Engineering Center (MRSEC), one of only 20 such centers nationwide. Their contributions were crucial in bringing the Center for Advanced Materials and Manufacturing to fruition and physics faculty members now lead the center’s administration, as well as the artificial intelligence for quantum materials research team.

The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, is rapidly emerging as a leader in quantum materials research and the physics faculty is central to that success.