Women in Quantum Science and Engineering Lecture Series: Laura Greene

PQI Event

Year of Diversity

Who: Laura Greene, Florida State University

When:

Tuesday, March 7, 2017 - 11:00am to 12:00pm

Where:

O'Hara Student Center Ballroom

View Laura Greene's itinerary

Picture Gallery

Interview with Laura Greene:

Upcoming Talk: Tuesday, March 7 at 11:00 a.m.

Year of Diversity at PQI

The Year of Diversity at Pitt

Last April, Provost Patricia E. Beeson announced in her closing remarks at the Senate plenary session that the upcoming academic year will be the Year of Diversity at Pitt. “It’s going to be a year that we’re going to celebrate difference; a year when we’re going to engage in conversations about difference: about cultural difference, academic difference and political differences,” she said. The Office of the Provost has therefore offered opportunity and support to organize various events to celebrate diversity in academia. At the Pittsburgh Quantum Institute (PQI), we decided to celebrate Women in Quantum Science and Engineering: outstanding researchers dedicated to furthering different fields of physics, chemistry, and engineering, and who happen to be strong, brilliant, empowering women.

Women in Quantum Science and Engineering

Women you said? Yes, in the field of Quantum Science and Engineering—as in most STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) fields, women are a resonating minority. Even at PQI, out of our seventy members, only ten faculty members are female, which accounts for a mere 14% of the membership. To overcome this gender imbalance, it is important to convince more women—as well as other underrepresented students—to pursue majors and careers in Quantum Science and Engineering. This may be achieved by giving the opportunity to established women scientists to share their experience with the local student community. The mission statement of the Pittsburgh Quantum Institute is to help unify and promote Quantum Science and Engineering in Pittsburgh. Within the framework of the Year of Diversity, we therefore propose that the efforts to fulfill this mission be directed by and for the community of Women in Quantum Science and Engineering.

A Lecture Series

PQI is therefore organizing a Lecture Series, with four local speakers and PQI members from the Departments of Physics, Chemistry, and Chemical Engineering at Pitt, as well as from the Department of Materials Science at CMU. Four additional speakers have been carefully chosen for both their scientific achievements and their involvement in bridging the diversity gap in STEM. They will all give colloquium-style talks throughout the Spring semester of 2017. Spread the word, and encourage your peers or students to attend. Although we are celebrating diversity in gender, we encourage the participation of all minorities in our events! These events not only ties in the Year of Diversity, but also fulfills PQI’s mission statement by providing the opportunity to personally meet strong female role models, which may broaden the perceived perspectives in Quantum Science and Engineering.

Biography: Laura Greene

Chief Scientist, National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, Florida State University

Laura H. Greene is a physics professor at the Florida State University, Chief Scientist at the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, and president of the American Physics Society. She was previously a professor of physics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
She is noted for her research on Andreev bound states and is an expert in strongly correlated Fermionic systems. During the discoveries of the first high transition temperature (Hi-Tc) superconductors she and collaborators from AT&T laboratories, were amongst the first to report on the role of oxygen and crystal structure in the copper-oxides. Laura Greene is a champion for diversity and is active in promoting equal rights for women and minorities. She is a member of the Department of State supported COACh team, an organization for assisting in the success and impact of women scientists and engineers.
Laura Greene studied physics as an undergraduate at Ohio State University and was awarded a cum laude BS, (1974) degree and Master’s (MS) in 1978. For higher education she joined Cornell University. At Cornell, first she was awarded a MS in experimental physics (1980) and then in (1984) she completed a PhD degree in condensed matter physics. With her PhD she joined the fabled AT&T Bell Labs in Murray Hills in New Jersey (NJ) and later Bellcore, Red Bank also in NJ.
Laura Greene is committed to equal rights for women and minorities in education and in the work place, particularly when it comes to the hard sciences and the engineering professions; she actively promotes awareness and sensitivity towards people who face difficult health challenges. She is a Co-founder of the Forum on Outreach and Engaging the Public (FOEP), and a member of Committee on Informing the Public, both parts of the American Physical Society. Laura Greene was on ‘BOOST/Grantwriting/Indonesia Advisory Board’; part of COACH International, for the Kavli Frontiers of Science Indonesia Meeting, Bali, Indonesia and she has served on the Argonne Education and Outreach Council for the Division of Educational Programs, Argonne National Laboratory (Argonne-U/Chicago-LLC).

Abstract

Correlated Electrons: the Dark Energy of Condensed Matter

The nearly 80-year-old correlated electron problem remains largely unsolved; with one stunning success being BCS electron-phonon mediated “conventional” superconductivity. There are dozens of families of superconductors that are “unconventional” including the high-T_c cuprate, iron-based, and heavy fermion superconductors. Although these materials are disparate in many properties, some of their fundamental properties are strikingly similar, including their ubiquitous phase diagram in which the superconductivity emerges near a magnetic quantum phase transition, plus some intriguing, enigmatic electronic phases that arise in the non-superconducting states. A recent research direction is towards the fundamental understanding of these phases, in the anticipation to predictively design new higher-T_c, J_c, and more practical superconductors.