Prospective Graduate Students

UCI is one of the ten campuses of the University of California and is the first public university with faculty receiving two Nobel prizes in two different fields – physics & chemistry – in the same year (1995).

The UC Irvine Physics and Astronomy Department was ranked 10^th among U.S. public and research universities for scientific influence in physics (ISI). It was recently ranked 29^th among all physics doctoral programs (public or private).

More importantly, the quality of the department is on a steep upward trend.

One measure of the dynamic growth is that 25 new faculty were hired since 2000, growing the faculty number to 43. Among the newly recruited young faculty, 10 have received the highest awards for new faculty (NSF CAREER/DOE Outstanding Investigator) from the National Science Foundation or the Department of Energy. 5 have received prestigious Alfred P. Sloan fellowships. This outstanding group of new young faculty is second to none in the nation and paves the way for a further increase of ranking and reputation of the already well-recognized scholarship at the UC Irvine Physics and Astronomy Department.

The increase in quality is reflected in the significant increase in extramural research funding (grants, contracts, gifts) awarded to researchers in the Physics Department. The funding has increased year by year since 2000, and more than doubled from the 2000 value, $6.8 Mio, to the 2007 value, $15.9 Mio, the latest for which a national listing is available. Such increase is unusual in a time of tight budgets and consequently, UCI Physics rose from 49^th in the research funding ranking in 2000 to 22^nd in 2007, outpacing Physics Departments at Harvard, Yale, Duke, University of Chicago, and UC – Santa Barbara, to name a few.

Education

We offer multiple ways to reach a Physics. Ph.D. degree, allowing students to find the courses most optimally suited to their interests.

The traditional Physics and Astronomy graduate program is described here.

For students interested in interdisciplinary training, leading towards a Ph.D. in Physics, there are three options available at UC Irvine:

The ChaMP is designed to prepare M.S. and Ph.D. scientists for modern careers in Physical Sciences, where cross-disciplinary education with an emphasis on applications is in increasing demand. Designed to appeal to students with backgrounds in Chemistry, Physics, or Engineering, the program unifies physical and chemical approaches to the study of matter, through the applied science of modern materials.

The Mathematical, Computational and Systems Biology Graduate Program provides one year of education at the interface between the quantitative sciences (Mathematics, Physics, Computer Science) and Biology. Students can enter this program during their first or second year at UC Irvine. The program is supported by multiple training grants.

The LifeChips graduate program provides fellowships from an NSF IGERT training grant and specialized training for students interested in combining the practices of engineering, physical sciences, biological sciences and medicine to produce small-scale technologies that benefit human health.

Complementing formal courses, regular gatherings enable faculty and students to interact. Individual research groups have weekly meetings that are open to all students, and especially welcome new students. The Department hosts mandatory weekly “pizza lunches” for new graduate students, where a faculty member provides an overview of research opportunities; weekly “cosmo”, “biophysics”, particle physics lunches”, and meetings of other research groups where advanced students present research and hone communication skills; and a daily coffee hour for faculty researchers and students. Additional seminars and lunch lecture series are organized by research centers.

Research
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Support
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The graduate program in Physics and Astronomy at UCI is committed to provide competitive financial support to all qualified students.

UC Irvine typically guarantees an offer of affordable on-campus housing to newly admitted full time Ph.D students for a period of 5 years. For more information about current housing rates, please visit http://www.housing.uci.edu/rates.asp

During the first year of study, graduate students are typically provided stipends, tuition fee fellowships, and/or teaching assistantships or reader positions. The details of the initial financial support package will be spelled out in the offer letter to you and depend on your personal situation and on whether or not you qualify for Regent’s or Chancellor’s fellowships. As a point of reference, a student with a Regent’s fellowship in 2009 received $21,637 in financial support for the period from 1 Oct 2009 – 30 June 2010. In the class of 2009, most students (14 out of 25) qualified for this fellowship.

In subsequent years, students typically receive support through Research Assistantships once they begin their doctoral studies.

Location
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The UCI campus is located on 1,489 acres of coastal foothills just 5 miles from the Pacific Ocean, and midway between Los Angeles and San Diego. The temperate, Mediterranean climate is classic Southern California.

The proximity of the campus to the ocean provides ready access to water sports such as surfing, sailing, kayaking and fishing at the local Laguna, Corona del Mar, and Newport beaches. Local mountain and desert recreation areas are within easy reach for skiing, hiking, and climbing expeditions. A wide variety of campus recreation programs are available to grad students and their families. Physics faculty and students participate in Department soccer and ultimate Frisbee games.