Paul Crowell

Paul Crowell
Head of School of Physics and Astronomy, Professor, School of Physics and AstronomyContact
John T. Tate Hall Room 130-11 116 Church Street SeMinneapolis, MN 55455
Education
Ph.D., Cornell University, 1994
B.A., Swarthmore College, 1986
Professional Background
- Faculty member of the University of Minnesota since 1997 and is currently a Professor of Physics
- General Chair, Joint MMM/Intermag Conference
- Chair of the APS Topical Group on Magnetism and its Applications, 2012-2013
- Program Committee Seventh International School of Spintronics and Quantum Information Technology, Japan, 2011
- Organizer, Focus Session on Spin-Dependent Phenomena in Semiconductors, APS March Meeting, 2010
- Program Committee, Conference on Magnetism and Magnetic Materials, 2005-2008, 2010
- Program Co-Chair, Conference on Magnetism and Magnetic Materials, Austin, 2008
Scientific & Professional Societies
- Fellow, American Physical Society
My research focuses on spin dynamics and transport in ferromagnets and ferromagnet-semiconductor heterostructures. The first project examines the role of non-equilibrium effects in spin transport in hybrid ferromagnet/semiconductor structures. The materials development for this work is carried out in collaboration with Chris Palmstrom's group at UCSB, who is a collaborator in CSPIN. In recent years, we have succeeded in fabricating simple devices that can be used to test theories of spin transport across interfaces as well as of spin dynamics in the presence of spin-orbit and hyperfine interactions. Similar questions, particularly about the role of interfaces, appear in studies of spin transport in all-metallic heterostructures, a research project that is being carried out in collaboration with Professor Chris Leighton and supported by Seagate. In C-SPIN I am also working on spin-transport in graphene (in collaboration with Steve Koester) and (with Palmstrom) on integrating highly polarized materials into heterostructures with strong spin-orbit coupling.
Honors and Awards
- Fellow, American Physical Society, 2008
- McKnight Presidential Fellow, University of Minnesota, 2004-2007
- Sloan Foundation Fellow, 1999-2001
- McKnight Land Grant Professor, University of Minnesota 1999-2001
Advisees & Collaborators
Undergraduate Students:
- Joe Dill
Graduate Students:
- James Etheridge
- Alex Hamill
- Zhen Jiang
- Bill Peria
- Han Yu
Postdoctoral Researchers:
- Tao Qu