Professor Minhyea Lee's Research Group 

My group studies quantum materials — crystalline solids with unusual physical properties arising from the quantum mechanical nature and interactions of electrons. Our interests include exotic magnetic phases and their low energy excitations, heat transport mechanisms,  strong spin-orbit interaction, and its imprints on light-matter interactions. These topics are not only at the heart of exciting developments in quantum materials research but also have strong potential to play a vital role in future technologies. 

We are particularly interested in magnetic materials: Advances in spintronics and quantum information processing are firmly rooted in understanding not only the properties of magnetically ordered states, spin excitations, and exotic ground states but also of the nature of the interaction between spin and lattice degrees of freedom.

My group employs a range of experimental probes --  transport properties,  Magneto-Optical Spectroscopy, Cantilever-Based Magnetometry, and various Thermodynamic Variable measurements under intense magnetic fields, high pressure and low temperature, to investigate the ground states and their low-energy excitations as well as the fundamental nature of couplings among different degrees of freedoms within crystalline solids

• Linear magnetoresistance phenomena in non-magnetic materials

• Magnetic Materials and their thermodynamic properties 

• Electrical and Thermal Transport Properties

• Magneto-Optical spectroscopy

• Cantilever-based magnetometry

Please contact Professor Minhyea Lee for further information! 

Principal Investigator 

• Dr. Minhyea Lee  (CV)

Graduate Research Assistant

• Hope Whitelock  (Hope.Whitelock[at]colorado.edu)

• Alexander Fix ( Alexander.Fix[at]colorado.edu)

** We are looking for highly motivated graduate students. If you are interested in talking to Professor Lee, please feel free to contact me  at minhyea.lee@colorado.edu

Alumni

• Emily Chavez (MS 2024, Thorlab)

• Colvin Iorio (REU, 2024)

• Elliot Roberts  (Post-Bachelor researcher, 2024)

• Marissa McMaster (Post-Bachelor researcher, 2023)

• Will Dietz(UG researcher, 2023)

• Ian Leahy (PhD 2021, National Renewable Energy Lab)

• Christopher Pocs (PhD 2021, Honeywell)

• Roei Dery (REU, 2021)

• Peter Siegfried (PhD 2020, Quantinuum)

• Mark Maus (UG honor thesis 2019)

• Andrew Treglia (UG research 2018)

• Roberto Valenuela (REU, 2017)

• Aaron Kraft (REU, 2015)

• Bailey Bedford (REU, 2014)

• Alex Borstein ( UG honor thesis 2014)

• Irene Duba (REU, 2013)

• Max Grossnickle  (UG honor thesis 2011)

Please see  Professor Lee's Google Scholar page  for the full list 

16. Leahy IA, Treglia, A, Cao, G. Skinner, B, Lee M. Refining the two-band model for highly compensated semimetals using thermoelectric coefficients. Physical Review B 112, 035135 (2025); DOI:10.1103/8nhh-cp3k (2025)

15. Pocs CA, Leahy IA, Xing J, Choi E, Sefat AS, Hermele M, Lee M. Heat conduction in magnetic insulators via hybridization of acoustic phonons and spin-flip excitations. Physical  Review Research Letter 7, L022007 (2025); DOI:10.1103/PhysRevResearch.7.L022007 

14. Suetsugu S, Shimomura M, Kamimura M, Asaba T, Asaeda H, Kosuge Y, Sekino Y, Ikemori S, Kasahara Y, Kohsaka Y, Lee M, Yanase Y, Sakai H, Opletal P, Yoshifumi Tokiwa Y, Haga Y, Matsuda Y. Fully gapped pairing state in spin-triplet superconductor UTe2. Science Advancea 10, eadk3772 (2024); DOI:10.1126/sciadv.adk3772

13. Feng K, Bush C, Oladehin O, Lee M, Baumbach R. Complex Antiferromagnetic Order in the Metallic Triangular Lattice Compound SmAuAl4Ge2. Physical Review B 109, 014436 (2024); DOI:10.1103/PhysRevB.109.014436 

12. Nelson JN, Leahy IA, Rice AD, Brook C, Teeter G, Schilfgaarde Mv, Lany S, Fluegel B, Lee M, Alberi, K. Direct Link between disorder and magnetoresistance in topological semimetals. Physical Review B 107, L220206 (2023); DOI:10.1103/PhysRevB.107.L220206

11. Jo S, Lee M,  Leahy IA, Vendrell X,  Raj, R. Capacitive discharge in flash experiments: A discussion of the charged species. Journal of the American Ceramic Society  106, 5635. 2023; DOI:10.1111/jace.19250

10. Spann BT,  Weber JC,  Brubaker MD,  Todd  EH, Yang L, Honarvar H, Tsai CN, Treglia AC, Lee M, Hussein MI et al. Semiconductor Thermal and Electrical Properties Decoupled by Localized Phonon Resonances. Advanced Materials 35, 2209779 (2023); DOI: 10.1002/adma.202209779.

9. Feng K, Leahy IA, Oladehin O, Wei K, Lee M, Baumbach R. Magnetic ordering in GdAuAl4Ge2 and TbAuAl4Ge2 : Layered compounds with triangular lanthanide nets. Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 564, 170006 (2022); DOI: 10.1016/j.jmmm.2022.170006 

8. Leahy I, Feng K, Dery R, Baumbach R, Lee M. Field-induced magnetic states in the metallic rare-earth layered triangular antiferromagnet TbAuAl4Ge2. Physical Review B 106, 094426 (2022); DOI:10.1103/PhysRevB.106.094426 

7. Pocs C, Siegfried P, Xing J, Sefat A, Hermele M, Normand B, Lee M. Systematic extraction of crystal electric-field effects and quantum magnetic model parameters in triangular rare-earth magnets. Physical Review Research 3, 043202 (2021); DOI:10.1103/PhysRevResearch.3.043202

6. Lee M. Disorder exchange is biased. Nature Physics 17, 434 (2021); DOI:10.1038/s41567-020-01127-6

5. You, JS, Eom, MJ,  Lee, M,  Jo, YJ, Won, CJ, Cheong, S-W, Kim, Kyoo, Kim, JS. Thermoelectric properties of the stripe-charge ordering phases in IrTe2. Physical Review B 103, 45102 (2021); DOI:10.1103/PhysRevB.103.045102

4. Zhao H, Hu B, Ye F, Lee M, Schlottmann P, Cao G. Ground state in proximity to a possible Kitaev spin liquid: The undistorted honeycomb iridate NaxIrO3 ( 0.60 ≤ x ≤ 0.80 ). Physical Review B 104, L041108 (2021); DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevB.104.L041108 

3. Tran T, Pocs C, Zhang Y, Winiarski M, Sun J, Lee M, McQueen T. Spinon excitations in the quasi-one-dimensional S = 1/2 chain compound Cs4CuSb2Cl12. Physical Review B 101, 235107 (2020); DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevB.101.235107 

2. Cao G, Zheng H, Zhao H, Ni Y, Pocs C, Zhang Y, Ye F, Hoffmann C, Wang X, Lee M, Hermele M, Kimchi I. Quantum liquid from strange frustration in the trimer magnet Ba4Ir3O10. npj Quantum Materials 5, 26 (2020); DOI: 10.1038/s41535-020-0232-6 

1. Pocs CA, Leahy IA, Zheng H, Cao G, Choi E, Do S, Choi K, Normand B, Lee M. Giant thermal magnetoconductivity in CrCl3 and a general model for spin-phonon scattering. Physical Review Research 2, 013059 (2020); DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevResearch.2.013059 

Professor Minhyea Lee  

• minhyea.lee@Colorado.edu   

• Office at  Duane F517  

• Phone: 303-492-1440

Lab 

• Duane E2B28, E2B42-44

• Lab Phone : 303-492-7551

• Mailing address :  2000 Colorado Ave  Boulder CO 80309-0390