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Principal Investigator: Dr. Ceren B. Dag
Principal Investigator: Dr. Ceren B. Dag
Ceren is an asst. professor at Indiana University Bloomington in the Department of Physics, and a research scholar at Harvard University in the Department of Physics. Ceren enjoys working at the intersections of different subfields of physics, brainstorming with other scientists and spending time with nature. She was an ITAMP Fellow at Harvard University before joining IU Bloomington as a faculty. She earned her PhD in Physics at University of Michigan Ann Arbor in 2021 studying quantum many-body systems out of equilibrium, quantum phases and phase transitions. Prior to that, she graduated in 2015 from Istanbul Technical University double majoring in Physics and Electronics & Telecommunications Engineering, where she started physics research with quantum thermodynamics and quantum optics. Click here to see Ceren's contributions, or check the Research tab.
Email: cbdag [at] iu [dot] edu
Email: cbdag [at] iu [dot] edu
Postdoctoral Researcher: Dr. Hanzhen Ma
Postdoctoral Researcher: Dr. Hanzhen Ma
Dr. Ma earned his PhD in 2023 at the University of Connecticut in Storrs writing his dissertation on cooperative phenomena in many-body radiative systems with analytical and numerical methods in Yelin Group. He was a visiting PhD student at Harvard University between 2021 and 2023, and continued to work in Yelin Group at Harvard as a postdoctoral research until he joined our group in February 2025. Prior to his graduate training, he graduated from Wuhan University in 2017 majoring in physics and studying heat transfer between metamaterials covered by semiconducting films. He is currently focusing on cavity induced physics in quantum materials and engineered systems, open quantum systems and Rydberg atom array quantum simulations.
Email: hm31 [at] iu [dot] edu
Email: hm31 [at] iu [dot] edu
Postdoctoral Researcher: Dr. Mostafa Ali
Postdoctoral Researcher: Dr. Mostafa Ali
Mostafa earned his Ph.D. in Physics in May 2026 from Michigan State University under the supervision of Dr. Mohammad Maghrebi. His dissertation research focused on quantum many-body systems out of equilibrium. Specifically, he developed exact nonequilibrium steady-state solutions for driven dissipative spin chains and explored how Markovian dissipation can stabilize quantum phase transitions. To study these systems, his work combines analytical approaches with large-scale numerical simulations using tensor-network methods (MPS). Prior to his graduate studies, he received his B.S. in Physics from the University of Science and Technology at Zewail City in 2020. His ongoing research interests broadly encompass quantum sensing, open quantum systems, and nonequilibrium dynamics. Outside of research, he is an avid long-distance runner and a movie enthusiast.
Email: moaali [at] iu [dot] edu
Email: moaali [at] iu [dot] edu
PhD student: Changrui Chen
PhD student: Changrui Chen
Changrui is a PhD student studying at Indiana University Bloomington and joined our group in Fall 2025. He obtained his BSc degrees in mathematics and physics in 2023 from Beijing Normal University, and his MSc degree in physics from Brown University in 2025. His interest areas lie in mathematical physics and condensed matter theory. In our group, Changrui has been focusing on the random unitary circuit theory and entanglement structure of many-body quantum states.
Email: cc146 [at] iu [dot] edu
Email: cc146 [at] iu [dot] edu
PhD student: Brendan Worthley
PhD student: Brendan Worthley
Brendan is an upcoming PhD student in Indiana University Bloomington and joined our group in May 2026. He obtained his BSc degree in Physics and Mathematics at Boston College in 2025. Brendan is currently exploring open quantum system physics and cavity quantum materials.
Email: bworthl [at] iu [dot] edu
Email: bworthl [at] iu [dot] edu
PhD student: Aarya Bothra
PhD student: Aarya Bothra
Aarya is an upcoming PhD student in Indiana University Bloomington and joining our group in September 2026. He obtained his integrated BSc+MSc degrees in Physical Science from Indian Insitute of Science Education and Research Kolkata.
Email: TBA
Email: TBA
PhD student (joint with M. Snow and D. Mitra): Sepehr Samiei
PhD student (joint with M. Snow and D. Mitra): Sepehr Samiei
Sepehr is PhD student at Indiana University Bloomington primarily in Snow Lab trained in experimental nuclear physics and in Mitra Lab trained in precision spectroscopy of cold molecules. Sepehr studies random matrix theory (RMT) in our group focusing on the role of RMT and its violations in nuclear physics problems such as parity violation.
Email: ssamiei [at] iu [dot] edu
Email: ssamiei [at] iu [dot] edu
Visiting Postdoctoral Researcher: Dr. Volker Karle
Visiting Postdoctoral Researcher: Dr. Volker Karle
Dr. Karle investigates chiral cavity induced physics in quantum matter in our group. He graduated from the Institute of Science and Technology Austria in 2024 working in Lemeshko Group on the topics of quantum chaos, ultracold atoms and molecules, and many-body physics. Click here to see Volker's contributions.
Email: volker.karle [at] ist [dot] ac [dot] at
Email: volker.karle [at] ist [dot] ac [dot] at
Undergraduates in research
Undergraduates in research
Cole Brzezinski, 4th year in Computer Science and Physics majors at IU
Active affiliated members (scientists in training and advised by the PI on a project)
Active affiliated members (scientists in training and advised by the PI on a project)
Jakub Novotný, PhD student at Institute of Particle & Nuclear Physics, Charles University (Prague)
Lauren H. Li, PhD student at Princeton University
Fiona Abney-McPeek, PhD student at MIT
Jiecheng Feng, PhD student in Max Planck Institute for the Structure and Dynamics of Matter
Alumni
Alumni
Zhongling Lu, was an affiliated member, now PhD student in Yale University
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