Invited Speakers

Dr. Mette Gaarde

Presenting on: Attosecond science: making movies of very fast electron dynamics

Mette Gaarde is the Les and Dot Broussard Alumni Professor of Physics. Her research focuses on how the electrons inside atoms, molecules, and solids respond when they are exposed to very short laser pulses. These electrons naturally move on the attosecond time scale, and their laser-driven motion leads to the production of attosecond light pulses — the shortest bursts of light ever made and the subject of the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physics. The ultrafast response of electrons to an attosecond light pulse also represent the first few frames of a “molecular movie” that follows the evolution of a photochemical reaction from its very beginning. Gaarde uses high performance computer simulations to study both the production of attosecond light pulses, and the dynamics that they can initiate. 

Gaarde received her PhD in Physics from University of Copenhagen, Denmark, and joined the LSU Faculty in 2003. She has received multiple awards at LSU, most recently the 2023 Distinguished Research Master Award for STEM. Gaarde is a Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS) and of Optica, and she recently served as Chair of the APS Division of Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Physics. 

Dr. Ryan Glasser

Presenting on: Artificial intelligence in the NISQ era

Prof. Ryan Glasser received his Ph.D. in physics at LSU in 2009, studying under the late Prof. Jonathan Dowling. After graduating he worked at a defense contractor for 1.5 years on an experimental DARPA program involving quantum sensors and quantum imaging/communication. He then worked at NIST in early 2011 as an NRC Postdoctoral Fellow.  This work continued in the Laser Cooling and Trapping Group as a postdoctoral researcher at the Joint Quantum Institute (NIST and the University of Maryland). He began as an assistant professor at Tulane University in the Fall of 2014, and was promoted to associate professor with tenure in 2020.  His research group at Tulane focuses on the combination of artificial intelligence and quantum technologies.

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Dr. Daniel Massat 

Presenting on:  Moiré materials from the perspective of momentum space 

Daniel Massatt is an Assistant Professor in the LSU mathematics department. He obtained his PhD from the University of Minnesota, and was a William H. Kruskal Instructor in the Statistics Department of the University of Chicago before joining LSU. He studies numerical methods and phenomenological analysis of electronic structure problems with a focus on 2D materials including moiré layered structures and topological insulators.