What led you to pursue a postdoctoral position in Physics at U of T?

My main goal in pursuing a postdoc was to broaden my horizons and fill in some of the gaps I felt I had in my physics background. In addition to just being very strong overall, the physics department at U of T has very little overlap with my graduate studies, so it was the perfect place to pursue this goal. I was also excited to get to work with Prof. Yong Baek Kim, a legendary figure in the field, and it didn’t hurt that I already had a few good friends in the department.

Where did you complete your Ph.D. What was the topic of your PhD thesis and why?

I did both my undergraduate and graduate studies at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where I was supervised by Prof. Taylor Hughes. My thesis was titled “Crystalline-electromagnetic responses of topological semimetals and insulators” and was about the way that lattice defects couple to electrons in a variety of phases of topological quantum matter. The overarching goal of the work was to further our understanding of the interplay between crystalline and charge-conservation symmetries.

Could you describe the focus of your current research as a postdoc? What inspired or motivated you to pursue this specific research area?

At the moment I’m working in the very active field of twisted two-dimensional materials. In these systems, atomically thin sheets of materials like graphene are stacked on top of each other with a small rotation between the layers. It turns out that this twist is an extremely powerful tuning parameter, and experimentalists have discovered a zoo of exotic quantum phases in these systems. Fabricating twisted materials is extremely labor intensive, so practical applications are far off in the future, but they provide an unprecedented opportunity to study fundamental questions about strongly-interacting many-body physics. Personally, I’m enjoying learning new numerical techniques to study these very complicated systems, and it’s nice to work on something so closely related to experiment.

Have you collaborated with other researchers or departments during your postdoc? How have these collaborations enhanced your research?

Outside of Toronto, I recently finished up a collaboration with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and QuEra Computing studying quantum criticality and nonequilibrium dynamics using QuEra’s neutral atom quantum simulator. This was a very challenging experience and was far out of my area of expertise, but I learned a huge amount from the experience and from my collaborators. Locally, I’m hoping to start collaborating soon with two of our recent hires, Prof. Sergio de la Barrera and Prof. Valentin Crepel, both of whom are experts in two-dimensional quantum materials.

How do you believe your research contributes to the broader field or addresses current challenges?

For twisted materials, my work has so far focused on understanding the mechanical properties of something called an “anomalous Hall crystal”. This phase was proposed to explain one of the more exciting recent experiments on twisted materials, and my work contributes to the field by helping assess whether this phase is present or not in that experiment. In a practical sense, understanding the phases that appear in twisted materials is a necessary first step towards understanding their potential technological utility.

What challenges have you encountered in your research, and how have you worked to overcome them?

I’ve encountered many challenges as I’ve transitioned to working on strongly correlated physics in my postdoc. There was a huge amount of theory and literature to catch up on, and I had to learn complex computational methods and implement them on unfamiliar computing resources. All of these challenges required a lot of patience and persistence, but, more often than not, I was fortunate to have a colleague in the department with just the right expertise to help me out. It can be scary in academia to admit you don’t know something and seek out help, but moving past that fear has contributed enormously to my growth as a researcher.

In what ways has your postdoctoral experience contributed to your professional development?

One of the biggest ways is just through the increased level of independence and responsibility that I have as a postdoc. I had to learn to swim after getting dropped in the deep end of a new field, and I’m a better researcher now for it. I now feel much more capable of learning and adapting to new areas of research, and it’s exciting to think of how many doors that confidence opens for my research. I’ve also had many opportunities to hone my writing and communication skills, from taking the lead writing papers and presenting work at conferences.

Are you actively involved in departmental activities or events? How do you engage with the department's academic and social community?

Yes, I think it’s very important to be engaged with the community. Academically, I attend as many seminars as I can, and I occasionally present in the journal club that the graduate students run. I’ve also made many friends in the department, and enjoy spending time bouldering and playing board games with them.

What are your future career aspirations after completing your postdoc?

I’ve only just finished the first year of my postdoc, so I don’t know where I’m going next yet. Long term, it would be nice to be faculty at a university or a research scientist at a lab. I’m also open to moving into the quantum computing industry.

What advice would you give to graduate students or early-career researchers considering a postdoc? Are there lessons learned during your postdoc that you believe would be valuable for others in the field?

I would give the same advice to a graduate student considering a postdoc as I would to an undergraduate considering graduate school: Think carefully and deeply about what is important to you and how your next move will accomplish that. Talk to people both in academia and industry to learn the pros and cons of each, so you can make an informed decision about what’s best for you personally.