NATURE COMMUNICATIONS - Key Persons

Following his fourth year undergraduate project, Anthony has joined us as a Project Officer to continue his work on "Spin topology of metallic magnets". Anthony is now pursuing his PhD at the University of Cambridge.

Antoine did his undergraduate final year project at the Grenoble High Magnetic Field Laboratory in France where he was introduced to cryogenic research through the development of a heat capacity system for measurements at low temperatures and high magnetic fields. He then joined the oil industry in France, where he worked as a geophysicist. Two years later however, he decided to join us in Singapore to invest on his rather unique expertise on low temperature physics and geophysics. He has since become the project leader of the construction and set up of one of the top 3 vibration-free laboratories for research in nano material properties in the world.

Azar first learned about Nanyang Technological University when it was to host the 2006 International Physics Olympiad. With some research at his home country in Azerbaijan, he realized that this university is a good place to pursue his physics career and applied for his undergraduate studies. All the administration procedures were swiftly settled during the Olympiad and he started his Bachelor of Science degree soon after wards. Among many modules that he took as an undergraduate student, he found modules related to condensed matter physics especially interesting and decided to work in this field of physics. He joined us in November 2008 for his undergraduate final year project and has been working in the team as a Project Officer since his graduation in 2010. He is now pursuing his graduate studies at Cornell University.

Chern Hui completed his bachelor studies and joint-master programme between the National University Singapore and Ecole Polytechnique (France) in 2014. Specialized in atomic physics, he has two years of working experience in a cold atom lab at the Centre for Quantum Technology, National University of Singapore, where he performed experiments on cavity QED systems. Interests include, but not limited to, experimental quantum computation, robotics and automation. Chern Hui joined our lab to assist the development of high resolution instruments for experiments under extreme conditions.

Christos Panagopoulos received his PhD from the University of Cambridge (Trinity College) in 1997. He has since worked as a Trinity College Research Fellow, Royal Society University Fellow at the University of Cambridge, and more recently Professor at the University of Crete, Nanyang Technological University, Affiliated Professor at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of the National Research Foundation, Singapore. (He also took a six months break in 2001 at the Hellenic Navy and the Naval Academy to experience a family tradition!) His academic activities in physics focus on emergent complex electronic phases in condensed matter systems. He employs both experiment and theory to investigate quantum magnetism and unconventional superconductivity, string theory towards the understanding of correlated electron matter, self-generated electronic heterogeneity, effects of electron-density variation caused by the spreading of charge across an interface in atomically precise heterostructures, new collective behavior in magnetoelectric systems etc. Techniques developed in-house for his research include miniature magnetometers, scanning probes, thermal and electrical measurement apparatuses to the milli-Kelvin regime and high fields. He also works at international facilities using x-ray, neutron and muon techniques. He has published more than eighty articles in this field of research, delivered several key note speeches and courses in graduate schools, and more than 200 invited lectures at international conferences and universities. In the past four years he founded and directs two laboratories on complex electronic matter and he is now nearing completion of a third one. For his research activities, he has raised as a principal investigator over 18 million Euros through competitive grants in the United Kingdom, European Union, Greece and Singapore, and chaired a number of academic panels. Honors accorded to Christos Panagopoulos include: Laureate of European Marie Curie Excellence Grants (EU), European Young Investigators Award (EU), Invited Professor at the Venture Business Laboratory - Kyoto University (Japan), the Chinese Academy of Sciences (China), and the University of British Columbia (Canada), and his election as Research Fellow at Trinity College, Cambridge (United Kingdom), the National Research Foundation (Singapore) and The Royal Society (United Kingdom). He has also received a number of awards as an undergraduate and graduate student and is a member of several academic committees throughout the world.

Elias grew up in Cyprus and completed his PhD at University College London (UCL), focusing on the study of electronic properties in one- and two-dimensional III-V semiconductor heterostructures. After graduation, he joined the group in December 2021 as a research fellow, working to develop Topological Quantum Devices.

Job Titles:

• Head of Enterprise Risk Management and Technology Qualification at DNV Consulting

Glenton is now the head of Enterprise Risk Management and Technology Qualification at DNV Consulting

Juan is now at the University of California, San Diego (USCD)

Kin Long is a third-year undergraduate from HKUST majoring in physics and will be staying in NTU during the summer for a research internship. He is interested in research on 2D Materials and was introduced to the topic through supervised literature review. Before having interests in 2D materials, he was working on econophysics, especially on the statistical analysis of the Hong Kong housing market.

Li Yuan Qing was in charge of CryoFace. He is now serving the Division of Physics and Applied Physics.

Lloyd was born and grew up in Mauritius - a small and very remote island, mostly known for its pristine beaches. He studied physics at the National University of Singapore and started his PhD there, in a group of multinationals, and partly at the Tokyo Institute of Technology as well. He enjoys being in multinational groups, as the present lab comprised of a Greek, Australian, British, French, Spanish, Korean, Malaysian, Indian, Azerbaijani, Singaporean and Mauritian - eleven nations! He enjoys observing people of different cultures, and different personalities, approaching science in their own particular way and with their unique perspectives.

Raju did his masters in physics (2006-2008) from University of Hyderabad, India and PhD (2008-2013) from Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi (IITD). He worked as research associate (2014-2015) at Quantum Phenomenon and Application Division, National Physical laboratory (NPL), New Delhi. Raju's research at IITD, NPL involved understanding the growth and magnetic properties of CoFeB/MgO, multilayers of Co/Pd, Cu/Co and nano structures of Co/Pd. During his one year at NPL he also worked on superconductivity and magnetism in nanostructures of Al/W and NbN/HoN/NbN systems. Currently (March 2015 onwards) at Physics of Novel Electronics group, he is involved in growth of ferromagnet/heavy metal multilayers and studying their magneto transport properties.

Fusheng was research fellow in the group doing micromagnetic simulations and is now Assistant Professor in Department of Physics at Nanjing Normal University, China.

Paloma Machain received her master degree in Physics in 2015 from the Balseiro Institute, Argentina. Her work was focused on the study of Nonalloy/alloy transitions in the Sn/Cu(001) system and 2D metal-organic networks using scanning tunneling microscopy, low energy electron diffraction experimental characterization techniques and by DFT calculations. She joined us in 2019 and currently working on chiral magnetism in atomically-thin films.

Sai was born in Andhra Pradesh, India and grew up in India and Malaysia. He came to Singapore in 2007 and completed his undergraduate education in physics in NTU in 2011. His final year project, done in our group, was on the magnetoelectric properties of EuTiO3. He then joined our group as a project officer and contributed to the construction of our laboratory, PhyCOSMOS. His research now focuses on the magnetoelectric properties of other strongly correlated systems. Presently, Sai is pursuing his doctoral research at Columbia University.

Xian Yang grew up in Malaysia and did his undergraduate study at the Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. He then joined the group for his PhD in unconventional superconductivity. Following graduation he worked in the electronics industry and has now rejoined us as research fellow to work on spin topology in collaboration with the Data Storage Institute.

Xiaofeng worked as a research fellow in our laboratory from 2009 to 2010. He is now a professor at Hangzhou Normal University.