Graduate Program
The Department of Physics & Astronomy at MSU offers a wide variety of opportunities for graduate education. Focus areas include condensed matter research, nuclear and high-energy physics, astrophysics and astronomy, biophysics, and physics education research. In recent years, computational science has become strongly interwoven in all of the above areas as well. In addition, the Department has strong connections to other colleges and departments, such as engineering, which results in additional opportunities for exciting fore-front research.
APPLY - Information for Prospective Graduate Students
Graduate students are central to the success of the research conducted in the department. Over 230 students are in the program, with about 25% joining us from outside of the U.S. To learn more, prospective graduate students are always welcome to contact the research faculty in their field of interest or to direct their questions to the Graduate Program Directors, Carlo Piermarocchi and Stuart Tessmer (pa.gradchair@msu.edu). For practical questions about the application process, please contact the Graduate Program Secretary, Kim Crosslan (crossla3@msu.edu).
Check out the journeys of some of the Graduate Students in the Department of Physics
and Astronomy at MSU through the podcast series "Journeys of Scientists" hosted by Bryan Stanley of the Women and Minorities in Physical Sciences student
organization. These journeys give you an excellent idea of the unique and diverse
ways that students in the department have come to pursue a Ph.D. in Physics or Astronomy/Astrophysics and
what their aspirations are.
Graduate students at MSU are not merely physicists. As programs have become more interdisciplinary, many student become proficient in more than one research area. We can be geeky, but we're also athletes, dancers, gamers, musicians, parents, singers, writers and much more. Graduate students also play an important role in shaping the department, for example through the the Physics Graduate Organization (PGO) and Women and Minorities in Physical Sciences (WaMPS). Students also serve on most of the departmental committees and play a key role in making the department inclusive and welcoming.
The menu at the right contains links for lots of information of interest to both current graduate students and to those interested in becoming graduate students in the MSU Department of Physics & Astronomy.