Welcome to the Department of Physics & Astronomy at the University of Southern California.
Our faculty are national leaders in their disciplines and many of them are among USC's most distinguished teachers. The Department of Physics and Astronomy provides professional training at the undergraduate and graduate levels, to serve as a foundation for a career in physics and astronomy. Beyond that scope, it is also an ideal preparation for a broad range of interdisciplinary areas for which a quantitative training is crucial. This range extends from the traditional fields in Science and Engineering to Business and Finances.
In addition, our Department provides pre-professional training in preparation for careers in medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, and architecture. And last but not least, our award-winning faculty teach popular General Education courses in Physics and Astronomy. We place great emphasis on the quality of our programs. Our faculty are active in modern research and bring this perspective to the classroom to ensure students receive appropriate training for this rapidly changing world.
Physics and Astronomy are both going through revolutionary times. From manipulating ensembles of ultra-cold atoms in laser traps, to controlling collective resonances in nanoscale clusters, from the anticipation of finding the so-called "Higgs particles" in the world's largest particle colliders, to the understanding of the formation of our universe based on variations in the cosmic microwave background radiation, there are many exciting developments in Physics and Astronomy right now. Our Department is active in all of them, and also well integrated in the current initiatives at USC, such as in the biomedical and nanoscale area, energy research, and high-power computing.
I hope this web site can answer some of your questions, but if not, please do not hesitate to contact me directly and I shall direct you to the appropriate person in the Department who can help.
Werner Däppen
Department Chair
