Our research focuses on the characterization of physical properties and structures of materials through thermodynamic, transport, X-ray and neutron measurements, with an emphasis on the design, synthesis and crystal growth of new materials. Our interests span a wide spectrum of materials, from intermetallics to oxides, especially superconductors and strongly correlated electron systems showing unusual electronic and magnetic ground states that can be perturbed by chemical doping, applied pressure or magnetic field. We aim at synthesizing new materials with nontrivial properties, characterizing quantum phases, and examining the different energy scales in solids. The interplay of magnetism, superconductivity and structure will be of particular interest.
06/2023 Congratulations to Tiema for recieving the Dissertation Year Fellowship!
03/2023 Tiema Travels to Las Vegas and presents a nice talk on the magnetic dilution effect on MnBi2Te4 at 2023 APS March meeting.
02/2023 Congrats to Tiema for receiving the APS DMP Ovshinsky Travel Award!
03/2023 Prof. Ni was elected as the Secretary/Treasurer for the APS Division of Materials Physics.
01/2023 Prof. Ni gave an invited seminar at UC-Davis on tuning the interplay of magnetism and band topology in intrinsic topological insulators MnBi2nTe3n+1.
11/2022 Prof. Ni gave the UCSB Materials colloquium talk on tuning the interplay of magnetism and band topology in intrinsic topological insulators MnBi2nTe3n+1.
11/2022 J went to Oak Ridge national Lab to perform neutron scattering experiments.
10/2022 J attended the "Magnetic Structrue Determination from Neutron Diffraction Data" workshop held in Oak Ridge national Lab.
10/2022 Congrats to Prof. Ni for her election as an APS fellow.
09/2022 Prof. Ni attended the Symposium on Quantum Materials Synthesis 2022 at Maui and gave an invited talk on the Synthesis and investigation of the intrinsic magnetic topological insulator family.
08/2022 Prof. Ni gave an invited virtual talk on intrinsic magnetic topological insulators in the 15th Asia Pacific Physics Conference.
07/2022 Congrats to Tiema and Chaowei for the publication of the magnetic dilution effect and topological phase transitions in MnBi2Te4 on PRB. Thanks to the great collaborations with Tayrong's team and Huibo's team.
06/2022 Congrats to Tiema, Eve, Chaowei and J for the publication of the pressure work on Sb-MnBi4Te7 on Nano. Lett. Big thanks to Igor for helping us understand the pressure-driven metamagnetic transitions in Sb-MnBi4Te7.
06/2022 Chaowei successfully defended his Ph. D. Congrats, Dr. Hu! And good luck to your future career at UW-Seattle.
05/2022 Prof. Ni gave an invited talk "Tuning the interplay of magnetism and band topology in intrinsic magnetic topological insulators" virtually at MRS Spring Meeting, Honolulu, HI
05/2022 Tiema and Prof. Ni attended the International Workshop "Experimental Advances in the Use of Pressure and Strain to Probe and Control Quantum Matter" (PSQM-2022) at Ames, IA. Tiema presented a poster on his nice strain work on CsV3Sb5 and Prof. Ni gave an invited talk on intrinsic magnetic topological insulators.
03/2022 Thanks to the Julian Schwinger Foundation for supporting Chaowei's three-month research in TopoXu Lab at Harvard.
03/2022 Prof. Ni gave an invited talk "Tuning the interplay of magnetism and band topology in magnetic topological materials" virtually at APS March Meeting, Chicago, IL.
03/2022 Chaowei and Tiema traveled to Chicago and presented their talks in the 2022 APS March Meeting.
01/2022 Congratulations to Chaowei for receiving the DMP Ovshinsky Student Travel Award from APS.