Roberto C. Ramos

Biography

Dr. Ramos is an experimental quantum mechanic and ultra-low temperature physicist who probes the quantum properties of materials and devices. He is published in top scientific journals including Science, Nature Communications, Physical Review, and Journal of Applied Physics. He has been awarded over $1.3M in research and education grants from the National Science Foundation and DOE research equipment valued at over $700,000. He was Program Director of two NSF S-STEM Scholarship Programs, at Drexel University and Indiana Wesleyan University, where he was Blanchard Endowed Research Chair, a Hinds Fellow, and two-time Principium Lecture Awardee. He received Drexel's Allan-Rothwarf Award for Excellence in Teaching and the Bright Idea Award at USciences. He has planted and nurtured award-winning chapters of the Society of Physics Students across three universities, was nominated twice as Outstanding SPS Advisor, and was research mentor to multiple Goldwater Scholars. He serves as Director of USciences Center for Undergraduate Research. He is an advocate of "women in STEM" and has organized four "Physics Wonder Girls Camp" for middle school girls, featured by Philadelphia's ABC News Network on their Nightly News.

Research Interest

Ultra-low Temperature Physics, Quantum Fluids, Novel and Applied Superconductivity, Quantum Information, Nanotechnology, Experimental Condensed Matter, Physics Education Active research work in Dr. Ramos's research group include the measurements of multiple-photon transitions, resonant activation and macroscopic quantum tunneling in Josephson junctions made with multi-gap superconductors (MgB2 and iron pnictides), confirmation of sub-structure in the superconducting energy gap of MgB2, Fabry-Perot interferometry in nanoscale graphene junctions, and quantum-classical crossover in Josephson junctions. He and colleagues at the University of Maryland were the first to propose the concept of the Josephson phase qubit, and were the first to couple Josephson phase qubits and measure spectroscopic evidence of entanglement. His graduate work with Oscar Vilches at the University of Washington led to the first mapping of the liquid-vapor coexistence curve in single-atomic layers of He3-He4 mixtures. In the area of physics education, he conducts research and workshops on flipping physics classes, and applying the iPAD for video-motion analysis and as an oscilloscope in introductory physics laboratories.