Our graduate student Igor Lyalin has been awarded the Presidential Fellowship by the OSU graduate School! The Presidential Fellowship is the most prestigious award given by the Graduate School.

Welcome!

Kawakami Group – 2024

Our research focuses on the fascinating properties of spin, magnetism, and topology in quantum materials including 2D materials, 2D magnets, topological insulators, topological magnets, and skyrmion materials. We synthesize new materials and heterostructures controlled at the atomic level using molecular beam epitaxy and mechanical exfoliation, and utilize a suite of advanced measurements to probe the spin currents, magnetic order, electronic states, and their dynamics. Our research ranges from curiosity-driven basic science to potential applications in microelectronics and quantum information. For more information, see the Science page.

  • Prospective graduate students and undergraduate students, please email Dr. Kawakami (kawakami.15@osu.edu)

Recent News:

  • November 2023: Our graduate student Igor Lyalin has been awarded the Presidential Fellowship by the OSU graduate School! The Presidential Fellowship is the most prestigious award given by the Graduate School.
  • November 2023: Congratulations to our Ph.D. alumnus Dr. Tiancong Zhu for accepting the position of Assistant Professor of Physics at Purdue University!
  • November 2023: Congratulations to our Ph.D. alumnus Dr. Jinsong Xu for accepting the position of Assistant Professor of Physics at University of Science and Technology of China (USTC)!
  • October 2023: Igor Lyalin reports the magneto-optic detection of the orbital Hall effect in a light metal, chromium, providing a foundation for the emerging field of “orbitronics”. Read the highlight in Physics Magazine
  • January 2023: Ziling Li and Shuyu Cheng participate in the first time-resolved microARPES study in the US, producing the momentum-resolved study of valley-polarized excitons in exfoliated WS2.
  • April 2022: Congratulations to our Ph.D. alumnus Dr. Yunqiu Kelly Luo accepting the position of Gabilan Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy at University of Southern California (USC!). Way to go Prof. Kelly!
News Archive
  • September 2021: Traveling for the first time since the start of the COVID shutdown, Shuyu, Ziling, and Prof. Kawakami visit Prof. Tom Allison at Stony Brook University for time-resolved ARPES, and A. J., Shuyu, Wenyi, and Prof. Kawakami make their way to Berkeley for an ALS ARPES run.
  • August 2021: Igor and Shuyu, Nice work in Nano Letters on measuring spin-orbit torque in an interesting new material, Fe3Sn2, a topological kagome ferromagnet.
  • June 2021: Tiancong and A. J., Congratulations on developing a new magnetic topological insulator, MnBi2Se4 — as reported in Nano Letters.
  • January 2021: Congratulations to Dr. Michael Newburger on starting work at Air Force Research Laboratory!
  • August 2019: Congratulations to Dr. Yunqiu Kelly Luo and Dr. Tiancong Zhu for passing their Ph.D. exams. Kelly, good luck at Cornell! TC, good luck at Berkeley!
  • June 2018: Congratulation to Dr. Dante O’Hara for passing his Ph.D. exam. Good luck on your postdoctoral fellowship at Naval Research Lab!
  • December 2018: Congratulations to Dr. Igor Pinchuk for receiving his Ph.D.  Good luck at Carnegie Mellon!
  • September 20, 2018: Jinsong’s work on “Strong and tunable spin lifetime anisotropy in dual-gated bilayer graphene” is published in Physical Review Letters and highlighted in Physics. Congratulations!
  • August 18: Congratulating Jyoti and Simran for their new jobs at Carnegie Mellon Univerisity! Great Job Assistant Professor Katoch and Research Assistant Professor Singh!
  • July 18: Congratulations to Dr. Elizabeth McCormick and Dr. Jinsong Xu for passing their Ph.D. exams! Good luck on your future endeavors!
  • 5/7/18: Our graduate student Yunqiu (Kelly) Luo has been awarded a Presidential Fellowship by the OSU graduate School! The Presidential Fellowship is the most prestigious award given by the Graduate School. Read more on the Physics Department Homepage.
  • 3/9/18: Our graduate students Yunqiu (Kelly) Luo and Dante O’Hara are awarded APS GMAG and DCMP student travel awards. They are featured in GMAG Newsletter!
  • 2/1/18: Our PhD student Elizabeth (Bushong) McCormick’s graduate school life story: “Presidential Fellows: A True Buckeye Love Story” is featured in our  recent Physics Magazine !
  • 1/22/18: Congratulations on Dr. Jyoti Katoch’s work on “Giant spin-splitting and gap renormalization driven by trions in single-layer WS2/h-BN heterostructures” published in Nature Physics! Great Job Jyoti! Click here for a press release from Advanced Light Source (ALS) at Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) .
  • 1/19/18: Congratulations to Kelly winning Young Scientist Award at PCSI 45 Conference for her upgraded talk titled “Opto-valleytronic spin injection in MoS2/graphene hybrid spin valve”!
  • 1/12/18: Congratulations on Walid Amamou and Igor Pinchuk’s work on “Magnetic Proximity Effect on Pt/CoFeO4 Bilayers” published in Physics Review Materials and selected as Editors’ Suggestion!
  • 11/20/17: Congratulations on Dr. Simranjeet Singh and Dr. Jyoti Katoch’s work on “Strontium Oxide Tunnel Barriers for High Quality Spin Transport and Large Spin Accumulation in Graphene” published in Nano Letters!
  • 11/06/17: Congratulations on Beth McCormick’s work on “Imaging Spin Dynamics in Monolayer WS2 by Time-Resolved Kerr Rotation Microscopy” accepted in 2D materials!
  • 07/01/17: Congratulations for Dr. Walid Amamou and Dr. Adam S. Ahmed for passing their Ph.D. defense exams. Good luck on your future endeavors!
  • 06/08/17: Congratulations on the successful commencement of 2017 Workshop on Spins, Valleys, and Topological States in 2D and Layered Materials at Ohio State Center for Emergent Materials!
  • 05/30/17: Great job Kelly! Opening up the field of 2D optospintronics with “Optovalleytronic Spin Injection in Hybrid Monolayer MoS2/Few-Layer Graphene Hybrid Spin Valves” published in Nano Letters!