Welcome

Irfan Siddiqi delivering the 2023 Department Welcome to the crowd

WELCOME

The Department of Physics at the University of California, Berkeley has a rich history of scientific innovation. Our research continues to advance the frontiers of human knowledge across the full spectrum of our discipline, covering size and energy scales that describe particles smaller than the atom to blackholes and stellar objects that span the extent of the universe itself. The journey today combines cutting-edge research efforts—in both experimental and theoretical physics—housed within individual laboratories across the Physics complex as well as collaborations distributed across the many international centers of excellence and multi-disciplinary institutes anchored in the Department.
 
There is a vibrancy in our Department that is palpable. Its origin lies in the synergy that emerges when a community of scholars and supporters, committed to excellence and equity, engage in open dialogue. A walk through our halls will reveal undergraduates both listening to lectures and also performing laboratory research, side-by-side with graduate students and postdoctoral researchers who travel to the Bay Area from all over the globe to be a part of the Berkeley Physics family.
 
As we look forward to the days ahead, we must develop new facilities and methods of pedagogy tailored for the information-age. Such infrastructure is critically needed to support the demanding requirements of precision laboratory science, to attract the next generation of the scientific avant-garde to Berkeley, and to provide safe spaces for discussion and the seamless dissemination of knowledge.  To succeed in these ambitious endeavors, we need the support of our community at large. As a public university that draws the best minds from every corner of the Earth, I am confident that together we can push the boundary of what is possible.  
 
Fiat Lux,
Irfan Siddiqi

Physics Chair

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