Join us!
How to apply
We are always looking for curious and enthusiastic team members!
Positions are currently open for:
- Summer internships
- Undergraduate students
- Graduate students
- Postdoctoral researchers
At the moment, our main priority is experimentalists.
To apply: Simply send me a short email so we can start chatting!
It would be helpful if you include a
- CV with a list of publications
- Contact details of 2-3 people who agreed to write you a reference letter.
- Statement of research interests (~2 pages) describing why you want to join our team, what skills you can bring in, and ideas for potential projects you want to explore together.
- For prospective postdocs, a list of potential fellowships that we could apply to.
If you have any questions, please get in touch and I will be happy to discuss them directly!
Team members
Arnold JTM Mathijssen
Assistant Professor
Department of Physics & Astronomy
University of Pennsylvania
Arnold was named ’30 under 30′ by Scientific American, and ‘Best Overall Undergraduate’ after completing his MSci at University College London (2012). He was awarded the Sir Sam Edwards PhD Thesis Prize for his work in the group of Julia Yeomans FRS at the University Oxford (2016). Supported by an HFSP cross-disciplinary fellowship, he moved to the lab of Manu Prakash at Stanford University, where he won the Charles Kittel Award from the American Physical Society (APS) far west division.
Outside the lab, Arnold is very enthusiastic about science communication. He worked editor-in-chief of The New Collection, a student-led magazine, and now he frequently organises family events, school visits and science hikes.
Postdocs
Erçağ Pinçe
Senior Research Scientist
Erçağ did his PhD in 2016 under the supervision of Giovanni Volpe at the Department of Physics at Bilkent University, Ankara. He conducted postdoctoral research in AMOLF, the Netherlands between 2016 & 2018 and in Rowland Institute at Harvard University between 2018 & 2021.
When not in the lab., he enjoys boxing, watching arthouse movies, reading Russian literature, and collecting Bluray discs from the criterion collection.
Albane Thery
Postdoc
Before coming to Philadelphia in 2022, Albane did her PhD at the University of Cambridge under the supervision of Eric Lauga. When not in the lab, Albane can be found reading, cooking, and lifting (tentatively heavy) things at the gym.
Graduate Students
Maggie Liu
PhD student in Physics & Astronomy
Maggie is a graduate student in physics. She is broadly interested in understanding emergent states of matter, especially in the living system. Outside of academics, she enjoys watching anime, throwing pottery and drawing.
Siqi Lu
Master student in Nanotechnology
Siqi is a master student majoring in nanotechnology and working on artificial microtubules recently. She enjoys playing valley ball, swimming, and taking photos by both digital and film cameras.
Ran Tao
PhD student in Physics & Astronomy
Ran Tao is a graduate student studying Soft Matter and Biophysics. His current project focuses on bacteria swimming upstream. He did his undergraduate at Emory University studying physics and applied mathematics. He enjoys running, soccer, and watercolor painting.
Julia Linxi Zhu
Master student in Nanotechnology
Julia is a master student majoring in Nanotechnology. She is working on MEMS devices and interested in bioMEMS. As a dog person, she has 3 dogs and the corgi in the photo is called GOGO.
Undergraduate Students
Raman Thadani
Vagelos Scholar in the Molecular Life Sciences
Raman is a sophomore in the Vagelos Scholars program who hopes to attend graduate school in Physics. He loves to visit new places, plays a great many sport (but is mediocre in all), and enjoys serious discussion on existential threats to humanity at 3am with friends.
Hannah Xiao
Vagelos Scholar in the Molecular Life Sciences
Hannah is a sophomore in the Vagelos Scholars program majoring in Physics. Outside of class, she enjoys woodworking, smoking meats, and listening to the CNBC Youtube channel while playing minesweeper.
Yihan Xie
Undergraduate Researcher
High School Students
Rishi Ambavanekar
High school student
Lab Alumni
Lab graduation
Name
Position in lab
Position after lab
2022
Faye Parker
Undergraduate researcher
2022
Anthony Mohr
Undergraduate researcher
2022
Chloe Mouzakitis
Undergraduate researcher
2022
Aaron Reisman
Undergraduate researcher
2022
Madeleine Riley
Undergraduate researcher
2021
Samantha Donovan
Vagelos Scholar in Molecular Life Sciences
Some of our collaborators & co-authors
- Saad Bhamla (Georgia Tech, United States)
- Zev Bryant (Stanford University, United States)
- Sapna Chitlapilly Dass (Texas A&M, United States)
- Eric Clement (ESPCI Paris, France)
- Abdallah Daddi-Moussa-Ider (University of Düsseldorf, Germany)
- Ahmet F Demirörs (ETH, Switzerland)
- Amin Doostmohammadi (Niels Bohr Institute, Denmark)
- Nuris Figueroa-Morales (CU Boulder, United States)
- Joost de Graaf (Utrecht University, Netherlands)
- Francsica Guzman-Lastra (Universidad Mayor, Chile)
- Raphael Jeanneret (Ecole Normale Supérieure, France)
- Chenyu Jin (University of Bayreuth, Germany)
- Anke Lindner (ESPCI Paris, France)
- Maciej Lisicki (University of Warsaw, Poland)
- Hartmut Löwen (University of Düsseldorf, Germany)
- Corinna Maass (University of Twente, The Netherlands)
- Wallace F Marshall (UCSF, United States)
- Andreas Menzel (Otto von Guericke University Magdeburg, Germany)
- Endre J Mossige (UC Santa Barbara, United States)
- Marco Polin (University of Warwick, United Kingdom)
- Manu Prakash (Stanford University, United States)
- Vivek Prakash (University of Miami, United States)
- Mitya Pushkin (University of York, United Kingdom)
- Guillermina Ramirez – San Juan (Brandeis University, United States)
- Tyler Shendruk (University of Loughborough, United Kingdom)
- Robert S Thorne (University College London, United Kingdom)
- Julia Yeomans FRS (University of Oxford, United Kingdom)
- Andreas Zöttl (TU Vienna, Austria)