You can find out more about the degree programs and courses at the web-site Undergraduate physics degree programs at Syracuse University. I have a particularly strong interest in teaching introductory physics. I emphasize lecture demonstrations and laboratories, because these aspects of the introductory physics course help establish that physics is essentially an effort to explain experiments and observations in the physical world. I co-wrote a lab manual for Phy 221, and developed our current experimental physics laboratory. I also teach a variety of advanced undergraduate and graduate physics courses.
Porous silicon is prepared by etching crystalline silicon.
Leigh Canham's 1991 discovery that certain porous silicons luminescence far more efficiently than crystalline silicon spawned a new research specialty on related types of silicon-based optoelectronics which continues to be of great interest. Our own research, in collaboration with Philippe Fauchet and Leonid Tsybeskov at University of Rochester, explores the fundamental mechanism of electrical transport in porous silicon. At about the same time as Canham's discovery, Michael Graetzel's group in Switzerland discovered how to make remarkably efficient solar cells based on porous TiO 2 . We are again studying the fundamental mechanism of charge transport in these solar cells, and hope to contribute to increasing their efficiency with an improved understanding. I have advised about ten graduate students on their doctoral and master's degree thesis projects, and I have advised two undergraduate students on honors thesis projects.