Professor Eric Jensen studies the behavior of electrons in solids and at solid surfaces using photoelectron spectroscopy. Professor Meyer studies complex fluid systems, including liquid crystals, colloidal suspension, and polymers, all systems with a degree of internal structure and order, but not the perfectly regular order of crystals. They attempt to understand these systems in terms of both their fundamental microscopic ordering and their macroscopic phenomenology, which is very rich in nonlinear phenomena of all kinds. This latter subject has led to new research projects in chaotic dynamics in both dissipative hydrodynamic systems and electronic circuits. Experimental techniques include x-ray and light scattering, optical microscopy with computerized image analysis, and simulations.
Theory is developed where appropriate.
There are close collaborations with professors Fraden.