Graduate Student Recruitment Letter

Dear graduating physics student,

As you approach the end of your undergraduate career in Physics, you will be planning for the next steps. This note is to advise you of the opportunity for graduate study next year in Physics at Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario.

Our Department of Physics has several openings and funding for new graduate students pursuing MSc and PhD programs in physics and astronomy. Our graduates are highly respected in science and industry because of the quality, breadth and flexibility of their graduate education. And Trent is recognized as the best funded university for NSERC grants in the category of small universities, according to the Maclean's survey of Canadian Universities.

Research assistantship stipends and teaching assistantships are available. Most physics graduate students receive stipends ranging from $17,000 to $22,000, based on their level and scholarship status.

Choosing Trent University for an advanced degree in physics is the right choice if you want one of our research areas (below) and prefer

• Working in small groups in close contact with a dynamic research supervisor.
• The opportunity to study in an interdisciplinary environment with students from other academic fields and other universities.
• Making a smooth transition from course work to research in the exciting areas of high temperature superconductivity, galaxy mergers, detection of landmines, scanning tunneling microscopy, upper-atmosphere physics, photonuclear physics, and others.
• Living in the midst of the beautiful Kawartha Lakes region, but still only 1.5 hours from Toronto

Opportunities and funding are available for graduate students in the following Physics research programs, with MSc and PhD degrees in most fields. For more information, click on the web sites given below.

• Extragalactic astronomy, galaxy mergers and galaxy evolution (David Patton)
• Theory of high-temperature superconductivity, vortex dynamics, and strongly correlated electrons (Rachel Wortis, Bill Atkinson)
• Synthetic organic chemistry, microbial and enzymatic modification, materials chemistry and physics, polymer physics (Suresh Narine)
• Surface nanoscience and the evolution of ultrathin films (Alan Slavin)
• Atomic, molecular and optical physics, the manipulation of quantum states using laser radiation (Ralph Shiell)

  Students in materials research will be part of Trent's Centre for Materials Research, which includes faculty in both Physics and Chemistry to give more opportunity for collaboration.

  For details of ongoing research and graduate study opportunities, we encourage you to visit our website at www.trentu.ca . If you have questions or would like more information, please contact the Graduate Student Coordinator (Bill Atkinson) at (705) 748 1011 x5520 or e-mail at billatkinson@trentu.ca, or any of the faculty whose email addresses are given here. We look forward to hearing from you.

  Yours sincerely,

  David Patton,
  Professor and Chair of Physics

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