Yuan Ping (scientist)

Yuan Ping () is a Chinese-American condensed matter and materials theorist whose research spans theoretical chemistry, condensed matter physics, and materials science. She is an associate professor at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, with appointments in materials science and engineering and affiliated appointments in physics and chemistry. She was previously a faculty member at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Career

Ping joined the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of California, Santa Cruz as an assistant professor in 2016. She was also affiliated with the Department of Physics at UC Santa Cruz from 2017 to 2023. In 2022, she became an associate professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry.

In 2023, Ping joined the University of Wisconsin–Madison as an associate professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering. She is also affiliated with the university's departments of physics and chemistry. She has continued as an adjunct professor in the Department of Physics at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Research

Ping develops first-principles quantum many-body theory and computational methods for describing nonequilibrium dynamics in solid-state materials. Her work includes density-matrix-based open quantum dynamics methods for predicting quasiparticle relaxation, dephasing, and transport from electronic structure calculations rather than from empirically fitted parameters.

A central part of Ping's research is the development of first-principles open quantum dynamics methods for relaxation and decoherence of quasiparticles in solids. This framework describes coherent and incoherent processes in materials through the time evolution of reduced density matrices, including interactions among electrons, phonons, photons, and other quasiparticles. In 2020, Ping and collaborators introduced an ab initio density-matrix approach for calculating spin-phonon relaxation in solids. She and collaborators later extended this approach to ultrafast spin dynamics in solids, spin relaxation, dephasing, and diffusion, as well as exciton relaxation in two-dimensional materials.

Ping has also developed first-principles methods for predicting the optical and spin properties of solid-state quantum defects. Her group developed a many-body perturbation theory approach for charged defects in two-dimensional materials, including defects studied for quantum technology applications. Ping and Tyler J. Smart later described computational approaches for designing quantum defects in two-dimensional materials. Her group has also developed first-principles approaches for excited-state dynamics and spin-dependent optically detected magnetic resonance contrast in solid-state spin defects.

Another area of her research concerns first-principles descriptions of electronic excitations and coupled electron-ion dynamics in complex materials. Her work on halide perovskites has addressed carrier localization and the formation of two-dimensional polarization domains in these materials. Her group has also contributed to spin non-collinear real-time time-dependent density functional theory methods in GPU-accelerated electronic-structure software.

Earlier in her career, Ping developed first-principles many-body perturbation theory methods for electronic excitations in light-absorbing materials, including approaches for solving the Bethe–Salpeter equation without explicitly calculating empty electronic states.

Awards and honors

• 2018 – Hellman Fellow
• 2021 – COMP OpenEye Outstanding Junior Faculty Award, American Chemical Society
• 2021 – Air Force Office of Scientific Research Young Investigator Research Program award, Air Force Research Laboratory
• 2022 – NSF CAREER Award
• 2022 – Sloan Research Fellowship