Dirk Morr Named University Scholar
Professor Dirk Morr has been named a 2015 University Scholar. The award provides three years of support to outstanding UIC faculty members who have significant achievements in research and teaching, and whose research shows great future promise. Morr, a theoretical physicist, investigates a range of phenomena that occur in strongly correlated electron systems.
Morr’s recent work, undertaken in collaboration with researchers at UIC, Cornell University, and Brookhaven National Laboratory, has focused on understanding the origin of unconventional superconductivity in condensed matter materials. Morr and his collaborators succeeded in identifying the “quantum glue” that pairs electrons and gives rise to unconventional superconducting state observed in CeCoIn5, a heavy fermion material made up of Cerium, Cobalt, and Indium. Not only did the team’s findings show once and for all that this quantum glue arises from the magnetism present in this material, but they also open some far-reaching opportunities for the future. Scientists hope one day to be able to construct an energy superhighway, where energy can be transferred over large distances without sustaining the losses that limit current efforts to make sustainable energy broadly available. Morr’s research could help make energy-efficient transfer a reality, expanding the possibilities for green power sources such as wind farms, which generate power far from urban centers where it will ultimately be used.
The team’s findings were published in 2014 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. To read more about Professor Morr’s work, follow the full story at UIC News.