Master of Science in Physics

The Physics Department welcomes students interested in the master’s degree. Master’s candidates can perform research in any of the areas covered by the department. They develop laboratory and computational skills which are of value in many fields. These include electronics design, computer simulation and visualization, cryogenics, X-ray scattering, complex novel materials and devices, materials science and biophysics. Each M.S. student is assigned a faculty adviser who helps to design a coursework plan suited to the interests of the student.Physics students and faculty use a number of UC Santa Cruz research facilities described at the beginning of this section and elsewhere in this catalog, including facilities of the Santa Cruz Institute for Particle Physics(SCIPP) and the UC Observatories (headquartered at UC Santa Cruz). There is strong interaction with other disciplines, especially astronomy and astrophysics, biology, chemistry, Earth sciences, electrical engineering, and mathematics. Proximity to the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory provides additional local research opportunities. UC Santa Cruz faculty and graduate students also participate in research programs at CERN in Geneva, Los Alamos, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, NASA Ames, NREL, Lucent, Xerox, IBM, Bell Labs, and other national and international laboratories.