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  Despina Louca   Despina Louca
Professor , Experimental Condensed Matter Physics
Ph.D., 1997, Pennsylvania

dl4f@Virginia.EDU email   924-6802 tel 317 JBL Office
  RESEARCH INTERESTS
     

The interactions of the spin, charge and lattice degrees of freedom in solids often lead to the emergence of unique properties that exhibit distinct characteristics under external influences. The class of materials that are of interest includes, but are not limited to, the magnetoresistive perovskite oxides, bulk metallic alloys, superconductors, and multiferroics. Understanding the macroscopic functionality of these systems can be potentially very useful for industrial applications. Louca’s research focuses on understanding their responses as a function of temperature, pressure, and magnetic fields by probing the atomic and magnetic structures and dynamics using scattering techniques performed at national and international neutron and X-ray facilities. The group makes use of analysis tools combined with modeling to examine atomic correlations at very small length scales under extreme conditions, probes lattice dynamics and magnetic interactions. The group is also involved with materials synthesis and characterization of the bulk properties.

  RESEARCH GROUP(S)
     

Metallic Glasses

  SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
     

"Possible Link of a Structurally Driven Spin Flip Transition and the Insulator-Metal Transition in the Perovskite La1-xBaxCoO3", P. Tong, J. Yu, Q. Huang, K. Yamada, and D. Louca, Phys. Rev. Lett. 106, 156407 (2011).

"Spin-state transitions in PrCoO3 investigated by neutron scattering", J. Yu, D. Phelan, and Despina Louca, Phys. Rev. B 84, 132410 (2011).

"Effects of local disorder in the overdoped regime of Ba(Fe1-xCox)v(2)Asv(2)", K. Park, A. Llobet, J. Yan and D. Louca, Phys. Rev. B 84, 024512 (2011).

"Suppression of superconductivity in Fe chalcogenides by annealing: a reverse effect to pressure", D. Louca, J. Yan, A. Llobet, and R. Arita, Phys. Rev. B 84, 054522 (2011).

"Compression-compression fatigue tests on model metallic glass nanowires by molecular dynamics simulations", Y. Shi, D. Louca, G. Wang and P. K. Liaw, J. Appl. Phys. 110, 023523 (2011).

  CURRENT AND RECENT COURSES
     

PHYS 3310: Statistical Physics [Fall]