Evelyn Hu Receives American Physical Society Honor

Evelyn Hu, the Tarr-Coyne Professor of Applied Physics and Electrical Engineering in the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), has received the 2026 Mildred Dresselhaus Prize from the American Physical Society for pioneering contributions to nanomaterials and nanofabrication of electronic, optoelectronic, and quantum devices.

Conferred annually, the prize recognizes an individual who has made seminal contributions to the field of nanomaterials or nanoscience.

Co-director of the Harvard Quantum Initiative, Hu’s work has explored the novel behavior of materials integrated within nanostructures that exhibit exceptional electron conductivity or light emission. She has helped to develop tools that, for example, enable the integration of semiconductor quantum dots coupled to resonant cavities that can selectively amplify quantum dot photonic signals. Recently, her research has focused on the development of building blocks for future semiconductor-based quantum information technologies.

An example of this research utilizes “color centers” within semiconductors such as diamond, silicon carbide, or silicon. These color centers are molecular-scale defects in the semiconductor that can provide correlated photon and spin information. Her team recently developed a platform to probe and control quantum systems using an electric diode that can manipulate qubits inside a commercial silicon wafer. Her lab continues to explore new possibilities of optical and electronic behavior within materials that have been sculpted, modulated, and modified at the nanoscale.

Before joining the Harvard faculty in 2009, Hu was a professor at University of California, Santa Barbara and also worked in microfabrication and nanofabrication for superconducting and semiconducting devices and circuits at Bell Laboratories. She is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and American Academy of Arts and Sciences, among other international recognitions.

The APS Dresselhaus Prize honors the scientific career and legacy of the late Mildred S. Dresselhaus, a physicist and materials scientist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology known for her work with graphite and carbon nanotubes.