Optical Multidimensional Coherent Spectroscopy

This book provides an introduction to optical multidimensional coherent spectroscopy, a relatively new method of studying materials based on using ultrashort light pulses to perform spectroscopy. The technique has been developed and perfected over the last 25 years, resulting in multiple experimental approaches and applications to a broad array of systems ranging from atoms and molecules to solids and biological systems.

Indeed, while this method is most often used by physical chemists, it is also relevant to materials of interest to physicists, which is the primary focus of this book. As well as an introduction to the method, the book also provides tutorials on the interpretation of the rather complex spectra that is broadly applicable across all subfields, and finishes with a survey of several emerging material systems and a discussion of future directions.

Hebin Li is currently an associate professor in the Department of Physics at Florida International University. He received his Bachelor's degree in physics from Wuhan University in 2001, and his Ph.D. in physics from Texas A&M University in 2010. Before joining the faculty at Florida International University in 2013, he worked as a Postdoctoral Research Associate at JILA, a joint institute between the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Colorado in Boulder, CO. He is interested in studying many-body quantum systems consisting of interacting atoms, molecules and electrons. He develops and uses techniques and ideas in ultrafast spectroscopy and quantum optics to probe and manipulate quantum dynamics of such systems.


Bachana Lomsadze is an Assistant Professor of Physics and a research group leader at Santa Clara University. He received his Bachelor's degree in physics in 2007 from Tbilisi State University (Georgia) and his Ph.D. in physics in 2012 from Kansas State University. After graduation, he was a joint post-doctoral researcher at JILA and the University of Colorado and then a research fellow at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Dr. Lomsadze's research at Santa Clara University is focused on studying light-matter interactions and ultrafast dynamics in atomic/molecular systems and semiconductor nanostructures using optical frequency combs.


Galan Moody is a Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is a member of the executive committee for the UCSB Quantum Foundry and the Institute for Energy Efficiency. Prior to UCSB, he was a Research Scientist (2015-2019) at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, a National Research Council fellow at NIST (2013-2015), and a postdoctoral associate at the University of Texas (2013). He received a PhD in Physics (2013) and a BSc in Engineering Physics (2008) from the University of Colorado. He is a recipient of a U.S. AFOSR Young Investigator Program Award (2020) and an NSF CAREER Award (2021).


Christopher L. Smallwood is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physics & Astronomy at San José State University. His research focuses on the spectroscopic interrogation of solid-state materials, and on the development and characterization of interferometric optical devices. From 2014-2018 he worked as a postdoctoral researcher, first at JILA and then at the University of Michigan, where he developed and used ultrafast spectroscopy techniques to study light-matter interactions in solids. He is the recipient of a National Research Council postdoctoral Research Associateship award at NIST, and the 2013 Lars Commins Memorial Award in Experimental Physics at UC Berkeley.


Steven T. Cundiff is the Harrison M. Randall Collegiate Professor of Physics and Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He received his BA in Physics from Rutgers University (1985) and his MS (1991) & PhD (1992) in Applied Physics from the University of Michigan. In 1993-94 he was a post-doctoral Alexander von Humboldt Fellow at the University of Marburg, Germany. He was a post-doctoral Member of Technical Staff at AT&T/Lucent Technology Bell Laboratories in Holmdel, NJ from 1995-97. In 1997 he joined JILA; from 2004-2009 he served as Chief of the NIST Quantum Physics Division. He moved to the University of Michigan in 2015.