About

Ivar Rydstrom

Physics Student

Headshot

Hi, I’m Ivar. I’m a senior Engineering Physics student in the Honors College at Santa Clara University. Aside from physics, I’m also studying Mathematics and Computer Engineering as minors.

I’m the current president of the Society of Physics Students chapter at SCU. Please reach out if you are interested in joining our community! I also do private physics tutoring at undergraduate and high school levels. Find more information about my tutoring services here.

I’m currently based here in Northern California (South Bay), but I’m originally from Orange County. On the side, I race bikes competitively for Team Mike’s Bikes: Development. You can occasionally catch me at Spectrum Ride or the SCU Triathlon Club ride on Saturday mornings!

Research Interests

My research in physics falls in the realm of experimental particle astrophysics. In particular, I help to develop powerful low temperature detectors to search for dark matter. I currently work with Dr. Betty Young at SCU in her collaboration with Dr. Noah Kurinsky at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in the Dark Matter and Quantum Information Science (DMQIS) group. We develop novel superconducting quantum sensors for dark matter detection in our lab, SLAC Millikelvin Facility (SMF).

Currently, I am most involved in developing room-temperature electronics for the SPLENDOR project, a prototype dark matter experiment that will use designer narrow-gap semiconductors to probe particle-like “light” dark matter of sub-Mev mass. Our two-stage High Electron Mobility Transistor (HEMT) amplifier is projected to achieve a charge-resolution of O(1e-). This ongoing experiment is a collaboration between various national laboratories that is committed to advancing the bleeding edge of ionization detector and charge-based readout technology.

DMQIS Group Photo DMQIS group underneath dilution refrigerator “OLAF” at SLAC, September 2023.


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