Michael Brown Homepage
Michael Brown
Morris L. Clothier Professor of Physics, Past Department Chair
American Physical Society Division of Plasma Physics, Past Chair
APS Fellow, APS Councilor
Swarthmore College
(610) 328-8648
email: doc@swarthmore.edu
Teaching 2003-2024:
- Doc Brown taught Plasma Physics (Physics138) and advanced physics lab in the spring of 2003.
- Doc Brown taught Electrodynamics (Physics112) and advanced physics lab (Physics82) in the fall of 2003.
- Doc Brown taught Math Methods (Physics50) and advanced physics lab (Physics82) and senior honors study (Physics199) in the spring of 2004.
- Doc Brown taught (Astronomy1) and advanced physics lab (Physics82) in the fall of 2004.
- Doc Brown taught Statistical Mechanics (Physics114), Math Methods (Physics50), and advanced physics lab (Physics82) in the spring of 2005.
- Doc Brown was on leave Fall 2005/Spring 2006.
- Doc Brown taught Physics5 Fall 2006.
- Doc Brown taught Astro1 Spring 2007.
- Doc Brown taught Physics5 Fall 2007.
- Doc Brown taught Plasma Physics Physics138 Spring 2008.
- Doc Brown taught Physics5 Fall 2008.
- Doc Brown taught Stat Mech Physics114 Spring 2009.
- Doc Brown was on leave Fall 2009/Spring 2010.
- Doc Brown taught Energy Seminar and Electrodynamics (Physics112) Fall 2010.
- Doc Brown taught Statistical Mechanics (Physics114), and electronics (Physics81/82) Spring 2011.
- Doc Brown taught Energy Seminar, Electronics, and Plasma Reading Fall 2011.
- Doc Brown taught Statistical Mechanics (Physics114), and electronics (Physics81/82) Spring 2012.
- Doc Brown taught Electrodynamics (Physics8) Fall 2012.
- Doc Brown taught Statistical Mechanics (Physics114), and electronics (Physics81/82) Spring 2013.
- Doc Brown was on leave Fall 2013/Spring 2014.
- Doc Brown taught Electrodynamics (Physics112) Fall 2014.
- Doc Brown taught Math Methods/Quantum (Physics17/18) Spring 2015.
- Doc Brown taught Electrodynamics (Physics112) Fall 2015.
- Doc Brown taught Math Methods/Quantum (Physics17/18) Spring 2016.
- Doc Brown taught Electrodynamics (Physics112) Fall 2016.
- Doc Brown taught Math Methods/Quantum (Physics17/18) Spring 2017.
- Doc Brown is on leave Fall 2017/Spring 2018.
- Doc Brown taught Electrodynamics (Physics112) Fall 2018.
- Doc Brown taught Stat Mech (Physics114), E&M (P8), and Energy (P2E) Spring 2019.
- Doc Brown taught Journal Club and Advanced Lab Fall 2019.
- Doc Brown taught Stat Mech (Physics114), E&M (P8), and Math Methods (P17) Spring 2020.
- Doc Brown taught Electrodynamics (Physics112) Fall 2020.
- Doc Brown taught Math Methods (P17) and Quantum Mechanics (P18) Spring 2021.
- Doc Brown was on leave Fall 2021/Spring 2022.
- Doc Brown taught Analytical Dynamics (P111) Fall 2022.
- Doc Brown taught Statistical Mechanics (P114) Spring 2023.
- Doc Brown is teaching Electrodynamics (P112) Fall 2023.
- Doc Brown is teaching Electrodynamics (P8) Spring 2024.
First Year Seminar on Energy:
- MB offered a first year seminar on Energy Spring 2019.
APS Award for Research at an Undergraduate Institution:
Research interests:
- plasma physics (SSX lab)
- magnetic confinement fusion (spheromaks, FRCs, magneto-inertial fusion, mirrors)
- magnetic reconnection (3D structure, particle acceleration, turbulence)
- self organization in space and laboratory plasmas
- solar physics (dynamo, coronal heating)
- here are some useful URLs
- here is the Department of Physics/Astronomy
Senior honors/published alums, SSX and dynamo (29 total, 21 honors theses):
- Matiwos Mebratu '21 (Stanford)
- Katie Gelber '20
- Emma Lewis '18 (Wisconsin, Santa Clara)
- Luke Barbano '18 (Johns Hopkins APL)
- Jaron Shrock '18 (Maryland)
- Holden Park '16 (LBL, Carnegie Mellon)
- Ariel Rock '16 (Wisconsin)
- Peter Weck '15 (Johns Hopkins)
- Adrian Wan '15 (APS-DPP student award 2014, Nest)
- Ken Flanagan '12 (Wisconsin)
- Xingyu Zhang '12 (Harvard, MIT Lincoln Lab)
- Darren Weinhold '12 (Telvac)
- Dan Dandurand '11 (Berkeley, DOE Fellow)
- Vernon Chaplin '07 (APS Apker finalist, Caltech, DOE Fellow, Aerospace, JPL)
- Jason Horwitz '07 (UChicago, Anderson)
- Jerome Fung '06 (Harvard, APS-DPP student award 2005, Wellesley, Ithaca)
- Aongus O Murchadha '05 (Wisconsin, TriNetX)
- Matt Landreman '03 (APS Apker finalist, Rhodes Scholar, NSF Fellow, APS-DPP award 2002, Oxford, MIT, Maryland)
- Abram Falk '03 (Harvard, UCSB/Chicago, IBM Watson)
- Andrew Fefferman '03 (Cornell, Institut Neel)
- Dave Schlossberg '01(Wisconsin, LLNL)
- Tim Gray '01 (Princeton, Swarthmore, NASA Glenn Research Center)
- Amy Reighard '01 (Michigan, LLNL)
- Dave Auerbach '01 (UCLA)
- Slava Lukin '00 (NSF Fellow, DOE Fellow, Princeton, NRL, NSF)
- Walter Luh '99 (Stanford, CoronaLabs)
- Tom Kornack '98 (Princeton, DOE Fellow, Twinleaf)
- Josh Lifton '98 (MIT Media Lab, CrowdSupply)
- Cameron Geddes '97 (APS Apker winner, Hertz Fellow, Berkeley, LBL)
Other student researchers (41):
- Solomon Murdock '24
- Kya Butterfield '25
- Ayla Cimen '25
- Alex Skeldon '24
- Xiyue Shen (BMC) '24
- Alberto Felix Bojorquez '22 (Iowa)
- Ercong (Tony) Luo '21 (Lev)
- Miriam Moore '22 (Stanford)
- Shouzhuo (Gary) Yang '23
- Lucas Dyke '20 (Dartmouth)
- Rhys Manley '20
- Nick Anderson '20
- Hariharan Srinivasulu '21
- Kat Lima '20
- Sahir Nambiar '18
- Jeremy Han '17
- Max Krackow '15 (Dartmouth, CRRLL)
- Samer Nashed '15 (UMass CS)
- Emily Hudson '17 (Dartmouth)
- Jeffrey Owusu-Boateng '16
- Ezra Day-Roberts '13 (Minn)
- Alexandra Werth '14 (Princeton Eng)
- Mike Fisher '14 (Michigan Eng)
- Max Korein '11 (CMU CS)
- Bevan Gerber-Siff '10 (Ventions, SF)
- Ed Dewey '10 (Wisc Math)
- Kevin Labe '11 (Chicago, Cornell)
- Jeff Santner '09 (Princeton Eng, Cal State LA)
- Lake Bookman '08 (NCSU Math, BAE)
- Anna Phillips '10 (Tufts)
- Marc Chang '06
- Zack Michielli '06
- Victoria Swisher '06
- Rachel Sapiro '04 (Michigan)
- Aaron Modic '04 (Auburn, Texas AMIU)
- David Murphy '03 (Columbia Eng, Duke Med)
- Keith Gilmore '01(Montana State, LBL)
- Peter Sollins '98 (Harvard, Boston Law)
- Erik Henriksen '97 (Columbia, Washington University faculty)
- Eric Engstrom '96 (Columbia Econ, FED)
- Charles Danforth '95 (Hopkins Astro, Colorado)
SSX postdoctoral research fellows:
- Chris Cothran (Virginia, Georgetown)
- Tim Gray (Princeton, NASA Glenn Research Center)
- David Schaffner (UCLA, Bryn Mawr)
- Manjit Kaur (Institute for Plasma Research, TAE Technologies, PPPL)
Other SSX collaborators:
- Adam Light (Colorado College)
- Carlos Cartegena (Bryn Mawr)
- Jason TenBarge (Princeton)
- Bill Matthaeus (U Delaware)
- Mike Schaffer (GA)
- Elena Belova (Princeton)
- David Cohen (Swarthmore)
- Clayton Myers (Princeton grad student, PPPL)
- Gang Qin (Delaware grad student, Chinese Academy of Sciences)
- Yu Lin (Auburn)
Experience and Education:
- 1994-2024 Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, PA
- 1993-1994 Occidental College, Los Angeles, CA
- 1987-1994 Caltech, Senior Research Fellow
- 1987 Dartmouth, PhD, Physics
- 1981 Pomona, BA, Physics
Here's a copy of my CV.
Here are some of my papers.
Here is my Google Scholar page.
Here are some pretty pictures of the sun.
Here are some pretty pictures of my family (Zoe (25), Leah (38), and Violet (29)) and the SSX-2002 research group (postdoc Chris Cothran, Matt, Andrew, Abram, Rachel, doc). Leah is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College 2003-7. Leah works in London at Deloitte, is married, and has a daughter Freya born March 31, 2021, and Savanah born September 29, 2023. Violet is a graduate (2017), and Zoe is a graduate (2021) of Carleton College, and lives in Chicago. Violet received her PhD in cognitive psychology from Washington University, and lives in Minneapolis. She is a postdoc at Carleton College.