- Professor
- Mitchell-Heep Chair in Experimental High Energy Physics
- Phone: 979-229-4196
- Email: mahapatra@physics.tamu.edu
- Office: MIST M417 (main office)
- Document: CV
Biography
Dr. Rupak Mahapatra joined the Texas A&M Department of Physics and Astronomy in 2008 after earning his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 2000 and completing postdoctoral work at the University of California, Santa Barbara. A member of the George P. and Cynthia Woods Mitchell Institute for Fundamental Physics and Astronomy, he is an international expert in high-energy particle physics with significant experience in building particle detectors and analyzing related data. He received the Department of Energy Early Career Research Award in 2010 and has been a principal investigator with the international Super Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (SuperCDMS) experiment since 2003. In 2017, he founded the Mitchell Institute Neutrino Experiment at Reactor (MINER) at the Texas A&M Nuclear Science Center, which uses cutting-edge, low-threshold detectors developed at Texas A&M to measure background signals and search for new physics beyond the Standard Model. In 2023, his detectors contributed to the creation of TESSERACT, a world-leading, low-mass dark matter search experiment approved as a Department of Energy project. He is actively developing next-generation detectors made of germanium, silicon, and gallium arsenide semiconductors, as well as sapphire and cesium iodide scintillators using transition edge sensors and custom semiconductor fabrication tools in his lab. Dr. Mahapatra also leads collaborative research with several national laboratories on projects spanning fundamental particle physics, applied quantum information sciences, and nuclear safeguards.
Research Team
- Mark Platt
- Sharada Sahoo
- Jing-Han Chen
- Keith Hunter
- Bailey Pickard
- Mahdi Mirzakhani
Institutional Partnerships
Research Interests
- Dark Matter
- Neutrino
- Axion
- High-Energy Detector R&D
- The Standard Model & Search for New Particles
Awards & Honors
- Mitchell/HEEP Endowed Chair in Experimental Particle Physics
- Chancellor EDGES Fellowship (2024)
- AFS University Distinguished Achievement Award in Teaching (The Association of Former Students, 2021)
- AFS College Level Teaching Award (The Association of Former Students, 2020)
- Presidential Impact Fellow (Texas A&M University, 2019)
- Early CAREER Award (Department of Energy, 2010)
- Donation of Entire 6-inch Semiconductor Fab Line (Maxim Integrated Products, 2009)
Selected Publications
- First Limits on Light Dark Matter Interactions in a Low Threshold Two Channel Athermal Phonon Detector from
the TESSERACT Collaboration: https://inspirehep.net/literature/2897108 - First Measurement of the Nuclear-Recoil Ionization Yield in Silicon at 100 eV (SuperCDMS collaboration):
https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.131.091801 - Low energy backgrounds and excess noise in a two-channel low-threshold calorimeter (TESSERACT
collaboration): https://pubs.aip.org/aip/apl/article-abstract/126/10/102601/3339435/Low-energy-
backgrounds-and-excess-noise-in-a-two - Phonon-mediated high-voltage detector with background rejection for low-mass dark matter and reactor
coherent neutrino scattering experiments:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0168900222002467 - First Leptophobic Dark Matter Search from the Coherent–CAPTAIN-Mills Liquid Argon Detector:
https://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.129.021801 - MINER Reactor Based Search for Axion-Like Particles Using Sapphire (Al2O3) Detectors:
https://inspirehep.net/literature/2916516 - New Directions for Axion Searches via Scattering at Reactor Neutrino Experiments:
https://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.124.211804