i. First paragraph ? Describe the general areas of research that interest you and why. (This is
helpful for a committee to determine which professors should read your application.)
1) Quantum optics
What I concern and am interested in is quantumoptics and its application. The major part of my experience is what I was atAdvanced Photonics Research Institute, which is largest among the institute tostudy optics and photonics in Korea. I installed instruments, analyzed results,and searched literatures related to high field laser plasma experiments. Onthis basis, it is natural for me to be interested in photonics. I think quantumoptics is the only remained way to make breakthrough the limited scientificknowledge because most of what we made are worked by the law ofelectromagnetism. In other words, the electromagnetism rules human life.
2) Solid state physics
Semiconductor device rules the world andbecomes more and more important nowadays. To reveal physical laws to explainproperties of solid state devices seems almost to be completed but many thingsto discover are still remained. I want to study solid state physics in yourdepartment. Specially, my interest is to apply theoretical method to solidstate material in order to found proper physical laws. Though I am involved totheoretical physics, I am well trained to experimental way as well.
ii. Second paragraph and Third paragraph ? Descibe some research projects that you worked on.
Tell us what you found, what you learned, what approaches you tried. It’s fine to say that you
were unable to prove what you wanted or to solve your problem.
My first research experience was neutrino phenomenology and particle detector development in master’s course. The results were published in Journal of Korean Physics Society at 2006. The research was performed with my advice proffesor. In neutrino physics, I studied massive neutrinos and their mixing parameters. I assumed a model so called “quark-lepton complementarity” and derived the parameters from the model. In particle detector project, my job was detector chamber design, electric field simulation, and the team leader. I made chamber design with AutoCAD design program. Electric field simulation was performed with a program written in C by ourselves. I advanced my leadership by this.
Second, I worked at Mindalive co., Ltd., which is a company to develop and serve education program for gifted children in science and mathematics. When I was in the company, my task was to review contents in educational games and textbooks. Moreover, my position was as a communication bridge between program developers and contents designers.
The last major experience was ultra-high power laser expreiment. When I was in APRI, I participated in four kinds of high power laser application, which are proton acceleration, electron acceleration, high order harmonic generation, and X-ray laser holography. Because I was a technical assistant, major tasks assigned to me were high vacuum system operation, optical path alignment, particle detection and diagnostic system operation, experimental result analysis, and development of computer programs to support experiments and their analyses. Minor tasks were also assigned, such as computing cluster management, radiation safety management and thin semiconductor film fabrication. From these, what I get are various. For example, I learnt using techniques of actual tools, analyzing vast amount of data, basic and advanced optics with laser, and difference between theory and experiment in real situation.
All in all, in any case my tasks included theory, experiment, and computer simulation. My experieces will be helpful to research in any case because wide range of experiences should give me creative idea and solutions for the given problems.
iii. Fourth paragraph ? Tell us why you feel you need a Ph.D.. Look back to section 2 and explain
what in there appealed to you.
As I was a child, I wanted to be a scientist, specially a physicist. If I get Ph.D., I will advance my research topic. I am a very curious boy. Asking and answering questions about nature and science make me happy and excited. More exactly, I would like to study the field with theoretical methods. Natural scientists have two ways to research: theory and experiment. I think to reveal mathematical structure in the nature is to give us more practical knowledge and suggest which way for us to choose progress the science. Moreover, because I have well experienced as an experimentalist, I can propose theories to get along with experiments.
iv. Fifth paragraph ? Tell us why you want to come to CMU.Whom might you like to work with?
What papers have you looked at from CMU that you enjoyed reading? What will CMU teach
you?