Andrew Jayich

Andrew Jayich is an Associate Professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), Department of Physics. His research focuses on trapped atomic and molecular ions to study fundamental symmetries, optical clocks, and quantum information science. He completed his Ph.D. at Yale University under advisor Jack Harris, followed by a postdoctoral position with Wes Campbell at UCSB where he pioneered laser cooling techniques using optical frequency combs.

Education: B.S. Harvard University; Ph.D. Yale University (2012), advised by Jack Harris. His doctoral work involved optomechanical cooling of a SiN membrane to near-ground-state occupancy in a cryogenic environment.

Research Interests: Experimental atomic physics, quantum control of trapped ions, precision measurements of electric dipole moments (EDMs), and development of next-generation optical clocks. His lab explores symmetry-violating interactions through EDM experiments and quantum information processing platforms.

Key Projects: The EDM-Limits GitHub repository (co-led with collaborators) tracks theoretical and experimental bounds on electron and quark EDMs, influencing searches for physics beyond the Standard Model. Recent work includes cooling radium ions to their motional ground state and developing novel measurement techniques for permanent EDMs published in Physical Review Letters.

Awards: Recipient of the Moore Foundation Fundamental Physics Innovation Award supporting his work on quantum sensors and symmetry violation experiments.

Advising: Mentors students including Mingyu Fan, Anna Wang, and undergraduates contributing to ground-breaking cooling experiments. His lab collaborates on projects like radioactive molecule production and frequency comb applications.

Labs/Teams: Principal Investigator of the Jayich Lab at UCSB, leading a team focused on precision measurement and quantum technologies. Active in open-source software development for experimental physics through GitHub repositories.