Diane M Markoff

Diane M Markoff is a Professor of Physics in the Department of Mathematics and Physics at North Carolina Central University (NCCU), teaching Fundamentals of Physics I/II for Scientists and Pre-Engineers, Modern Physics, Introduction to Quantum Mechanics, and graduate nuclear/particle physics courses.

Her educational background includes:

• Ph.D. in Physics (Experimental Nuclear Physics) from University of Washington (1998)
• M.S. in Nuclear Engineering (Reactor Analysis) from University of California, Berkeley (1986)
• B.S. in Engineering Physics (Nuclear Engineering) from University of California, Berkeley (1983)
• B.A. in Applied Mathematics from University of California, Berkeley (1983)

Dr. Markoff's research centers on low-energy experimental nuclear and neutrino physics. As an active COHERENT collaboration member at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, she studies neutrino-nucleus scattering across target materials. She also contributes to the KamLAND-Zen collaboration's search for neutrino-less double beta decay—a process that would reveal fundamental neutrino properties. Her Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory (TUNL) work includes Compton scattering on liquid cryogenic targets, quenching factor measurements for detector characterization, and few-body cross-section studies relevant to neutrino and dark matter experiments.

She supervises undergraduate and graduate students through PHYS 4800/5800 research credits and grant stipends. Current funding includes an NSF grant (2024–2027) for cryogenic CsI scintillator deployment in COHERENT, a DOE grant (2023–2028) expanding NCCU's TUNL research, a NASA subaward (2024–2029) for Roman Project cosmological measurements, and a DOE/ORNL CANDID subaward (2023–2025) spanning collider physics, AI, neutrinos, dark matter, and heavy ions.

Her experimental work operates through major international collaborations (COHERENT, KamLAND-Zen) with daily operations at Duke University's TUNL facility, focusing on detector development and fundamental particle interaction measurements.