Physics and Photonics Science Department

The Physics & Photonics Science department at National Institute of Technology Hamirpur was established in in 2009 as Department of Physics and in 2019 renamed as Physics & Photonics Science department. There are 10 faculty members in the department, including Guest faculty. National Institute of Technology Hamirpur is situated in the land of Gods i.e. Himachal Pradesh. The campus sits in the lap of scenic beauty and the snow-clad mountains of Dhauladhar range which are vividly visible from the campus. The Department is providing world-class undergraduate and postgraduate education, as well as research facilities for doctoral program in diverse areas of fundamental and applied Physics. The department is one of the few places offering a B.Tech. academic degree, in Engineering Physics from 2020. This unique course blends the best of contemporary physics and technology, to create professionals who are equally equipped with both science and technology. Department is equipped with latest world class equipment available to facilitate the fundamental understanding of different concepts to UG and PG students and to give them more exposure of experimentation.

The department also offers 2-year M.Sc. program in Physics and Ph. D. program in various specialized areas of research in experimental and theoretical Physics. At present, there are 12 full time research scholars pursuing Ph. D. degree and more than 24 Ph.D. degrees have been awarded so far. The faculty members of the department have executed projects research projects sponsored by external agencies like DRDO, DST and other govt. agencies. The faculty of the department has published more than 175 research papers in various International Journals.

Mr. Uttam Kumar, who is in the third year of his B.Tech. in Engineering Physics, took part in the three-stage International Astronomy and Astrophysics Competition of 2022. In the final round, people from all over the world were tested on their knowledge of Astronomy and Astrophysics, from the most basic to the most in-depth. In this competition, Mr. Uttam Kumar was in the top 7% of all the people who took part, which earned him the Silver Honour. Ms. Preeti Sharma, Mr. Ankush Verma and Mr. Ashmit Gupta received invitation for attending a wonderful interactive session by Professor William D. Phillips, USA, Nobel laureate in Physics whose work in Laser Cooling and Trapping of Atoms has changed the world through their applications in Atomic Clocks, Time Measurements, GPS, Ultra–cold Atom Quantum Simulations, and Quantum Computing from Womanium Team. The Womanium Foundation's WOMANIUM Global Quantum Computing and Entrepreneurship Program was attended by Mr. Ashmit Gupta and Ms. Preeti Sharma, second-year B.Tech. (Engineering Physics) students. They successfully completed a QBronze Quantum Computing and Programming Module and received a diploma certificate. Mr. Ashmit Gupta received a scholarship from this foundation in order to take part in this big event. Mr. Yash Upadhyay, a third-year B.Tech. (Engineering Physics) student, was selected from among thousands of applications from around the world to attend the prestigious Qalypso School on "Quantum Computation & Open Quantum Systems," held in Gozo, Malta, from September 5 to 9, 2022. Mr. Yash Upadhyay and Soumya Ranjan participated in the IBM Quantum Challenge Fall 2021. It contained exercises related to Quantum Computing’s different industry applications using Qiskit’s application modules: Finance, Nature, Machine Learning and optimization. Mr. Upadhyay has also achieved an Advanced digital Badge in IBM Quantum Challenge fall 2021. Students are doing internship/projects with various prestigious academic/research Institutes and science societies.

Within a very short span of time, the department has made an impression of excellence in the field of academics and research. Our M.Sc. program started in 2017 and the graduated students have secured exceptionally good rankings/scores in competitive examinations like GATE, JEST, JRF/NET etc. and have been selected for Ph.D. programs at different Institutions like National University of Ireland Galway, Raja Raman Centre for Advanced Technology (RRCAT), Indore, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Jawaharlal Nehru University- New Delhi, Indian Institute of Technology Dhanbad, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, Indian Institute of Technology (BHU) Varanasi, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Bhopal, NIT Jalandhar, NIT Kurukshetra, NIT Durgapur, Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati etc. Through the Training and Placement office of the Institute, many of our M.Sc. students have got placement in the reputed cademic and banking organizations and have got the package offers ranging from Rs. 5.0 – 12.56 Lacs per year.

Some more recent achievements:

Recently our department Ph. D. students Mr. Ishant Kumar, Ms. Leelavati, Ms. Jyoti, Dr. Arvind Kumar and Mr. Naveen Kumar were selected for the position of Assistant Professor in Physics, Class-I Gazetted (College Cadre) in the Department of Higher Education, H.P., based on the written cum Personality Test recently conducted by the Himachal Pradesh Public Service Commission-Shimla.

Ms. Mansi Talwar, a student in the Master of Science in Physics program, achieved the All India Rank AIR-88 on the National Level Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE-2023). The other M. Sc. students Ms. Divya Rani, Ms. Ritu, Mr. Sri Ram G, Mr. Mohit Saini, Mr. Satish Singh Kaintura, Mr. Rupam Roy, and Mr. Rohit Singh, along with B.Tech. (Engineering Physics) 3rd year students Mr. Vaibhav Sharma and Mr. Uttam Kumar, were also recognized for qualifying and achieving high Ranks in GATE-2023.

Recently our B.Tech. (Engineering Physics) 3rd year students, namely Mr. Md. Taushif Ali and Mr. Vaibhav Sharma, have been offered summer internships at the Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre, Kolkata which is one of the premier R & D unit of the Department of Atomic Energy, Government of India.

Other students of B.Tech. (Engg. Phys ) 3rd year Mr. Prashant Dhiman, Mr. Udit Chauhan, Mr. Shivansh Sharma and Mr. S. Aravindhakshan of M.Sc. (Physics) have been chosen for the Summer Research Fellowship Program 2023 offered by three National Science Academies.

Mr. Sai Vignesh Kallimakula and Mr. Ayush Sahu, both in their third year of the Bachelor of Technology programme in Engineering Physics have been offered summer internships at the Defense Metallurgical Research Laboratory in Hyderabad.

The department is actively involved in organizing activities like, Conferences, Workshops, Symposium, DST sponsored SERC School, Seminars, Short-term Courses, Capacity Building Programmes for Lecturers etc. and is planning to organize many more of such events in the near future. The department is proactive and would like to attract talented students.