Dr Bo Peng
College positions: Junior Research Fellow
Subject: Physics
Dr Bo Peng a Junior Research Fellow at Magdalene.
I am a Nevile Junior Research Fellow at Magdalene College Cambridge, a position that will allow me to start my independent academic career.
I obtained my MSc and BSc at Fudan, where I explored different research topics in computational condensed matter physics such as heat transport and light-induced dynamics. I also visited the Institute of Physics of Chinese Academy of Sciences for one year, working on searching for topological materials.
In my PhD, I worked on the topological aspects of vibrational properties of solids, especially non-Abelian braiding of phonons. In my JRF and beyond, I want to take the next steps to design quantum materials for a wide range of sustainable practices, including but not limited to chemical catalysis, most energy-efficient computing, most accurate time-keeping, and most programmable quantum systems.
Research Interests
My research focuses on computational condensed matter physics. My longer-term vision is to seamlessly apply the fundamental laws of quantum physics to study nature at large, from astrophysics to quantum biology.
Qualifications
- PhD Physics, Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge, UK
- MSc Physics, Department of Optics, Fudan University, China
- Second Major in Economy, School of Economics, Fudan University, China
- BSc in Optics, Department of Optics, Fudan University, China
Career / Research Highlights
- 2024 IOP Sam Edwards Prize for best PhD thesis advancing theoretical condensed matter in UK and Ireland
- 2022 Winner in the category Emerging Talents, Falling Walls Science Summit, Berlin
- 2021 Cavendish Prize in Computational Physics. Awarded to 1 PhD student by the Head of Department, Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge, UK
- 2019 15th Daheng Wang Award in Optics. The highest honour for Chinese students in optics, the Chinese Optical Society
- 2019 Young Scientist, 69th Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting, Germany
- 2018 National Scholarship, Ministry of Education, China
- 2017 National Scholarship, Ministry of Education, China
- 2017 Committee of 100 Leadership Scholarship, Committee of 100, US
- 2016 Top 10 Graduating Student. Awarded to 10 out of 3,000 Fudan graduating students.
KEY PUBLICATIONS
Committed to nurture the next generations of scientists, the following 3 last-author papers, highlighted as a Front Cover, demonstrate my ambition to build an inclusive group as a PI where everyone can maximise their capacity.
Jiaqi Wu & BP*. Smallest fullerene as Building Blocks for 2D Networks with Superior Stability and Enhanced Photocatalytic Performance. Journal of the American Chemical Society 147, 1749 (2025). Front Cover.
Cory Jones & BP*. Boosting Photocatalytic Water Splitting of Polymeric C60 by Reduced Dimensionality from 2D Monolayer to 1D Chain. The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters 14, 11768 (2023). Front Cover.
Gunnar F. Lange, Juan D. F. Pottecher, Cameron Robey, Bartomeu Monserrat* & BP*. Negative Refraction of Weyl Phonons at Twin Quartz Interfaces. ACS Materials Letters 6, 847 (2024). Front Cover.
The following 2 single-author papers demonstrate my capacity to work independently.
BP*. Monolayer Fullerene Networks as Photocatalysts for Overall Water Splitting. Journal of the American Chemical Society 144, 19921 (2022).
BP*. Stability and Strength of Monolayer Polymeric C60. Nano Letters 23, 652 (2023).
The following 6 first- or/and corresponding-author papers, published in my PhD, demonstrate my leadership and teamwork, as I set up teams of physicists, chemists, materials scientists, engineers, and mathematicians and led these projects. Through these projects, I won the Sam Edwards Prize for the best PhD thesis in the UK and Ireland advancing theoretical condensed matter and the Cavendish Prize in Computational Physics.
Phonons as a Platform for Non-Abelian Braiding and its Manifestation in Layered Silicates. BP*, Adrien Bouhon*, Bartomeu Monserrat* & Robert-Jan Slager*. Nature Communications 13, 423 (2022). Hot Paper (Top 0.1% mostly cited) in Physics.
Photoinduced Electronic and Spin Topological Phase Transitions in Monolayer Bismuth. BP*, Gunnar F. Lange, Daniel Bennett, Kang Wang, Robert-Jan Slager & Bartomeu Monserrat*. Physical Review Letters 132, 116601 (2024).
Topological Phonons in Oxide Perovskites Controlled by Light. BP, Yuchen Hu, Shuichi Murakami, Tiantian Zhang & Bartomeu Monserrat. Science Advances 6, eabd1618 (2020).
Tunable Photostriction of Halide Perovskites through Energy Dependent Photoexcitation. BP, Daniel Bennett, Ivona Bravić & Bartomeu Monserrat. Physical Review Materials 6, L082401 (2022). Editors’ Suggestion.
Sub-Picosecond Photo-Induced Displacive Phase Transition in Two-Dimensional MoTe2. BP, Hao Zhang, Weiwen Chen, Bowen Hou, Zhi-Jun Qiu, Hezhu Shao, Heyuan Zhu, Bartomeu Monserrat, Desheng Fu, Hongming Weng & Costas M. Soukoulis. npj 2D Materials and Applications 4, 14 (2020).
Topological Semimetallic Phase in PbO2 Promoted by Temperature. BP, Ivona Bravić, Judith L. MacManus-Driscoll & Bartomeu Monserrat. Physical Review B 100, 161101(R) (2019).
Through the following 8 projects before my PhD, I was awarded the highest honour for Chinese young scientists in Optics in my Master whilst all other recipients were either postdocs or senior PhDs.
Predicting Dirac Semimetals Based on Sodium Ternary Compounds. BP*, Changming Yue* (contributed equally), Hao Zhang, Zhong Fang & Hongming Weng. npj Computational Materials 4, 68 (2018).
Room Temperature Bound Exciton with Long Lifetime in Monolayer GaN. BP, Hao Zhang, Hezhu Shao, Ke Xu, Gang Ni, Liangcai Wu, Jing Li, Hongliang Lu, Qingyuan Jin & Heyuan Zhu. ACS Photonics 5, 4081 (2018).
Chemical Intuition for High Thermoelectric Performance in Monolayer Black Phosphorus, α-Arsenene and aW-Antimonene. BP, Hao Zhang, Hezhu Shao, Ke Xu, Gang Ni, Jing Li, Heyuan Zhu & Costas M. Soukoulis. Journal of Materials Chemistry A 6, 2018 (2018). Back Cover.
Stability and Strength of Atomically Thin Borophene from First Principles Calculations. BP, Hao Zhang, Hezhu Shao, Zeyu Ning, Yuanfeng Xu, Gang Ni, Hongliang Lu, David Wei Zhang & Heyuan Zhu. Materials Research Letters 5, 399 (2017).
The Conflicting Role of Buckled Structure in Phonon Transport of 2D Group-IV and Group-V Materials. BP, Dequan Zhang, Hao Zhang, Hezhu Shao, Gang Ni, Yongyuan Zhu & Heyuan Zhu. Nanoscale 9, 7397 (2017). Top 1% Highly Cited Paper.
Phonon Transport Properties of Two-Dimensional Group-IV Materials from ab initio Calculations. BP, Hao Zhang, Hezhu Shao, Yuanfeng Xu, Gang Ni, Rongjun Zhang & Heyuan Zhu. Physical Review B 94, 245420 (2016).
Beyond Perturbation: Role of Vacancy-Induced Localized Phonon States in Thermal Transport of Monolayer MoS2. BP, Zeyu Ning, Hao Zhang, Hezhu Shao, Yuanfeng Xu, Gang Ni & Heyuan Zhu. Journal of Physical Chemistry C 120, 29324 (2016).
High Thermoelectric Performance of Weyl Semimetal TaAs. BP, Hao Zhang, Hezhu Shao, Hongliang Lu, David Wei Zhang & Heyuan Zhu. Nano Energy 30, 225 (2016).