Programs & research areas

We offer S.M., M.E., and Ph.D. programs that cover research topics in several broad areas. Study/research is not limited to just the topics below; most students pursue work that covers multiple areas.

Students may also pursue collaborative options with other schools and departments through programs such as Engineering and Physical Biology, Science, Technology & Management (jointly with Harvard Business School), Health Sciences and Technology (with Harvard Medical School and MIT), and Systems Biology (with Harvard Medical School).

Note: SEAS students are expected to have an SEAS faculty member as their primary advisor; co-advising with other appropriate faculty throughout Harvard is encouraged for students pursuing interdisciplinary work.

To learn more about each area and its sub-areas and our collaborative and related programs click on the links below. Also see our Faculty Area Research brochure (PDF).

Graduate research Areas

Applied Mathematics

Control Theory and Communications
Mathematical Biology
Mathematical Geophysics
Numerical Analysis
Physical and Engineering Mathematics
Theoretical Computer Science

Applied Physics

Biophysics
Materials Science
Electronic and Magnetic Systems and Devices
Oceans, Atmospheres, and Geophysics
Optics, Electromagnetics, and Light-Matter Interactions
Soft Condensed Matter
Surface and Interface Science
Theory and Simulation

Bioengineering

Biomechanics
Cell and Tissue Engineering
Instrumentation and Imaging
Neural Engineering

Computer Science

Artificial Intelligence and Computational Linguistics
Electronic Commerce
Graphics
Languages, Compilers, and Tools
Networking and Systems
Theory of Computation

Electrical Engineering

Circuits and VLSI
Communications and Signal Processing
Computer Engineering
Intelligent Systems and Computer Vision
Photonics and Optical Devices
RF and Antennas
Stochastic Systems
Systems and Control

Environmental Sciences and Engineering

Atmospheric Chemistry and Climate Modeling
Climate Dynamics and Physical Oceanography
Environmental Chemistry
Environmental Microbiology
Environmental Systems, Resource Management, and Planning
Geomechanics
Meteorology and Atmospheric Dynamics
Risk Analysis and Public Health

Mechanical Engineering

Fluid Dynamics
Solid Mechanics
Robotics

Collaborative Graduate Programs

Engineering and Physical Biology

(with the Faculty of Arts and Sciences)
The goal of Engineering and Physical Biology (EPB) is to create a new generation of young scientists who can work comfortably, and simultaneously, in both the life sciences and the physical sciences. From an engineering/physics perspective, a particular biological phenomenon may reflect the operation of chemical, electrical and/or mechanical effects. Questions of interest fall into three general categories: Mechanics and Dynamics;Patterns and Collective Phenomena; and Transport, Signaling and Communication.

Science, Technology & Management (STM)

(joint with the Harvard Business School)
The ITM Ph.D. program, a collaboration with
Harvard Business School (HBS), seeks to develop
new methodologies and to generate research that
explores in depth the interaction between information,
technology, and management. Area's of emphasis include: Accounting and Control; Competition and Strategy; Marketing; Negotiation, Organizations, and Markets; Organizational Behavior; and Technology and Operations Management.

Medical Engineering and Medical Physics

(Harvard-MIT School of Health Sciences and Technology)
The departments of Biophysics and Physics participate in the Harvard-MIT Health Science and Technology (HST) Medical Engineering and Medical Physics Program (MEMP), including a specialized tract in Bioinformatics and Integrative Genomics (BIG).

The five- to six-year Medical Engineering and Medical Physics program leads to the Ph.D. or Sc.D. in Medical Engineering or Medical Physics awarded by MIT, or the Ph.D. awarded by the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences.

The MEMP/BIG curriculum gives students hands-on experience in the biomedical sciences and engineering to allow them to explore the fundamental principles underlying human biology and diseases, discover new diagnostic and therapeutic approaches, and ultimately ameliorate human suffering.

BIG is a specialized area of study within HST’s Medical Engineering and Medical Physics program. In BIG, bioinformatics is viewed in a broad sense to comprise the overall activity of extracting the functional dependencies of biological systems from the data generated by sequence, microarray, proteomics, and metabolism-probing technologies.

Related Programs

The Exchange Scholars Program

(via The University of Pennsylvania)
The Exchange Scholar Program enables accepted graduate students enrolled in our doctoral programs to study at one of the other graduate schools for a limited period of time as to take advantage of particular educational opportunities not available on the home campus.

The academic experience, including courses taken and/or research conducted with particular faculty at the visited institution, will be registered on the academic record maintained by the student’s home institution.

Participating institutions: University of California at Berkeley; Brown University; University of Chicago; Columbia University; Cornell University; Harvard University; Massachusetts Institute of Technology; University of Pennsylvania; Princeton University; Stanford University; Yale University.

For complete information visit: www.upenn.edu/VPGE/exchange.html