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Academics - Physics Faculty & Staff

Academics - Physics Faculty & Staff

Dennis Krause

Professor of Physics, Dept Chair

CONTACT:

Goodrich Hall 313
765-361-6181
kraused@wabash.edu
Curriculum vitae

Picture of Krause, Dennis

Dennis Krause came to Wabash in 1998 after finishing a three-year stint as a visiting professor at Williams College. Wabash was a perfect fit for Prof. Krause who discovered he wanted to teach at a quality liberal arts college while an undergraduate at Saint Olaf College in Minnesota. At Wabash, he is also able to collaborate with researchers at Purdue University (where received his Ph.D. and where he is an adjunct physics professor) and Indiana University. While he is a theoretical physicist, Prof. Krause works closely with experimentalists since he believes that physics must be firmly grounded in experiments, which provide the true test of a theory’s validity.  His research focuses on the phenomenology of ultra-low-energy fundamental physics beyond the Standard Model (e.g., the search for new forces and dark matter using tabletop experiments) and fundamental issues of quantum mechanics and quantum field theory.

Prof. Krause sees research and teaching as being integral to each other. To see what a physicist really does, a student needs to work on a problem with no known answer. And to teach, a teacher must go beyond the textbook and know how physics is really done.   He has brought his research into the classroom and involved students in his research, and he has used ideas inspired by his teaching in his research. It is also important to Prof. Krause to use the latest results of physics education research to try to better understand how his students think and to improve his teaching. All of this takes up most of his time, but when he needs a break, Prof. Krause can be found running the streets of Crawfordsville or perfecting his skills as the Physics Department’s unofficial “grillmeister.”

Krause talks about his 2015 presentation at the 36th LaFollette Lecture.

EDUCATION

  • Ph.D. Physics, Purdue University, 1994
  • M.S. Physics, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 1987
  • B.A., Physics, Saint Olaf College, 1984

RECENT COURSE OFFERINGS

  • Enduring Questions
  • PHY 111: General Physics I
  • PHY 112: General Physics II
  • PHY 209: Introduction to Thermal and Relativity Physics
  • PHY 210: Introduction to Quantum Theory
  • PHY 230: Thermal Physics
  • PHY 278: Introduction to Quantum Information and Computing
  • PHY 315: Quantum Mechanics
  • PHY 388: Independent Study: General Relativity

RECENT PRESENTATIONS

  • “E = mc^2 and the Quantum Mechanics of Systems with Indefinite Mass,” Keynote Lecture, Annual Meeting of the Indiana Section of the American Association of Physics Teachers, Indiana University Kokomo, April 2023.

  • “Searching for Ultralight Dark Matter Forces,” Monon Bell Physics Lecture, DePauw University, November 2022.

  • “The 2-Neutrino Exchange Potential with Mixing: A Probe of Neutrino Physics and CP Violation,” Eighth Meeting on CPT and Lorentz Symmetry, Indiana University, May 2019.

  • “The 2-Neutrino Exchange Potential: A Window into the Weirdest Particles in Physics,” Kalamazoo College Physics Colloquium, May 2019.

  • “The 2-Neutrino Exchange Potential: A Window into the Weirdest Particles in Physics,” Knox College Physics Colloquium, April 2019.

RECENT PUBLICATIONS

  • "Phenomenological implications of a magnetic 5th force," D. E. Krause, J. Bertaux, A. M. McNamara, J. T. Gruenwald, C. Y. Scarlett,  E. Fischbach,  International Journal of Modern Physics A 38, 2350007 (2023).

  • "Significance of composition-dependent fifth-force searches," E. Fischbach, J. T. Gruenwald, D. E. Krause, M. H. McDuffie, M. J. Mueterthies, C. Y. Scarlett, Physics Letters A 399, 127300 (2021).

  • “Unitarily inequivalent vacua and long-range forces: Phenomenology with scalar boson mass-shift,” Q. Le Thien and D. E. Krause, Modern Physics Letters A 35, 2050139 (2020).

  • The 2-Neutrino Exchange Potential with Mixing: A Probe of Neutrino Physics and CP Violation,” D. E. Krause and Q. Le Thien, in Proceedings of the Eighth Meeting on CPT and Lorentz Symmetry, edited by R. Lehnert (World Scientific, Singapore, 2020), pp. 190–193.

  • “The E ?otv ?os Paradox: The Enduring Significance of E ?otv ?os’ Most Famous Paper,” E. Fischbach and D. E. Krause, Proceedings of Science FFK2019, 039 (2019).

  • “Spin-independent two-neutrino exchange potential with mixing and CP violation,” Q. Le Thien and D. E. Krause, Physical Review D 99, 116006 (2019).

HONORS AND AWARDS

  • Purdue University Special Initiative Dissertation Year Fellowship (1993)
  • Purdue University Physics Department Edward S. Akeley Prize (1994)
  • Wabash College McLain-McTurnan-Arnold Research Scholar (2004)
  • Charles D. LaFollette Lecturer (2015)

 

RECENT STUDENT RESEARCH PROJECTS

  • "Time Dilation in the Forbidden Region" with Nikolai Jones ('24)
  • "Setting Limits on New Forces and Ultralight Dark Matter using Force Experiments" with Chad Wunderlich ('21)
  • "Dark Matter and Cosmic Neutrino Background Drag Forces" with Joseph Bertaux ('19)
  • "Neutrino Oscillations" with Quan Le Thien ('18)
  • "Limits on New Inverse Power Law Forces from Free-fall Experiments" with Tim Riley ('18)
  • "Motion of Quantum Systems with Indefinite Mass" with Inbum Lee ('16)

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