Postgraduate Admissions 2025

The Theory of Condensed Matter group usually accepts a little over half a dozen PhD students each year.

Research areas include Electronic Structure Computation, Soft Matter, Statistical Physics, Collective Phenomena, Strongly Correlated Systems, and Biological Physics/Physics of Life. There is no fixed list of projects, but you can find some representative examples in this slideshow. Prospective applicants are strongly encouraged to contact potential supervisors whose research is of interest. Even if you do not receive a reply, such an approach is often a useful first step.

Those potentially interested in applicants to begin in October 2025 are Artacho, Barnes, Béri, Castelnovo, Cicuta, Fusco, Jasak, Lamacraft, Peng, Schran, Souslov, Terentjev. However, please note that any Principal Investigator in the group can supervise postgraduate students.

The application process

You must apply for graduate admission to the Physics Department. Relevant applications reach TCM for further selection, shortlisting, and interviews.

In your application, you should specify that you are interested in projects in TCM. You should also include the names of all potential supervisors that you are willing to consider working with. Ideally, these should be ranked in order of preference (the names and the ordering can later be altered at or shortly after the interview, if invited). Above in this same page you find a list of supervisors who are likely to look for postgraduate students this coming academic year.

There is no strict application deadline but in order to receive full consideration in the TCM group, we strongly encourage students to submit their applications by the end of November. TCM will hold online interviews in January 2025. Interviews typically begin with a 10 minute presentation by the candidate on a project or extended piece of work they have recently completed, or on a research topic they are familiar with. This is followed by approximately 10 minutes of questions, not limited to the topic of the presentation. The interview panel will consist of three members of TCM.

Shortly after the interview, the applicants will be asked to provide a final ranked list of the supervisors they are willing to work with in TCM, which will form the basis for the final selection process before official offers are made.

TCM will continue to consider applications until all available positions have been filled. If you are unsure whether we are still accepting applications, please contact the TCM group administrator.

Funding

Your eligibility for funding from different sources will depend on your individual circumstances. Details can be found on the departmental website. Some of these sources have their own internal deadlines and you should make sure that your application is submitted in time.

When filling out the departmental application, we encourage prospective students to apply for any funding sources that they are eligible for, including Cambridge Trust funding, College funding, Gates Cambridge etc. Some of these funding sources will ask for extra information: for example, Gates Cambridge asks for an extra reference letter, specific to their funding competition. Applications submitted by the end of November are eligible for most funding sources. As an exception, Gates Cambridge has an earlier deadline for U.S. residents, typically in early October.

Centres for Doctoral Training

This University page lists all EPSRC-funded Centres for Doctoral Training at Cambridge. Each CDT has its own application process and includes a taught component in the first year in addition to a funded 3-year PhD project. Many Cambridge CDTs are in areas relevant to TCM research, and some CDTs have PhD projects proposed by one of the TCM academics. The applications to CDTs are separate to the TCM application and provide an independent extra source of funding (these applications are not mutually exclusive).

Some CDTs that may be of interest are the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Superconductivity and the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Aerosol Science. In addition, the department also hosts the Centre for Doctoral Training in Computational Methods for Materials Science for those with interest in computational methods and materials.

Information for incoming students

If you have been accepted and secured funding through TCM, we encourage you to visit the group. Please get in touch with your future supervisor to organise the visit. In addition to others at TCM and the TCM website, some useful information may be found through the Department of Physics and your college. We look forward to welcoming you in the Ray Dolby Centre!