Bernardo Barbiellini

Northeastern University
Department of Physics
Boston, MA 02115

Phone: (617) 373-2961
Email: bba@neu.edu

Web:
nuweb.neu.edu/bbarbiellini/research/

Bernardo Barbiellini defended his Ph.D. dissertation entitled “Effect of correlations on electronic and positronic states in solids” at University of Geneva in 1991. This work proposed new potentials for the Density Functional Theory (DFT) beyond the Local Density Approximation (LDA) and suggested new scheme to predict material characteristics measured by the Positron Annihilation Spectroscopy. After his thesis, he was offered a two years research associate position at University of Geneva to provide the theory for positron annihilation experiments in temperature superconductors. He then received a three years grant from the Swiss National Foundation (SNF), which enabled him to work at Helsinki University of Technology, Bell-Labs and UCLA. During this period, he developed the theory of positron annihilation and Compton x-ray scattering. The work performed at Bell-Labs culminated in the discovery of the covalency of the hydrogen bond in ice, which has important consequences in the theory of the hydrogen bond. After completing his research SNF grant, he was hired in 1999 by Northeastern University to manage the Advanced Scientific Computation Center (ASCC) and to conduct research on the theory of various spectroscopic techniques. In this position that he is still holding, he conducts original research on x-ray scattering, photoemission and positron annihilation spectroscopic studies of materials relevant for energy applications. In particular, he has elaborated new advanced characterizations for doped superconducting oxides, nano-crystals in dye sensitize solar cell and for Li cathode materials.

Research Interests
Bernardo’s more recent scientific interests are investigations on materials relevant for energy demand challenges via an advanced characterization combining First Principles computations and probes available at powerful synchrotron light sources. He has strong interest in interdisciplinary research combining strategies in scientific computing with applications in condensed matter physics, materials science and bioinformatics.

5 most relevant publications

Y. Sakurai, M. Itou, B. Barbiellini, P. E. Mijnarends, R. S. Markiewicz, S. Kaprzyk, J.-M. Gillet, S.Wakimoto, M. Fujita, S. Basak, Yung Jui Wang, W. Al-Sawai, H. Lin, A. Bansil, and K. Yamada. Imaging Doped Holes in a Cuprate Superconductor with High-Resolution Compton Scattering. Science 332, 698 (2011)
B. Barbiellini and T. Jarlborg. Importance of local band effects for ferromagnetism in hole doped La2CuO4 cuprate superconductors. Phys. Rev. Lett. 109, 233203 (2008)
E.D. Isaacs, A. Shukla, P.M. Platzman, D.R. Hamann, B. Barbiellini and C.A. Tulk. Evidence for Covalency of the Hydrogen Bond in Ice: A Direct X-ray Measurement. Phys. Rev. Lett. 82, 600 (1999)
A. Harju, B. Barbiellini, S. Siljamaki, R.M. Nieminen and G. Ortiz. Stochastic Gradient Approximation: An Efficient Method to Optimize Many-body Wave Functions, Phys. Rev. Lett. 79, 1173 (1997)
B. Barbiellini, M.J. Puska, T. Torsti and R.M. Nieminen. Gradient Corrections for Positron States in Solids, Phys. Rev. B 51, 7341 (1995)