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Karen E. Daniels
Karen E. Daniels is an American physicist who is a professor of physics at North Carolina State University. Her research considers the deformation and failure of materials. She is a Fellow of the American Physical Society, and serves on their Committee on the Status of Women in Physics. She is also a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Early life and educationDaniels completed a bachelor's degree in physics at Dartmouth College in 1994.[1][2] She originally planned to study engineering.[3] After graduating, Daniels spent three years as a physics teacher at Saint Ann's School. Daniels joined Cornell University as a graduate student, earning a PhD in 2002.[1] She was a postdoctoral research associate at Duke University, working on jamming transitions.[1][4] At Duke University, Daniels developed a technique that can make a container of granules arrange into a solid-state crystal (freeze) or into a fluid (melt) by changing the rate at which they are shaken.[5] Research and careerDaniels joined North Carolina State University as an assistant professor in 2005.[1] She is interested in how materials compress, stretch and bend when a force is applied.[6] She specializes in granular materials and their force chains, and how networks within granular materials control their bulk properties. She developed a way to monitor whether granular materials reach a thermodynamic equilibrium, using plastic granules.[7] In 2011, Daniels spent a year as an Alexander von Humboldt Foundation fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization in Göttingen,[1][8] coordinating a workshop on complex system's: "Particulate Matter: Does Dimensionality Matter."[9] She worked with Haverford College to study the naturally arising sound waves of granular materials.[10][11] When the materials experience shear stress, the vibrating grains start to stick to the interface. When the stress becomes too much, several grains slip at once, rearranging into new patterns.[12] The stick-slip transition is accompanied by low-frequency vibrational modes.[12] She demonstrated that sound passes through the areas of a material where particles are tightest together.[12] Her lab team have investigated how space missions could explore asteroids.[13] She was supported by NASA to conduct experiments in zero gravity, and took a group of undergraduates to Zero Gravity Corporation.[13] She has also looked at liquid metals, and demonstrated that applying a low voltage to eutectic gallium-indium can cause it to form snowflake-like crystals.[14] Daniels is on the editorial board of Physical Review Letters.[1][15] She serves on the American Physical Society Topical Group on Soft Matter committee.[16] Daniels has been involved with activities to increase the representation of women in physics since the start of her career.[17] She is part of the North Carolina State University NSF ADVANCE award "Developing Diverse Departments".[1][18] Awards and honors
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