Rate My Professor Pavel Snopok

Pavel Snopok is the Chair of the Department of Physics and a Professor at Illinois Institute of Technology, part of the Lewis College of Science and Letters. Originally from Russia, he earned an M.S. degree from St. Petersburg State University and another M.S. from Michigan State University. He completed his Ph.D. in physics and mathematics in 2007 at Michigan State University through a joint graduate program with Fermilab. From 2007 to 2010, Snopok served as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, Riverside, focusing on muon collider design in a Fermilab-hosted program. He joined Illinois Institute of Technology in 2011 as a tenure-track assistant professor, was promoted to full professor by 2016, and assumed the role of department chair at the start of the 2023–24 academic year.

Snopok's research encompasses beam physics, accelerator physics, neutrino physics, and computational physics, including advanced accelerator design and simulation, machine learning, nonlinear dynamical system analysis, normal form methods, mathematical modeling, and optimization methods. He collaborates closely with Fermilab on prominent experiments such as NOvA, which studies neutrino oscillations and their cosmic significance; the Muon Ionization Cooling Experiment (MICE); and the Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility/Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (LBNF/DUNE). Select key publications include "Improved measurement of neutrino oscillation parameters by the NOvA experiment" (Physical Review D 106, 032004, 2022), "Demonstration of cooling by the Muon Ionization Cooling Experiment" (Nature 578, 53-59, 2020), "First Measurement of Neutrino Oscillation Parameters using Neutrinos and Antineutrinos by NOvA" (Physical Review Letters 123, 151803, 2019), "Long-baseline neutrino oscillation physics potential of the DUNE experiment" (European Physical Journal C 80, 978, 2020), "Muon Collider Forum report" (Journal of Instrumentation 19 T02015, 2024), and "Minimizing Space Charge Tune Spread and Increasing Beam Quality Parameters with Circular Modes" (Proceedings of the 15th International Particle Accelerator Conference, IPAC'24, 2024). A member of the American Physical Society, Snopok contributes to advancing experimental particle physics through accelerator innovations and neutrino studies.