NAVID VAFAEI-NAJAFABADI
Associate Professor
Physics and Astronomy
navid.vafaei-najafabadi@stonybrook.edu | (631)-632-7023, Physics D-101
Research Group Website

Biography
Navid Vafaei-Najafabadi is an Associate Professor at Stony Brook University and the Facility Scientist at the Accelerator Test Facility (ATF) at the Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL). He received his PhD from UCLA in 2016, after which he joined the department of Physics and Astronomy as faculty. Since the end of 2023, he has served as the chair of the BeamNetUS, a new organization which aims to expand access to the beam test facilities in the US. He is an active member of the Advanced Accelerator community, serving as a member of the Advanced Accelerator Concepts (AAC) Steering Committee (SC) since 2025. He is also deeply committed to undergraduate research and education and has served as the chair of the Undergraduate Research and REU Committee.

Research Statement
My research interest cover all aspects of plasma-based particle acceleration, including simulation, theory, and experiments. Specifically, my group’s projects revolve around generation of beams with unique properties suitable for applications in free electron lasers (FELs) and plasma-based colliders. We collaborate with leading laboratories in the US including Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), SLAC National Laboratory, and Laboratory for Laser Energetics (LLE). Our primary activities are at BNL ATF, where we conduct a number of laser–plasma experiments, the flagship of which is an all-optical photoinjector enabled by their unique multi-terawatt CO2 laser.