A Georgetown professor has some new toys to play with – NASA supercomputers.

NASA awarded use of its computers to Physics Professor James Freericks on March 3 as part of a grant to study the effects of materials’ exposure to large electric fields.

Freericks was granted 900,000 computer hours over the course of one year on NASA’s Columbia computer, one of the world’s most advanced supercomputers with over 4,000 gigabytes of memory. The 900,000 hours account for approximately 5 percent of the supercomputer’s available time for the year.

Freericks, who specializes in quantum physics, plans to use the supercomputers to process equations relating to electric conductivity Mott insulators, which can dramatically change electronic properties depending on their environment.

With the help of the computers, Fredericks said he may be able to finally solve complex equations that will help predict how the insulators will react in different environments.

Freericks said that the awarded computer hours would provide an opportunity to investigate and improve the use of Mott insulators for applications such as enhancing electronics in NASA, the private sector and the military.

“[Freericks] finds innovative ways to tackle some of the most challenging problems in computational materials science, and his work has a big impact on the department and on the scientific community,” said Jeffrey Urbach, chair of the physics department.

“The award from NASA is a well-deserved recognition of his important scientific achievements, and will undoubtedly lead to exciting new discoveries,” he added.

The award was part of NASA’s National Leadership Computing System Initiative, the division of NASA responsible for awarding the grants. Freericks’ proposal was one of four accepted out of 20 applicants. It was the only award given for physics researchers.