Dr. Prineha Narang is a Professor in Physical Sciences and Electrical and Computer Engineering at UCLA with an interdisciplinary group spanning areas of physics, chemistry, and engineering. Prior to moving to UCLA, she was an Assistant Professor of Computational Materials Science at Harvard University. Before starting on the Harvard faculty in 2017, Dr. Narang was an Fellow at HUCE, and worked as a research scholar in condensed matter theory in the Department of Physics at MIT. She received an M.S. and Ph.D. in Applied Physics from Caltech. Her group works on quantum materials, non-equilibrium dynamics and photonics, and quantum information science.

Dr. Narang is an elected Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS). Narang’s work has been recognized by many awards and special designations, including the 2023 Guggenheim Fellowship in Physics, Maria Goeppert Mayer Award from the American Physical Society, 2023 ONR Young Investigator Award, 2022 Outstanding Early Career Investigator Award from the Materials Research Society, Mildred Dresselhaus Prize, Bessel Research Award from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, a Max Planck Sabbatical Award from the Max Planck Society, and the IUPAP Young Scientist Prize in Computational Physics all in 2021, an NSF CAREER Award in 2020, being named a Moore Inventor Fellow by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, CIFAR Azrieli Global Scholar by the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, a Top Innovator by MIT Tech Review (MIT TR35, )and a leading young scientist by the World Economic Forum in 2018. In 2017, she was named by Forbes Magazine on their “30under30” list for her work in atom-by-atom quantum engineering, that is, designing materials at the smallest scale, using single atoms, to enable the leap to quantum technologies. A full list of publications as PDF is available here .

A trailblazer at the intersection of physics, engineering, and computation, she is known for her research and leadership in translating breakthrough discoveries into real-world technologies. She has founded and worked with a variety of deep tech startups, and has held senior engineering and advisory positions at Applied Materials, Northrop Grumman, among others. In 2023 she was appointed a U.S. Science Envoy by the Secretary of State; she was reappointed to the role in 2024 to advocate for quantum science, technology, and innovation internationally and establish American leadership in the field. She has served in policy, technology, and national security facing roles, and is a non-resident Senior Fellow at the Foundation for American Innovation.

Dr. Narang has held leadership roles in a DOE EFRC ‘Photonics at Thermodynamic Limits’, DOE NQI Quantum Science Center, and the NSF ERC ‘Center for Quantum Networks’, among others. Her continued service to the science community includes chairing the Gordon Conference on Ultrafast and Cooperative Phenomena, Materials Research Society (MRS) Spring Meeting (2022) and the MRS-Kavli Foundation Future of Materials Workshop: Computational Materials Science (2021), organizing APS, Optica (OSA), and SPIE symposia, and a leadership role in APS’ Division of Materials Physics. Narang is an Associate Editor at ACS Nano of the American Chemical Society, an Associate Editor at Applied Physics Letters of the American Institute of Physics, and the Editorial Advisory Boards of Nano Letters and Advanced Photonics. 

In 2023 she was elected to the Board of Trustees of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and appointed to the Science Advisory Council of arXiv.

In November 2025, Narang was elected to the Council of the U.S. National Academies Government-University-Industry-Philanthropy Research Roundtable,  charged with improving the research enterprise of the United States.

In 2025 Dr. Narang started as an Operating Partner at DCVC, a leading deep tech venture capital firm, enabling founders to push the boundaries of computing, sensing, and networking to turn break­through science into transformative businesses.

Outside the lab and the boardroom,  Dr. Narang is a dedicated endurance athlete, competitive marathoner, and high-altitude mountaineer. Time spent outdoors is important to her and here’s a Faculty Spotlight highlighting how she spends time outside the lab and an article by the Moore Foundation on “Beyond the Lab“.