1993 Bachelor of Science in Physics, University of Science and Technology of China

1996 Master of Science in Physics, University of Science and Technology of China

1999 PhD in Physics, Peking University

1999-2001 Postdoc, Institute of advanced studies, Tsinghua University

2001-2005 Associate researcher, Institute of advanced studies, Tsinghua University

2005-present  Professor, Renmin University of China

I am mainly engaged in the theoretical study of the mechanism of the high temperature superconductivity in the cuprates and the exotic quantum ground state and excitations in strongly frustrated quantum magnets. Both systems are typical strongly correlated electron systems whose study has much overlap in both theoretical techniques and physical ideas. In fact, it is P. W. Anderson who first pointed out the profound relationship between these two seemingly unrelated and even mutually exclusive phenomena through the lens of the resonating valence bond theory.

Since 2007, 7 students got their PhD degree from my group, among whom one is affiliated to Tsinghua University and the other six are affiliated to Renmin University of China. 6 students got their Master degree from my group.

The courses that I taught since 2003 are as follows

Physics of superconductivity, 2003(at Tsinghua)

Quantum statistical physics, 2004(at Tsinghua)

Atomic physics, 2006

Quantum mechanics, 2007-now

Principles of condensed matter physics, 2007-2010

Group theory, 2012-2014

Field theories in condensed matter physics, 2016,2018

Advanced quantum mechanics, 2019,2020

Physics of high temperature superconductivity in the cuprates, 2021-2023

Research topics for undergraduate student, 2022-now

More information on my teaching can be found at my teaching webpage

https://space.bilibili.com/472751271?spm_id_from=333.999.0.0

My research focuses mainly on the development of variational optimization method and dynamical variational theory to study the ground state and excitation behaviors of strongly correlated electron systems such as the cuprate superconductors and frustrated quantum magnets. I am also interested in the construction of low energy effective field theory of strongly correlated electron systems and their application in the phenomenological understanding of the physics of the cuprate superconductors. Some of my recent publications about these issues are as follows

[1] Origin of the pseudogap end point in high-Tc cuprate superconductors, Jianhua Yang and Tao Li, Phys. Rev. B 110, 024521(2024).

[2] Strong relevance of zinc impurities in spin-1/2 kagome quantum antiferromagnets: A variational study, Jianhua Yang and Tao Li, Phys. Rev. B 109, 115103(2024).

[3]Instability of the U(1) spin liquid with a large spinon Fermi surface in the Heisenberg-ring exchange model on the triangular lattice，Jianhua Yang and Tao Li，Phys. Rev. B 108, 235105 （2023）

[4]Absence of a T^2/3 specific heat anomaly in a U(1) spin liquid with a large spinon Fermi surface, Tao Li, Phys. Rev. B 104, 165123 (2021)

[5] Resonating valence bond theory of anomalous spin dynamics of spin-1/2 triangular lattice Heisenberg antiferromagnet and its application to Ba3CoSb2O9, Chun Zhang and Tao Li, Phys. Rev. B 102, 075108(2020).

More information on my research can be found at my academic webpage:

https://arxiv.org/a/li_t_7.html