Neil Shenvi

My name is Neil Shenvi. Whether you’re a Christian seeking a better understanding of the Neil718headshotevidence for Christianity, an agnostic who isn’t sure what he believes, or a committed atheist, I hope you’ll find this site helpful.

About me:

I grew up in Delaware and attended Princeton University as an undergraduate where I worked on high-dimensional function approximation with Professor Herschel Rabitz. I became a Christian in Berkeley, CA where I did my PhD in Theoretical Chemistry at UC – Berkeley with Professor Birgitta Whaley. The subject of my PhD dissertation was quantum computation, including topics in quantum random walks, cavity quantum electrodynamics, spin physics, and the N-representability problem. From 2005-2010, I worked as a postdoctoral associate with Prof. John Tully at Yale where I did research into nonadiabatic dynamics, electron transfer, and surface science. I moved down to Durham in 2010 to do research into nonadiabatic dynamics and electronic structure theory with professor Weitao Yang at Duke University.

A list of my publications can be found here.

A few days after arriving in Durham, I had a seizure caused by an undiagnosed 5cm brain tumor between my cerebellum and occipital lobe. By God’s grace, the emergency surgery was a success and I’ve been healthy ever since.

In 2015, I quit my job at Duke to homeschool my four children, although I still fiddle with quantum mechanics now and then for fun. In addition to my duties as the principal of the South Durham Academy for Math and Science (also known as Daddy Academy), I tutor the Master’s class at our local Classical Conversations homeschool co-op. In my spare time, I enjoy reading, weight-lifting, and video games.