Dr. Brendan Reagan

Brendan Reagan recently joined the faculty of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Colorado State University as an associate professor in 2025.

Prior to this appointment, he was a laser physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and was a group leader in LLNL’s Advanced Photon Technologies program in the NIF and Photon Science Directorate.

His research focuses on the development of high energy, high average power laser systems and their applications for driving novel radiation sources. While at LLNL, he led projects focused on the development of a high energy, high repetition rate, petawatt peak power laser for the Matter in Extreme Conditions Upgrade project at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, a seven institution DARPA-funded effort to develop laser-based sources of muons for unprecedented radiography of large structures, and the development of ultra-high average power lasers for producing unique sources of particles and radiation applications including for the manufacture of the most advanced semiconductor chips.

Prior to joining LLNL, he was a research scientist in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Colorado State University. He completed his PhD in Electrical Engineering at Colorado State University in 2012 with research focused on the development of high energy, short pulse, diode-pumped solid state lasers. He has coauthored numerous papers and given invited conference presentations on these lasers and their applications including driving high repetition rate, compact plasma-based soft x-ray lasers and incoherent sources of extreme ultraviolet radiation.