FUNDING AND SPONSORS |
Recent Funding NewsNovember 10, 2011The Biotechnology Research Center announced the recipients of its 2011 Fall Travel Grants. Among the recipients was Saikat Mukhopadhyay (graduate student in Physics), who received $500 toward a poster presentation at the International Conference on Theoretical and Applied Physics to be held in Kolkata, India, in December. November 8, 2011Professor Alex Kostinski (Physics/EPSSI) has received $125,333 of a potential $400,252 from the National Science Foundation for the first year of a potential three-year project, “Stochastic Aspects of Physical and Radar Meteorology.” October 3, 2011Assistant Professor Claudio Mazzoleni (Physics/EPSSI), co-PI Louisa Kramer (GMES) and co-PI Robert Owen (MTRI) have received $156,057 of a potential $299,857 from the US Department of Energy for the first year of a potential two-year project, “The Radiative Role of Free Tropospheric Aerosols and Marine Clouds Over the Central North Atlantic.” September 28, 2011Assistant Professor Lynn Mazzoleni (Chemistry/EPSSI), co-PI Claudio Mazzoleni (Physics/EPSSI), co-PI Chris Owen, (MTRI) and co-PI Noel Urban (CEE) have received $546,213 from the National Science Foundation for a three-year project, “Collaborative Research: Chemical, Physical, and Radiative Properties of North Atlantic Free Tropospheric Aerosol after Long-range Transport.” September 23, 2011Professor Raymond Shaw (Physics/EPSSI) has received $82,007 of a potential $293,268 from the US Department of Energy for the first year of a potential three-year project, “Laboratory Investigation of Contact Freezing and the Aerosol to Ice Crystal Transformation Process.” June 14, 2011Chair Ravindra Pandey (Physics/MuSTI) has received $50,000 from the Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the Advancement of Military Medicine Inc. for a project, “Fundamental Understanding of Biological Compatibility of Nanomaterials—Interaction of Nanoparticles with Biological Molecules.” April 18, 2011The Vice President for Research has announced this year's recipients of the Research Excellence Fund Awards, which total $502,378 among 27 people. Will Cantrell received an Infrastructure Enhancement Grant for “Acquisition of a Sunset Laboratory OCEC Instrument.” Yoke Khin Yap received a Technology Commercialization Grant. March 8, 2011Associate Chair Craig Friedrich (ME-EM/MuSTI), Co-PI Paul Bergstrom (ECE/MuSTI), Co-PI Ravi Pandey (Physics/MuSTI) and Co-PI Chang Kyoung Choi (ME-EM/MuSTI) have received $538,000 from Marshall University Research Corporation for a one-year project, “Center for Diagnostic Nanosystems—Phase 1.” March 1, 2011Michigan Tech's Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) will support 23 students from across the University with funds from the Vice President for Research, the Honors Institute and the Biotechnology Research Center (BRC). The total funding for the program this year is $74,300. The following physics undergraduates were awarded SURF funds: Michael Adler (Physics, Honors Institute), advisor Associate Professor Peter Moran (ME-EM), “Iodine Doping and Carrier Concentration Analysis in N-Type PbTe Semiconductors.” Ryan Connolly (Physics), advisor Professor Robert Nemiroff (Physics), “Applying the Pulse Start Conjecture to High-Energy Gamma-Ray Bursts in Order to Constrain Lorentz Invariance Violation.” Jordan Hagen (Physics, Honors Institute), advisor Assistant Professor Claudio Mazzoleni (Physics), “Using Quartz-Enhanced Photoacoustic Spectrometry to Characterize Aerosol Optical Properties.” Derek VanderLaan (Physics, Honors Institute), advisor Associate Professor Yoke Khin Yap (Physics), “Quantum Dot-Sensitized ZnO Nanostructures for Photovoltaic Devices.” January 14, 2011Professor Raymond Shaw (Physics) has received $72,000 from the Battelle Memorial Institute, Pacific Northwest Division, for the first increment of a potential $286,247 project, “Further Development of the HOLODEC 2 (Holographic Detector for Clouds 2) Instrument.” December 14, 2010Assistant Professor Claudio Mazzoleni (Physics/EPPSI) has received $76,965 from the Nevada System of Higher Education-Desert Research Institute for a three-year project, “MRI: Development of a Photoacoustic Light Absorption and Albedo Spectrometer for the Characterization of Aerosol Radiative Transfer in the Solar Spectrum.” NSF ABSTRACT October 28, 2010Richard and Elizabeth Henes have donated $700,000 to the University to upgrade research facilities in Fisher Hall, including infrastructure improvements. The gift is the first step toward establishing a Henes Institute of Quantum Phenomena. October 5, 2010Professor Raymond Shaw (Physics/EPSSI) has received $267,169 from the National Science Foundation for the first of a potential three-year $688,384 project, “Laboratory and Field Studies of Cloud-Turbulence Interactions via Digital Holography.” September 28, 2010Assistant Professor Petra Huentemeyer (Physics/EPPSI) has received $100,000 from the National Science Foundation for the first of a potential three-year $425,000-project, “Collaborative Research: Personnel Support for the Construction and Commissioning of the HAWC Gamma-Ray Observatory.” September 20, 2010Associate Professor Will Cantrell (Physics/EPSSI) and Assistant Professor Claudio Mazzoleni (Physics) have received $175,488 from the National Science Foundation for the first of a potential three-year, $400,786 project, “Measurement of Ice Nuclei in the Contact Mode.” August 13, 2010Colin Gurganus, a PhD student in atmospheric science is among the 150 graduate fellows nationwide selected by the US Department of Energy Office of Science from among 3,300 applicants. He will receive $50,500 per year for up to three years to support tuition, living expenses, research materials and travel to conferences or to DOE scientific facilities. July 20, 2010Donald Beck, professor of physics, has received $70,000 from the National Science Foundation for “Bound and Continuum Properties of Lanthanide and Actinide Atoms.” It is the first year of potential three-year project totaling $210,000. June 7, 2010Assistant Professor Claudio Mazzoleni (Physics) has received $31,954 from the Los Alamos National Laboratory for a one-year project, “Collection of Samples for Electron Microscopy, and Operational Support and Data Analysis for the Carbonaceous Aerosols and Radiative Effects Study in Sacramento, Calif.” May 28, 2010The Biotechnology Research Center announced the recipients of its 2010 Spring Travel Grants. Among the recipients was Saikat Mukhopadhyay (graduate student in Physics), who received $500 toward a podium presentation at the American Physical Society 2010 Meeting held in March in Portland, Ore. April 15, 2010The Michigan Space Grant Consortium (MSGC), sponsored by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), has awarded approximately $375,000 to nine Michigan universities with aerospace, engineering and space science related programs. Michigan Technological University submitted 40 proposals, and 27 received funding totaling $105,000. Students in Physics receiving $2,500 research fellowships include Peter Solfest and Amalia Anderson. Physics faculty members receiving $5,000 seed grants include Claudio Mazzoleni. April 14, 2010Michigan Tech's Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) program funds students across the University with funds from the Vice President for Research and the Honors Institute. This year 62 applications were submitted and 19 are funded for a total of $63,350. The following physics undergraduates were awarded SURF funds: Kyle Gorkowski (Physics), advisor Claudio Mazzoleni, “Particle collection and data analysis for the carbonaceous aerosols and radiative effects study, California, summer 2010.” Justin Holmes (Physics), advisor Robert Nemiroff, “Relative brightness of gamma-ray burst pulses as an indicator of cosmic distance.” Erin Scanlon (Physics), advisor Kim Fook Lee, “Exploration of coherent-state polarization cloning.” April 12, 2010The Vice President for Research Office is pleased to announce this year's recipients of the Research Excellence Fund Awards. Awards totaled $472,527, and there are 27 award recipients. Petra Huentemeyer and Kim Fook Lee are recipients of the Research Seed Grant. Will Cantrell was awarded an Infrastructure Enhancement grant for his project “Ultra Performance Liquid Chromatograph for Studies of Atmospheric Organic Chemistry.” March 17, 2010Associate Professor Peter Moran (MSE) has received $249,589 from the US Department of Defense, Office of Naval Research, for a project titled, “A Breakthrough Thermoelectric Power Generation Material: Using Powder Metallurgical Processing to Design and Thermal Transport Properties.” November 24, 2009Vice President for Research David Reed has awarded Century II Campaign Endowed Equipment Fund (C2E2) grants at the recommendation of the C2E2 Committee. Kim Fook Lee (Physics) was awarded $4,000 for a two-photon correlator for an entanglement generation scheme. John Jaszczak (Physics) and Jaroslaw Drelich (MSE) received $1,500 towards an atomic force microscope upgrade for education, outreach and research. Lynn Mazzoleni (Chemistry), Claudio Mazzoleni (Physics) and Judith Perlinger (CEE) received $5,000 for a submicron aerosol generator for interdisciplinary research applications. September 16, 2009David Nitz (Physics) received $102,900 from Colorado State University for a three-year project, “Northern Hemisphere Pierre Auger Observatory in Colorado.” September 15, 2009Ravindra Pandey, chair of Physics, has received $120,000 from the US Department of Defense, Army Research Laboratory for a potential multiple-year, $451,150 project, “First Principles Studies of Structure-Property Relationship in Responsive Materials for Defense Applications.” August 2, 2009Graduate Student Chee Huei Lee received a Student Travel Award from Nano Today to attend the 1st Nano Today Conference, held August 2-5, 2009, in Singapore. July 17, 2009Professor Miguel Levy has received $60,000 from Integrated Photonics for “Materials Development of Optical Band Gaps in Magneto-Photonic Crystals for Switching and Biosensor Applications.” July 2, 2009Professor Miguel Levy has received $289,070 from NSF for a three-year project, “Degenerate Bandgaps in Magneto-Photonic Crystals and Magneto-Photonic Crystal Biochemical Sensors.” Department Chair Ravindra Pandey has received $50,000 from the US Department of Defense, Army Research Office, for a potential $434,000 project, “Fundamental Understanding of 'Probe'-'Target' Molecular Interactions and Electronic Response for Nanoarchitecture-Based-Time and Chemical and Biological Detection System.” Professor Ulrich Hansmann has received $213,001 from the National Institutes of Health for “Folding, Mis-folding and Aggregation of Small Proteins,” the first year of a four-year program that will total $776,383. May 6, 2009Claudio Mazzoleni has received a $30,301 Research Seed Award for “Toward a White-light Supercontinuum Photoacoustic Spectrometer” by the Vice President for Research. This year's Research Excellence Fund Awards totaled $407,872 among 22 people. April 8, 2009A recipient of the 2009 Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships (SURF) included Viktor Bollen (Physics), “Generation of Bi-Partite Entanglement using Coherent States” with Assistant Professor Kim Fook Lee. The fellowships, funded by the vice president for research, provide up to $4,000 to support the recipient's summer research work with a faculty mentor. March 6, 2009Michigan Space Grant Consortium Award: $5000 to physics grad student Amalia Anderson as a Graduate Fellowship for “Using MODIS and CALIPSO to study cloud glaciation level”. Amalia's advisor is Dr. Alex Kostinski. January 13, 2009Multi-Scale Technologies Institute (MuSTI) 2009 Awards for Exploratory Multi-Scale Research has announced the awarding of $30,370 in exploratory research funding for 2009. Each award is a maximum of $5,000. Among the awards are:
January 8, 2009Robert Nemiroff has received $75,490 from NASA for the first year of potential four-year project totaling $311,071 for “Support for the Astronomy Picture of the Day Website.” November 18, 2008Claudio Mazzoleni has received $2,000 for “A Universal Infrared Detector for Interdisciplinary Research Applications" from the Michigan Tech Century II Campaign Endowed Equipment Fund (C2E2). Kim Fook Lee has received $2,500 for "Low-Noise, High-Speed Single Photon Detector.” September 24, 2008Graduate student Ming Xie and Professor Yoke Khin Yap have been awarded a new instrumentation support grant from the Electron Microscopy Center at Argonne National Laboratory. This project, “Structural and compositional study of doped boron nitride nanotubes,” will enable Ming to characterize nanotubes by high-resolution transmission electron microscopy and electron energy loss spectroscopy. Ming is currently working full time in Argonne National Laboratory with Dr. Dieter Gruen in the division of materials science. September 1, 2008Professor Yoke Khin Yap is co-PI of a new award of $224,063 from the National Science Foundation. This project, “MRI: Acquisition of an In-Situ AFM/STM-TEM System for Interdisciplinary Nano-Research and Education at Michigan Tech,” was supported by the Division of Materials Research, Major Research Instrumentation program. The principal Investigator of this project is Professor Reza Shahbazian-Yassar (MEEM). July 1, 2008Professor Ulrich H. E. Hansmann was awarded $420,000 from the National Science Foundation for “Development of Generalized-Ensemble Algorithms and their Application in Protein Studies”. The three-year project is from 2008-2011. April 8, 2008A recipient of the 2008 Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships (SURF) included Ryan Lemmens (Mechanical Engineering and Applied Physics), “A Comparative Study of the Power Efficiencies of Bubble Actuation Methods” with Dennis Meng (Assistant Professor, MEEM). The fellowships, funded by the vice president for research, provide up to $3,000 to support the recipient's summer research work with a faculty mentor. December 13, 2007Professor John Jaszczak has received $200,000 from NSF for a two-year project, "NUE: Michigan Tech Nanotechnology Enterprise." August 12, 2007Miguel Levy has been awarded $330,000 over three years from NSF for “Nonlinear Magnetophotonic Crystals.” This work is part of the Materials World Network program of the National Science Foundation. August 8, 2007Associate Professor Yoke Khin Yap received $135,606 for the second year of a potential four-year project totaling $563,266 from the U.S. Department of Energy for “Hetero-Junctions of Boron Nitride and Carbon Nanotubes: Synthesis and Characterization.” May 8, 2007Yoke Khin Yap received $40,000 of a projected $124,806, three-year funding from the Argonne National Laboratory for “Argonne National Laboratory Guest Graduate Student Appointment.” April 12, 2007The Michigan Tech Biotechnology Research Center has awarded 2007 BRC Travel Grants to two Physics graduate students. Parimal Kar will receive $250 toward his presentation at the From Computational Biophysics to System Biology Conference held in Jülich, Germany, May 2-4. Yanjie Wei will receive $500 toward his presentation at the same conference. Kar and Wei are both part of the Computational Nano - and Biophysics research group. February 28, 2007A recipient of the 2007 Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships (SURF) included Ben Coupland (advisor Assistant Professor Yoke Khin Yap), for “Exploration of Carbon Nitride.” February 23, 2007Associate Professor Peter Moran (Physics and MSE) received $76,000 from the U.S. Department of Defense Office of Naval Research for “Developing Highly Magnetoelectric Fe(1-x)Gax/PMN-PT Heterostructures for Integration onto SiC”. February 7, 2007Assistant Professor Ranjit Pati has received an NSF CAREER Award for his project, “Theory and modeling of a mono-molecular field effect organic transistor (MOLFET)”. The amount is $74,700 for 2/15/07 to 1/31/08, and the total funding for five years is $400,000. January 16, 2007Associate Professor Yoke Khin Yap obtained a new grant ($100,000) from United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) for the proposal entitled “Carbon Nanotube Arrays for Bacteria”. This project is in collaboration with Drs. Haiying Liu (PI), Pushpalatha Murthy and Martin Thompson in the Department of Chemistry. In addition, Dr. Yap was also awarded the Michigan Tech Faculty Scholarship Grant ($2,000) for his project “The First Book on Boron Nitride Nanotubes and Related Nanostructures”. Finally, Dr. Yap has received a continuing grant ($95,615) for his National Science Foundation CAREER award. January 12, 2007Jacob Fugal has received $24,000 from NASA for the first year of a potential three-year project totalling $72,000, “Improving Validation of MODIS Cloud Ice Crystal Data Products Using the HOLODEC Instrument.” July 26, 2006Yoke Khin Yap received $142,859 for the first year of a potential four-year project totaling $563,266 from the U.S. Department of Energy for “Hetero-Junctions of Boron Nitride and Carbon Nanotubes: Synthesis and Characterization.” June 1, 2006Physics graduate student Jacob Fugal has received the NASA Earth System Science (ESS) Graduate Student Fellowship for 2006-2007. Only 55 out of 181 new applicants were identified to receive the fellowship this year. The purpose of the Fellowship program is for NASA Earth Science to train a pool of highly qualified scientists in support of NASA's mission to use the vantage point of space to understand and protect our home planet. The amount of award is $24,000 per annum, including $18,000 student stipend and an allowance of up to $6,000 consisting of $3,000 for student expenses and $3,000 for university expenses. Fugal is part of Raymond Shaw's Cloud Physics Lab research group. Improving Validation of MODIS Cloud Ice Crystal Data Products Using the HOLODEC Instrument April 18, 2006Recipients of the 2006 Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships (SURF) include Dan Freeman (advisor Associate Professor Miguel Levy) who won $840 for “The Fabrication of Magneto-Optic Films by RF Magnetron-Sputtering” and Matthew Hansen (advisor Assistant Professor Yoke Khin Yap), who won $2,800 for “Controlled Growth of Carbon Nanotubes through PECVD.” April 14, 2006Professors David F. Nitz and Brian Fick have received $247,000 from the U.S. Department of Energy for their project, “RFI Study High Energy Particle Astrophysics.” April 10, 2006Assistant Professor Yoke Khin Yap has received an addition of $60,000 from the Research Foundation of CUNY (Sponsor: U. S. Department of Army) for his project, “Molecular Nanomaterials for Device Applications.” In addition, Yap received another $92,499 from the National Science Foundation for his project, “CAREER: Synthesis, Characterization, and Discovery of Frontier Carbon Nanotubes.” April 6, 2006Assistant Professor Ranjit Pati has received $55,093 from the National Science Foundation for the project “Exploring monomolecular architecture for an organic transistor.” The objective of this proposed work is to explore an innovative mono molecular architecture for a three terminal organic transistor in which the gate electrode will be separated from the channel by an organic throttle unlike the insulating oxide layer generally used in a conventional transistor design. This funding will support one graduate student for one year and an undergraduate student in the summer. March 10, 2006Michigan Space Grant Consortium Award: $5000 to physics grad student Patrick Younk, “Compositional Analysis of Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays.” Patrick's advisor is Dr. David Nitz. Abstract: Cosmic rays are energetic charged particles of interstellar origin. Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECRs) are the highest energy cosmic rays, and they are not well understood. They can have energies as great as a major league fastball, but yet are the size of an atomic nucleus. We will carefully study the composition of UHECRs by analyzing the extensive air showers they create in earth’s atmosphere. This knowledge will help scientists learn more about the environments where UHECRs are accelerated, the extra galactic environment between the UHECR source and earth, and particle physics in energy regimes well past those available in modern accelerators. We will be using data from the Pierre Auger Cosmic Ray Observatory in Argentina. The Auger Instrument is the largest hybrid cosmic ray detector ever built. November 11, 2005Michigan Space Grant Consortium Awards: $2500 to physics undergraduate Carly Robinson, “A Perspective on the Influence that Biomass Burning May have on Cirrus Clouds: Freezing of Solution Catalyzed by High Molecular Weight Organic Compounds,” and $5000 to physics grad student Jacob Fugal, “Proposal to Build and Fly HOLODEC II.” October 13, 2005Associate Professor Raymond Shaw has received $179,118 for the first year of a potential three-year, $460,111, project from the National Science Foundation for “Turbulence--Cloud Interactions: Laboratory and Field Studies.” October 4, 2005Ravindra Pandey received $46,535 from the U.S. Department of Defense, Army Research Office for “International Conference in Frontiers in Nanoscale Science and Engineering.” August 30, 2005Assistant Professor Yoke Khin Yap has received an addition of $47,000 from the Research Foundation of CUNY (Sponsor: U. S. Department of Army) for his project, “Molecular Nanomaterials for Device Applications.” August 29, 2005Associate Professor Miguel Levy has received a new NSF award of $239,926 for his project “A Nanomagnetic Route to Bias-Magnet-Free On-Chip Faraday Rotators.” This is a 3 year project starting in September 2005. August 15, 2005Professors Pandey, Pati, and Yap received $1,206,316 from the Defence Advanced Research Program Agency (DARPA) for their 3-year project on molecular electronics. July 1, 2005Assistant Professor Ranjit Pati has received the Research Excellence Fund (REF). The Research Seed amount is $33,972 and the award is from MTU, 2005. The title of the project is, “Theory and Modeling of Molecular Electronics Devices for New Generation Information Processing Technology.” It will support one graduate student for one year and an undergraduate student during the summer. May 9, 2005Assistant Professor Yoke Khin Yap has received an addition of $18,000 from the Research Foundation of CUNY (Sponsor: U. S. Department of Army) for his project, “Molecular Nanomaterials for Device Applications.” April 18, 2005A recipient of the 2005 Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships (SURF) included Matthew Davenport (advisor Assistant Professor Yoke Khin Yap), for “Vertically Aligned Carbon Nanotubes.” April 14, 2005Professor David F. Nitz has received $247,000 from the U.S. Department of Energy for his project, “RFI Study High Energy Particle Astrophysics.” February 22, 2005Assistant Professor Yoke Khin Yap has received an NSF CAREER Award for his project, “Synthesis, Characterization and Discovery of Frontier Carbon Materials.” The amount is $117,020 for 4/1/2005 to 3/31/2006, and the total funding for five years is $506,227 (4/1/2005 to 3/31/2010). The project is part of the Solid-State Chemistry programs of the Division of Materials Research (DMR) in the NSF Directorate for Mathematical & Physical Sciences (MSP). January 21, 2005Assistant Professor Yoke Khin Yap has received an addition of $37,500 from the Research Foundation of CUNY (Sponsor: U. S. Department of Army) for his project, “Molecular Nanomaterials for Device Applications.” Nanoscience research lead by Assistant Professor Yoke Khin Yap in the DOE Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences (http://cnms.ornl.gov/) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) is extended for an additional year. Yap research theme on “Controlling Nanostructures of CVD-Multiwall Carbon Nanotubes,” is the only selected project from the state of Michigan.
Research Sponsors
In 1915 Arnold Sommerfeld introduced the fine structure constant. |
Research in MTU's Physics Department has received sponsorship
from the following agencies: 