About Us NewsWeiland Awarded NSF GrantLisa Mauck Weiland, assistant professor, was awarded a National Science Foundation grant to carry out a reseach project entitled "Enabling Miniature Ionomeric Sensors."The work is motivated by current limitations in implementing ionomeric sensors, which have superior sensitivity as compared to other active materials, because of an inadequate understanding of the physics responsible for the observed sensing response. Moreover, the transduction properties which make this material a superior sensor also enable it as a energy harvesting material. This work presents and tests the hypothesis that the sensing mechanism of ionic polymers is directly analogous to streaming potential. The proposed effort will enable the reliable use of this novel class of polymer material to function in combined sensing and energy scavenging applications. Team members include Barbar Akle and Don Leo of Virginia Tech. While both Virginia Tech and Pitt will engaged in experimentation and modeling, Virginia Tech will lead the experimental aspect of the program while Pitt will focus on developing models appropriate to validating the hypothesis of streaming potential. Yang Awarded NSF Grant5/14/2007 Judith C. Yang, associate professor, was awarded a $300,000 National Science Foundation (NSF) grant to carry out a research project entitled "Fundamental In Situ Nano-Oxidation Mechanisms of Metals and Metallic Alloys." Surface oxidation processes play critical roles in environmental stability, high temperature corrosion, electrochemistry, catalytic reactions, gate oxides and thin film growth as well as fuel reactions. At present, however, the nanoscale stages of oxidation - from the nucleation of the metal oxide to the formation of the thermodynamically stable oxide - represent a scientifically challenging and technologically important terra incognito. The objective is to fundamentally understand nanoscale oxidation processes by coordinated experimental (in situ UHV-TEM) and theoretical efforts, where the impact is potentially a new paradigm for oxidation. Wang Awarded IREE Grant04/27/2007 Qing-Ming Wang, associate professor, was recently awarded an IREE (International Research and Education in Engineering) supplemental grant from NSF to support two students to have summer research experience at Tsinghua University, Beijing, China for about three months in the summer, 2007. Cho Awarded Three-Year, $234,179 Grant02/01/2007 Sung Kwon Cho, assistant professor, received a National Science Foundation unsolicited grant ($234,179 for three years) for the development of micro bubble tweezers for individual cell manipulation and ultrasonic cell therapy and a Department of Defense Small Business Innovation Research phase II grant ($150,000 for 21 months) from the U.S. Homeland Security Advanced Research Project Agency for the development of channel-to-droplet sample extraction and purification. Cho’s work on microparticle sampling (Lab Chip, 6, 137–44, 2006) with his student Yuejun Zhao was recognized as an application highlight in Chemical Technology magazine. Wang Awarded Research Grant12/07/2006 Qing-Ming Wang, associate professor, was recently awarded a three-year research grant from the U.S. Army Research Office for the development of thin film bulk acoustic wave resonators for RF and microwave frequency control applications. In the project, high-quality piezoelectric thin films will be deposited on various substrate materials, and a novel liftoff and wafer bonding processing will be investigated for on-chip integration of thin film resonator. The ultimate goal of the research is to develop a simple yet low-cost technology for on-chip micro device fabrication and integration. |
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