Researchers meet at the Carolina Science Symposium

On November 10, the Carolina Science Symposium (CSS) was held at NC State’s McKimmon Center. This event brought together over one hundred people from universities, non-profits, and industry. Attendees learned about ongoing work in diverse scientific disciplines in a series of talks and a student poster session. Dr. Yong Zhang from the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte opened the symposium. He discussed his work in light effect transistors for high speed and low energy switching. Dr. Jacqueline Cole (UNC/NC State Joint Department of Biomedical Engineering) highlighted her research in the role of vascular structure and perfusion in bone mechanics and health. Ian Haehnlein from Starfire Industries described the technique of high power impulse magnetron sputtering and its capabilities. Dr. Michael Daniele (NC State Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering) talked about his work in wearable biosensors and bioelectronic systems. These invited speakers were joined by students from across North Carolina: Islam Sayed (NC State), Michael Dryzer (Elon University), Ryan Fox (UNC), and Manish Sharma (North Carolina A&T State University).

Over $2,000 was awarded in prizes. Winners for best student oral presentations were  Ryan Fox and Islam Sayed. Awardees for best poster included Michael Spencer, Zhihui Cheng, Tasso von Windheim, and Ashish Kapoor. Hanhan Zhou took home the Hans Stadelmaier Award. The AIF Best Paper awards went to Kate Marusak and Nathalia Ortiz.

A photo contest was held in honor of Mike Rigsbee. Tasso von Windheim won for the black and white image, “Happy Accidents,” depicting molybdenum oxide crystals formed using a microwave plasma chemical vapor deposition process (left). Sahil Tahiliani won in the color competition with the image, “Blood Trapped in a Vessel,” showing blood cells (false colored red) in a vessel within a lung tissue section from a mouse exposed to ceria nanoparticles (right).

This annual event occurs each November. If you are interested in learning more or hearing about upcoming events, please contact rtnanonetwork@ncsu.edu.

Professor Jim LeBeau Awarded NSF MRI for new $2M TEM

Professor Jim LeBeau, Associate Director of the Analytical Instrumentation Facility (AIF) and Associate Professor in NC State’s Department of Materials Science and Engineering has been awarded funds from NSF’s Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) program to acquire a new TEM. The instrument will be available to users starting in the summer of 2018.

More information about the instrument and its capabilities can be found here.

RTNN Faculty Team Wins GRIP Award!

Led by RTNN director Dr. Jacob Jones, a team of researchers from NC State, UNC-CH, Duke, and RTI has been announced as a GRIP (Game-Changing Research Initiative Program) awardee for their project “Water Sustainability through Nanotechnology: Nanoscale Science and Engineering at the Solid-Water Interface.” Water is a fundamental requirement for life. However, universal access to clean water has become a crisis facing society, evidenced by continuing droughts and contaminated water supplies in major population centers. There is an emergent need for innovative, sustainable technologies to improve and maintain worldwide availability and quality of clean water. Development of new materials, membranes, and separation processes are essential to more efficiently create drinking water from salt water (desalination), reclaim clean water from waste and local streams (wastewater and point-of-use treatment), and to recover contaminants of value from water (resource recovery). Engineered nanotechnologies and nanomaterials can be used to uniquely address many emerging challenges in water sustainability due to their high surface area, reactivity, and surface and interfacial phenomena. Empowered by a multi-agency Nanotechnology Signature Initiative released in March 2016, the team will launch an ambitious effort to catalyze several interrelated, game-changing research activities for substantially increasing water availability at lower cost. The effort will position NC State, RTI, and partnering institutions including Duke and UNC-CH as a leading team at the water-nano nexus.

More information about the GRIP and other awardees can be found in the NC State press release and on the GRIP website.

RTNN users win awards at Microscopy & Microanalysis meeting

RTNN congratulates Houston Dycus, Dr. Jim LeBeau, and Matt Cabral for their recent awards at the 2016 Microscopy & Microanalysis meeting. Dycus (left picture), LeBeau, and Cabral (right picture) are all in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at NC State. Dycus and LeBeau were awarded the best paper in the Microscopy and Microanalysis Journal (Materials Science Category) for their paper: Accurate nanoscale crystallography in real-space using scanning transmission electron microscopy.” Dycus also received the best poster award for his work, “Resolving Atomic Scale Chemistry and Structure at NO and Ba Passivated SiC/SiO2 Interfaces.” Cabral won a Student Scholar award for his contribution entitled: Direct Observation 
of Local Chemistry and Local Cation Displacements in the Relaxor Ferroelectric PMN-PT.”