University of Delaware Receives NSF Grant for Nanotechnology Education

An interdisciplinary team of researchers at the University of Delaware has received a two-year $200,000 grant from the National Science Foundation's Nanotechnology Undergraduate Education (NUE) in Engineering Program.

Entitled “Connecting Nanotechnology and Alternative Energy Approaches Through Undergraduate Education in Engineering,” the program will be led by Ismat Shah, professor in the departments of Materials Science and Engineering and Physics and Astronomy.

In addition to Shah, the team includes the following faculty:

• Jingguang Chen, Claire D. LeClaire Professor of Chemical Engineering;
• Matthew Doty, assistant professor, Department of Materials Science and Engineering;
• James Kolodzey, Charles Black Evans Professor of Electrical Engineering;
• Michael MacKay, Distinguished Professor of Materials Science and Engineering;
• Thomas Powers, assistant professor, Department of Philosophy;
• Ajay Prasad, professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering;
• Valery Roy, associate professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering; and
• Joshua Zide, assistant professor, Department of Materials Science and Engineering

According to Shah, the grant will enable establishment of a comprehensive program to prepare undergraduate students for nanotechnology by providing them with both the knowledge and the background to become part of the fast-growing community of researchers at the local, national, and global levels in this area.

The focus of the program will be on coursework and training related to the application of nanomaterials for alternative energy research. “Participating students will have the opportunity to choose topics from a variety of current research going on in the energy and nanotechnology areas on campus,” Shah says.

The program will also include a component to educate the future work force in the ethics of nanotechnology through course work and workshops to be organized in collaboration with co-principal investigator Thomas Powers, who directs the Delaware Interdisciplinary Ethics Program, and with the Science, Ethics and Public Policy Program (SEPP) program at the Delaware Biotechnology Institute. The workshops will be open to the University community.