Category: Alumni

Volunteers Needed for KSEF

KSEF GroupMichigan Tech and the surrounding community are joining together to host the inaugural Keweenaw Science and Engineering Festival to stimulate and sustain interest in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) in the Keweenaw for all ages. ​This four-day festival is an open forum to showcase all facets of STEM in the Western Upper Peninsula. Current scheduled events have something for all ages and include the Michigan Tech Mind Trekkers, Nerd Night for teens with Tech’s Physics Department, the Family Engineering Day, Summer Concert Series, Science Pub Crawl, The Wonders of Physics, science comedian Brian Malow and David Gaynes presenting his documentary Saving Hubble and more! This event is scheduled for August 5 to 8, and most of the activities are free.

See the event calendar on the current schedule. Volunteers are still needed to help with the festival. If you would like to get involved and run a hands-on demonstration, assist with set-up, work the KSEF booth or have questions on how to volunteer contact Amanda McConnon at amcconno@mtu.edu.

From Tech Today, by Center for Pre-College Outreach.

Sun, sand, science
Festival intended to spark STEM interest

Read more at the Mining Gazette, by Meghan Marquardt (subscription required).

Nerd Night at KSEF

KSEFKeweenaw Science and Engineering Festival

Michigan Tech and the community will come together to host the inaugural Keweenaw Science and Engineering Festival.

The event is designed to stimulate and sustain interest in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) in the Keweenaw.

This four-day festival is an open forum to showcase all facets of STEM in the Western Upper Peninsula. Current scheduled events include the Michigan Tech Mind Trekkers, Nerd Night with Tech’s Physics Department, the Family Engineering Day, Summer Concert Series, Science Pub Crawl, The Wonders of Physics, science comedian Brian Malow and David Gaynes presenting his documentary “Saving Hubble” and more!

This event is scheduled for Aug. 5 – 8, 2015, with most of the activities free to the public. Check out the current schedule. If you would like to get involved and run a hands-on demonstration or volunteer please contact Amanda McConnon at amcconno@mtu.edu.

From Tech Today, by the Center for Pre-College Outreach.

Nerd Night (Teens)

Wednesday, August 5th, 6:00 PM – 9:00 PM
Continental Fire Company, 408 E Montezuma Ave. Houghton
Teens! Bring your friends and come discover the WOW! of science with amazing demonstrations and hands-on activities presented by the Michigan Tech Physics Dept.

Hui and Winslow Teach The Physics of Skiing

The Physics of Skiing
The Physics of Skiing

Science Helps Students Master Skiing

Skiing and snowboarding involve more than just sliding down a hill. There is a unique science to it all, but how often do you think about it? Last winter, the Keweenaw Bay Ojibwa Community College (KBOCC), its Youth STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) Academy and the staff at Mont Ripley created a program to get kids to do just that.

Chiumun Michelle Hui, a Michigan Tech postdoctoral research fellow in physics, and Dustin Winslow, a physics laboratory assistant, taught “The Physics of Skiing” to the students. “Michigan Tech did a awesome job with the physics instructors that helped,” says Karen Colbert, program coordinator for KBOCC Youth STEM Academy. “Learning about physics in skiing got the students to think about how science really impacts how they perform.”

One of the students, Annalynn Griffin, 11, says that the physic instructors also taught them about gravity, friction and the different types of skis. “I didn’t know there were so many types!”

Read more at Michigan Tech News, by Monica Lester.

Swarup China accepted to participate in ACCESS XIII

Dr. Swarup China former graduate student in the Atmospheric Sciences program at MTU, has been accepted to participate in ACCESS XIII, to be convened at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) (July 31 – August 2, 2015), and to attend the Gordon Research Conference (GRC) in Atmospheric Chemistry. Participation to ACCESS is highly competitive and it is an honor to be accepted.

Information about the conference can be found here.

High School Girls Come to Michigan Tech to Explore Nanotechnology

National Science FoundationProfessor Yoke Khin Yap (Physics) held a workshop for ninth-grade students from three local high schools over the weekend. The theme of the workshop was Introduction to Nanotechnology and was part of the outreach and education activities in Yap’s research grant funded by the National Science Foundation.

This workshop was co-organized by Michigan Tech’s GEAR UP, a Pre-College Innovative Outreach Institute, with the assistance of Liz Fujita. The goal of the workshop was to help stimulate the interest of pre-college underrepresented groups (girls, students with dissability, etc.). A total of 104 female students from Houghton, Calumet and Lake Linden participated with their science teachers.

During the workshop, students were introduced to the concept of nanoscale and hands-on experience in making molecular structures. Following lunch there was a discussion on the potential applications of nanoscale materials. “Since Michigan Tech is the only research-intensive university in the area, we regularly provide educational support to the local communities,” says Yap. More outreach events like this are planned during the three-year research project.

From Tech Today.

The Physics of Skiing

 

Mont Ripley
Mont Ripley

Mont Ripley partnered with the Keweenaw Bay Ojibwa Community College PEAR Center, to provide 13 Middle and high school age kids with 10 ski or snowboard lessons, paid for with a grant from the Department of Education. To fulfill the grant, the students had to participate in a science-related activity. The science activity was provided by Michigan Tech physicists Dustin Winslow, and Chiumun Michelle Hui, who presented “The Physics of Skiing.”

From Tech Today.

Physics Faculty, Graduate Students, Alumni at 2015 March APS Meeting

MM15logo-web-grayMembers of the Department of Physics and alumni attended the 2015 Meeting of the American Physical Society (APS) on March 4-9 in San Antonio, Texas.

Attendees affiliated with Michigan Tech were alumni Saikat Mukhopadhyay (’12, now at Oak Ridge National Lab), Partha Pal (’11, now at Northwestern University), Subhasish Mandal (’12, now at Yale University), Pradeep Kumar (’13, now at University of Wisconsin–Madison), Xiaoliang Zhong (’13, now at Argonne National Lab), physics graduate students Gaoxue Wang and Kamal Dhungana, Prof. Ranjit Pati, and Chair of Physics Prof. Ravi Pandey.

The APS March Meeting 2015 had over 10,000 in attendance.

VIEW THE PHOTO ALBUM

Communicating Nanoscience and Engineering

PhD Students Learn to Communicate their Research

Alex Mayer, the Charles and Patricia Nelson Presidential Professor at Michigan Tech, runs a fellowship program that teaches PhD students in a variety of fields to explain their research in K-12 classrooms and to write news releases to communicate with the public through the media.

Here are this year’s student releases.

Communicating Nanoscience and Engineering – Possibilities and Pitfalls

Nanoscale science and engineering is a flourishing field that holds great potential for solving current and future problems.

But what is the best way to communicate with an audience unfamiliar with the nanoscience and engineering community? Yoke Khin Yap, professor of physics and adjunct professor of materials science and engineering, says, “In order to communicate really effectively, you need to speak in their language.”

Read more at Michigan Tech News, by Jennifer Donovan, Anika Kuczynski and others.