9-23-2007

I am now In Ann Arbor at the University of Michigan and have been for about a month. I am taking two classes this semester, MSE 560 Structure of Materials and MSE 556 Molecular Simulation of materials. On top of this I have joined the Kieffer research group under professor John Kieffer. In the coming months I am to become acquainted with the operation and theory behind the Raman, and Brillouin Spectrometer, as well as in the preparation of material samples. It looks like My area of research will be in computational simulation of and experimental analysis of nano-composites and/or carbon-fiber composites.

 

6-21-2007

At the C.A.I.P. Ive been spending most of my time doing dissolved Oxygen analysis of hydrilla stress response to herbicide treatment. The hydrilla is incubated in sealed bottles and the dissolved oxygen levels are measured before and after a one hour incubation period.  The fresh-weight  of the sample is  recorded and the total oxygen production/consumption of the sample is calculated. It turns out that stressed plants produce less oxygen than our controls....not too suprising.

 

6-8-2007

I graduated from New College on May 25. I am supposed to know stuff about physics. This summer I am working at the U.F. center for aquatic and Invasive Plants. I will be doing taxonomy studies of milfoil i haven't worked out the details on this study yet.

 

4-30-2007

I am currently a 4th year student at New College of Florida in Sarasota. I am a physics major, and my senior thesis subject is "Raman Spectroscopy of Te Filled Double-Walled Carbon nanotubes". My theisis advisor is Dr. Mariana Sendova, My thesis research was done entirely in her lab and under her guidence. Next year I will be attending graduate school at the University of Michigan in the department of Materials Science and Engineering, where I will be working under a graduate research assistantship.