REU Site: Summer Research Projects in Contemporary Physics for Women and Minorities

芝加哥大学物理系管理着一个本科生研究经验(REU)网站项目，其目标特别是鼓励代表不足的少数群体成员和妇女从事物理学事业。物理学和工程学本科课程面向全国征集申请，重点是历史悠久的黑人大学和传统的女子学院。每个学生参与的项目的核心是一个为期10周的暑期研究项目，由一名教师个人监督。每个学生都被分配了一项具体的、定义明确的研究任务，可以在项目的10周时间内完成。典型的项目分布在高能、宇宙线和空间物理、天文学和天体物理学、广义相对论、凝聚态物理、非线性和非平衡现象、光学和太阳能、生物物理学以及电子和离子显微镜等领域。对阿贡和费米加速器实验室的实地考察补充了这些研究经验。此外，每年夏天，教师都会举办一系列讲座，概述目前物理学中一些最重要的研究课题。通过让大学预科教师参加我们的系列讲座，我们相信我们可以扩大我们的范围，并将一些前沿研究的想法引入高中科学课堂。在课程的最后两周，每个学生都要提交一份书面报告，描述她或他的研究，并做一个正式的口头报告。物理REU让学生接触到物理学的广度和统一性。此外，它还提供活动，让所有REU的学生相互联系，在学生之间创造同伴互动，增加项目的兴奋度和活力。我们正在利用我们观察到的REU参与者和我们的研究生之间的良好融洽关系来加强该计划。这将增加我们可以获得的关于该项目的反馈，并通过年龄接近本科生的榜样提供更多的指导。

The University of Chicago Department of Physics administers a Research Experiences for Undergraduate (REU) site project targeted especially towards encouraging members of under-represented minority groups and women to pursue careers in physics. Applications are solicited nationally from undergraduate programs in physics and engineering with some emphasis on historically black colleges and traditional women's colleges. The core of the program for each student participant is a 10-week summer research project under supervision of an individual faculty member. Each student is given a specific, well-defined research task that can be completed within the 10-week duration of the program. Typical projects are distributed among the areas of high-energy, cosmic-ray and space physics, astronomy and astrophysics, general relativity, condensed-matter physics, non-linear and non-equilibrium phenomena, optics and solar energy, biophysics and electron and ion microscopy. These research experiences are complemented by field trips to Argonne and Fermi Accelerator Laboratories. In addition, each summer, a series of lectures is presented by faculty to provide an overview of some of the most important research topics currently pursued in physics. By having pre-college science teachers participate in our lecture series, we believe we can broaden our scope and introduce some of the ideas of cutting-edge research into high-school science classrooms. Each of the students submits a written report describing her or his research and makes a formal oral presentation during the last two weeks of the program. The Physics REU provides the students with an exposure to the breadth and unity of physics. In addition it provides the activities that bring all of the REU students into contact with one another to create the peer interactions among students that increase the program's excitement and vitality. We are enhancing the program by taking advantage of the excellent rapport we have observed between the REU participants and our graduate students. This will increase the feedback that we can get about the program as well as provide increased mentoring by role models close in age to the undergraduates.