REU Site: Analysis, Fabrication and Engineering of Surfaces and Materials in Information Technology

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This award by the Chemistry and Materials Science Divisions supports Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) and Research Experience for Teachers (RET) sites at San Jose State University for the summers of 2006-2008. The program director is Joseph Pesek. Eight students and two high school teachers each year will do state-of-the-art research at the IBM Almaden Research lab, working on collaborative projects with San Jose State faculty. The participants will have an opportunity to experience the challenges of a lab where current technologies (photoresists, semiconductors, storage devices and media, nanotechnology) are being improved and new ones are being invented. The students and teachers will interact with other undergraduate interns, with postdoctoral researchers from around the world, with IBM scientists and with SJSU professors in the environment of one of the premier technology labs in the world. They gain insight into the teamwork and decision-making inherent in industrial research. They will gain experience in professionally significant skills such as oral and poster presentations, and they attend special weekly seminar meetings which feature presentations by scientists on the frontiers of IT research (speakers are asked to spend some time on how they made their own career choices). Significant efforts will be made to select participants such that the group is balanced in terms of gender, ethnicity and educational background. This REU site is supported by the Department of Defense in partnership with the NSF REU program and the Mathematics and Physical Sciences Directorate Office of Multidisciplinary Affairs provides support for the RET component.