REU Site: Nuclear Science at Texas A&M University

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This award provides continued support for the REU site at the Cyclotron Institute at Texas A&M University (TAMU). The new award includes a collaboration with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and a significantly refined outreach activity, Street Physics. The need for increased efforts in recruiting the next generation of young people into nuclear science was recently emphasized in a report by the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee. Involvement in research at the undergraduate level is believed to be an important component in increasing the numbers and preparation of students entering graduate programs. The students supported through this award will be in residence for 10 weeks in conjunction with the summer session at TAMU, for which they will receive a $5000 fellowship, housing, travel and most importantly the opportunity to work closely with internationally renowned scientists at a first-rate university-based nuclear facility. The research projects are at the leading edge Nuclear Science, including sub-fields such as nuclear astrophysics, weak interactions, nuclear dynamics and thermodynamics, nuclear structure, RHIC, atomic ionizations, and radiation effects. There are proposed projects both in theoretical and experimental Nuclear Science. Some students will work at the Cyclotron Institute, which is a DOE Nuclear Physics Center of Excellence. The facilities include a K500 superconducting cyclotron, a K150 cyclotron and associated state-of the art detector systems. The Cyclotron Institute and the department of physics are also home base for involvement in experiments at other facilities, such as RHIC, ANL, and TRIUMF. The faculty at TAMU are leading scientists in the field and have a history of working with undergraduates in their research programs.