Partnership for Research and Education in Materials: Partnership for Advanced Functional Metamaterials (Meta-PREM)

在整个人类历史中，新材料在技术的发展和整个文明的进步中发挥了关键作用。石器时代、青铜器时代或硅谷等术语强调了新材料的发现或利用可能引发的决定性社会影响。21世纪初，人们发明了一种全新的材料平台——超材料——工程多相复合材料，内含物通常具有定制的形状、大小、相互排列和方向。这种材料对许多类型的波激励表现出无与伦比的反应，包括电磁、声学和热。超材料系统和器件的许多应用，例如在光学频率下工作的下一代电子器件，都需要无源和有源（放大或非线性）元件。在过去的十年中，超材料的发展主要集中在被动超材料上。该伙伴关系的两个研究重点之一是旨在开发活性超材料：可调谐、非线性和放大。另一类有趣的超材料是双曲色散的超材料，它的发展是由团队成员开创的。在一个方向上，这些独特的材料对电磁波的反应与金属相似。然而，在正交方向上，它类似于电介质。研究这些材料无与伦比的经典和量子特性（包括自发发射、能量转移等）是Meta-PREM的第二个研究重点。研究将由具有互补专业知识和能力的合作伙伴以高度协作的方式进行。Meta-PREM整合了一所历史悠久的黑人大学诺福克州立大学和三所研究密集型机构——密歇根州立大学、普渡大学和康奈尔大学——的研究和教育努力。项目的教育和外联活动来自已确定的合作伙伴的互补优势。这种协同作用允许一系列相关的项目，这些项目将使各种各样的学生在整个教育连续体中受益，特别是在研究生阶段。诺福克州立大学的材料科学与工程博士项目只有5年的历史，是校园内唯一的STEM博士项目。通过将NSU的学生和教师与那些已经建立的研究生项目相结合，Meta-PREM将加速年轻的博士项目走向成熟，有效地提高培养更多样化的训练有素的材料科学专业人才的能力。

Partnership for Advanced Functional Metamaterials (Meta-PREM)Throughout human history, new materials have played a pivotal role in the development of technologies and the progress of whole civilizations. Terms such as Stone Age, Bronze Age, or Silicon Valley underscore the defining societal impact that the discovery or harnessing of a new material can foment. The beginning of the 21st century has coincided with the invention of an entirely new materials platform - metamaterials - engineered multi-phase composite materials containing inclusions that often have tailored shapes, sizes, mutual arrangements and orientations. Such materials exhibit unparalleled responses to many types of wave excitations, including electromagnetic, acoustic and thermal.Many applications of metamaterials systems and devices, e.g. next-generation electronics operating at optical frequencies, require both passive and active (amplifying or nonlinear) components. The development of metamaterials over the past decade has focused primarily on passive metamaterials. One of the two research foci of the Partnership is aimed at the development of active metamaterials: tunable, nonlinear, and amplifying. The other intriguing class of metamaterials, whose development has been pioneered by the team members, is metamaterials with hyperbolic dispersion. In one direction, the response of these unique materials to electromagnetic waves is similar to that of metals. However, in an orthogonal direction, it is similar to that of dielectrics. The studies of unparalleled classical and quantum properties of such materials (including spontaneous emission, energy transfer, and many others) comprise the second research focus of Meta-PREM. The research will be performed in a highly collaborative manner by the partners with complementary expertise and capabilities. Meta-PREM integrates the research and education efforts of a historically black university, Norfolk State University, and three research-intensive institutions, Michigan State University, Purdue University and Cornell University. The project's education and outreach activities flow from identified complementary strengths of the partners. This synergy allows for a range of relevant programs that will benefit a diverse body of students in the full spectrum of the education continuum, especially at the graduate level. Norfolk State University's Ph.D. program in materials science and engineering is only five years old, being the only STEM doctoral program on campus. By integrating NSU's students and faculty with those at well-established graduate programs, Meta-PREM will accelerate the young doctoral program towards maturation, effectively increasing the capacity to produce a more diverse group of highly trained materials science professionals.