The College’s Aerogel Team, directed by Prof. Ann Anderson of Mechanical Engineering with Mary Carroll of Chemistry, has received a third grant from the National Science Foundation.
The three-year instrumentation grant from the Civil, Mechanical and Manufacturing Innovation Division, “Collaborative Facility for Research on Aerogel Materials,” is for $172,574. It also includes Prof. William D. Keat of Mechanical Engineering.
The aerogel team, which includes six or more students from a range of disciplines, seeks improvements in the manufacturing process and on characterizing the properties of the aerogels, ultra-light matrix materials that make excellent insulators.
Another NSF grant, “RUI: Aerogel-Platform Optical Sensors” from the Division of Chemistry, with Carroll and Anderson, goes through August 2008.
Carroll’s American Chemical Society Petroleum Research Fund (ACS PRF) grant, “Spectroscopic Investigation of Aerogel Structure and Suitability for Sensor Platforms,” ended last month.
Summer 2007 aerogel research students included:
— Christopher Backlund ’09, Chemistry major; funding from NSF RUI grant
— Shazia Baig ’09, Chemistry; funding from ACS PRF grant
— Michael Bono ’09, Mechanical Engineering; Scholars Summer Research Fellowship
— Emily Green ’08, Mechanical Engineering and Chemistry; Davenport Summer Research Fellowship
— Ondrej Nikel, exchange student from Czech Republic, Mechanical Engineering; summer funding from NSF RUI grant
— Caleb Wattley ’08, Mechanical Engineering; funding from NSF RUI grant
Total funding of the aerogel lab is more than $750,000 over the past five years. To date, more than 40 students have been involved in aerogel research at Union.