[BNC-all] MONDAY MEMO: 2008 January 14

Mon Jan 14 08:58:05 EST 2008

MONDAY MEMO, January 14, 2008

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1. Announcements
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1.1:  REMINDER: Any reservations made last Fall have been deleted; you must
renew your group meetings every semester.  Use the RAT system
(https://engineering.purdue.edu/ECN/Resources/Tools/RAT/index_local) to
request rooms for your Spring Semester Group Meetings.  Once at the RAT
website, select ³Birck²; then click on ³Request Reservation² on the
left-hand column of the page that comes up.  We have Melissa Lane
coordinating all reservations so that she may keep a back up calendar, in
the event that RAT would crash (similar to the events at the beginning of
the Fall semester).

1.2:  Try your Monday Memo via RSS feed:
http://www.purdue.edu/dp/Nanotechnology/Resources/fac_resources.php

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2.  BIRCK TOURS/VISITORS
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1.2:  Tuesday, January 15, 9:55AM:  Krannert Advising Office personnel.
1.2:  Tuesday, January 15, 2:30PM:  Dr. Michael Manfra, Candidate,
Experimental Condensed Matter Physics
2.3:  Thursday, January 17, 11:45AM: Albena Ivanisevic¹s EPICS lab class.

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3.  SEMINARS
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3.1:  Tuesday, January 15, 4:00PM, PHYS 223; refreshments 3:30PM, PHYS 242):
³Life in the 2nd Landau level: Bubbles, stripes, and non-Abelian quantum
Hall states,² by Dr. Michael Manfra.
Semiconductor heterostructures form the basis for many of our modern
technologies, ranging from high-speed transistors to the laser diode. They
also provide an ideal playground for exploring the physics of interacting
electrons in two dimensions. When a perpendicular magnetic field is applied
to a two-dimensional electron gas, the electronic density of states is
transformed into a series of discrete, highly degenerate, states known as
Landau levels (LL). At high fields, all of the electrons can be accommodated
within a single LL known as the lowest (N=0) LL. Within the lowest LL,
transport is dominated by the fractional quantum Hall effect (FQHE). The
strong correlations of the FQHE in the lowest LL are now understood in the
framework an intuitively appealing model of weakly interacting composite
fermions. At lower magnetic fields where more than one LL is occupied,
physics is much more complicated. In this regime the FQHE competes with
other correlated, but inhomogeneous, ground states, producing some
spectacular transport signatures at low temperatures. In this talk I will
describe our efforts to understand and modify the possible ground states in
the higher LL¹s of extremely high mobility two-dimensional electron and hole
systems. In addition, I will detail our experimental efforts to confine the
fragile FQHE at filling factor 5/2 in micron scale geometries. The
quasiparticles of the 5/2 state are believed to obey non-Abelian statistics.
Small scale devices in which the 5/2 state¹s quasiparticles can be
manipulated may someday provide a platform for quantum computation.

3.2:  Tuesday, January 15, 7:00PM, Class of 1950 Lecture Hall: ³What should
be the future of biofuels?  An open discussion and debate,² sponsored by the
Center for the Environment
Featuring a panel of Purdue experts who will discuss their perspectives on
the environmental, technical, and policy related issues surrounding the
increasing production and promotion of biofuels. Following brief statements
from each panelist, questions will be taken from the audience.  Participants
will include: Moderator‹Dr. Bernie Tao, Indiana Soybean Professor in Soybean
Utilization in the Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering;
and Panelists‹Dr. Mike Ladisch, Director, Laboratory of Renewable Resources
Engineering and Distinguished Professor of Agricultural and Biological Eng;
Dr. Larry Nies, Associate Professor of Civil Engineering and Division of
Environmental & Ecological Engineering; Dr. Wally Tyner, Professor of
Agricultural Economics and June 2007 Lugar Energy Patriot; and Dr. Tony Vyn,
Professor of Agronomy

3.3:  Wednesday, January 16, 2:30PM, EE317: ³Multiphase Gallium Nitride
Nanowires and Nanocircuits,² by Virginia Ayres
ASBSTRACT: Catalyst-free vapor-solid nanowire growth, a newly described
method for the production of nanowires compatible with a wide variety of
semiconductor materials, has been used to produce novel multiphase
zinc-blende/wurtzite gallium nitride nanowires.  Orientation relation-ships
within the multiphase nanowire were observed using high-resolution
transmission electron microscopy of cross-sections created with focused ion
beam techniques.  A totally coherent interface be-tween the zinc blende and
wurtzite phases, which is sustained over the entire length of the nanowire,
is identified and discussed.  Multiphase nanowire growth occurs at specific
nanoscale nucleation sites on platelets of gallium nitride.  Furnace growth
temperature has been shown to exert a strong influence on nucleation site
formation. The types of nanowires that form and the corresponding nanowire
nucleation sites over the furnace growth temperature range 850-1000°C are
discussed.  Multiphase nanowires may have novel properties that augment and
may be superior to single-phase nanowires in device applications. The
electronic performance of the new multiphase nanowires in a NanoFET
configuration is investigated using 2-point and 4-point probe
current-voltage characterizations. The current-voltage characterizations
were carried in a special nano-probing system, in which oxide sharpened ~30
nm radius tungsten nanoprobes were coupled to directly a nanowire while the
experiments were directly visualized using a scanning electron microscope.
All measurements showed high current densities.  Evidence for single-phase
current transport within the multiphase nanowire structure is discussed.
Novel multiphase gallium nitride nanowires and nano-circuits may provide
unique flexibility for photon and carrier confinement.
*with collaborators: B.W. Jacobs, K. McElroy, M.A. Crimp, Michigan State
University; J.B. Halpern, and M-Q. He, Howard University; H.C. Shaw, NASA
Goddard Space Flight Center; M.P. Petkov, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
BIO: Virginia M. Ayres is an Associate Professor in the Department of
Electrical & Computer Engineering, and heads the Electronic and Biological
Nanostructures Laboratory (http://www.egr.msu.edu/ebnl
<http://www.egr.msu.edu/ebnl> ) at Michigan State University.  Her research
interests include the reduced dimensionality-based electronic properties of
nanotubes and nanowires.  Dr. Ayres earned her Ph.D. and M.S. in Physics
from Purdue University, and her B.A. in Physics and Biophysics from the
Johns Hopkins University.  She is the recipient of two NASA Faculty
Fellowship Awards and of two international awards from the Japan Society for
Promotion of Science and from Tokyo Institute of Technology for research and
education in Japan.

3.4:  Thursday, January 17, 12:30PM, Pfendler Auditorium 241: ³Advances in
Drug Delivery and Tissue Engineering,² by Robert S. Langer, Sc.D.; Draper
Award Winner; Institute Professor, Massachusetts Institute of Technology;
2007 National Medal of Science Recipient; Member of the National Academy of
Science, National Academy of Engineering and Institute of Medicine.
Advances in drug delivery and tissue engineering are revolutionizing medical
therapies.  New drug delivery technologies including novel polymers and
intelligent microchips promise to create new treatments for cancer, heart
disease, and many other illnesses.  Furthermore, by combining mammalian
cells with synthetic polymers, new approaches for engineering tissues are
being developed that may someday help repair tissues for patients with
burns, damaged cartilage, paralysis and vascular disease.

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4.  Opportunities
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4.1:  Per the VPR¹s office, the National Institutes of Health has issued an
RFA for Regional Centers of Excellence for Biodefense and Emerging
Infectious Diseases Research.  This program¹s purpose ³is to establish and
maintain strong infrastructure and multifaceted research and development
activities to provide scientific information and translational research
capacity that will facilitate the next generation of therapeutics,
diagnostics and vaccines against the NIAID Category A-C Priority Pathogens
and emerging infectious diseases agents.² The full program announcement may
be found at http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/RFA-AI-08-002.html
<http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/RFA-AI-08-002.html> .  For
this competition, an institution may submit one proposal.  Internal
deadlines are as follows:  Monday, March 17: Letters of Intent due to the
OVPR; Monday, April 21: Preproposals due to the OVPR; Thursday, April 24:
Preproposal rankings due to the OVPR.  Please note:  Letters of intent,
preproposals, and rankings to the OVPR should be e-mailed to
OVPRlimited at purdue.edu.  Purdue's limited submission policy and template for
letters of intent may be found at
http://dagon.admin.purdue.edu/cgi-bin/lsid.cgi
<http://dagon.admin.purdue.edu/cgi-bin/lsid.cgi> . For any case in which the
number of internal letters of intent received is no more than the number of
proposals allowed by the sponsor, the OVPR will notify the PI that an
internal preproposal will be unnecessary.

4.2:  Per the VPRs office, a new opportunity on ³Nanoscience and
Nanotechnology in Biology and Medicine (R01)² has been anncouned.  Visit
http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PA-08-052.html
<http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PA-08-052.html>  for a full
description.  This opportunity (FOA) is aimed at enhancing nanoscience and
nanotechnology research focused on problems in biology and medicine.  A
major challenge facing medicine is to develop novel and more sophisticated
approaches for the diagnosis, treatment and management of an array of
diseases and traumatic injuries. Nanotechnology and nanoscience have the
capacity to drive a new wave of medical innovation through the engineering
of bioactive nanoscale structures, processes and systems based on the
advancement of our understanding of biology at the nanoscale.

4.3:  Limited Submission Competition: NSF Ethics Education in Science and
Engineering, on behalf of Christine King
The National Science Foundation has issued a new RFP for the above program,
which ³accepts proposals for research and educational projects to improve
ethics education in all of the fields of science and engineering that NSF
supports, especially in interdisciplinary or inter-institutional contexts.
Proposals must focus on improving ethics education for graduate students in
those fields, although the proposed programs may benefit advanced
undergraduates in addition to graduate students.² The full program
announcement may be found at
http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2008/nsf08530/nsf08530.htm
<http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2008/nsf08530/nsf08530.htm> .  For this
competition, an institution may submit one proposal as lead organization.
Internal deadlines are as follows:  Monday, January 28: Letters of Intent
due to the OVPR; Monday, February 18: Preproposals due to the OVPR;
Thursday, February 21: Preproposal rankings due to the OVPR.  Please note:
Letters of intent, preproposals, and rankings to the OVPR should be e-mailed
to OVPRlimited at purdue.edu.  Purdue's limited submission policy and template
for letters of intent may be found at
http://dagon.admin.purdue.edu/cgi-bin/lsid.cgi
<http://dagon.admin.purdue.edu/cgi-bin/lsid.cgi> . For any case in which the
number of internal letters of intent received is no more than the number of
proposals allowed by the sponsor, the OVPR will notify the PI that an
internal preproposal will be unnecessary.

4.4:  Innovative Technologies for Molecular Analysis of Cancer (R21)
Application Receipt Dates: March 11, 2008; May 29, 2008; September 24, 2008
Purpose. This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) issued by the National
Cancer Institute (NCI), National Institutes of Health (NIH), solicits grant
applications proposing exploratory research projects focused on the
inception and early stage development of highly innovative cancer-relevant
technologies.  The emphasis of this FOA is on technically innovative
molecular analysis tools with the potential to add a new quality to the
investigations of the molecular basis of cancer (e.g., by facilitating the
detection of cancer-related characteristics/alterations at the molecular and
cellular levels of organization and function). These technologies may be
intended for molecular analyses in vitro, in situ, and/or in vivo.
Responsive ³technologies² encompass relevant methods, techniques, tools,
instrumentation, and devices (but not software or informatics solutions).
This funding opportunity is part of a broader NCI-sponsored Innovative
Molecular Analysis Technologies (IMAT) Program. Several IMAT FOAs of
identical or closely related scientific scope using various funding
mechanisms are available. To facilitate selection, a separate Notice in the
NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts provides brief cross-comparison and links
to all the IMAT FOAs. See NOT-CA-08-003
<http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-CA-08-003.html
<http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-CA-08-003.html>
<http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-CA-08-003.html >  > .

4.5:  Application of Emerging Technologies for Cancer Research (R21)
Purpose. This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) issued by the National
Cancer Institute (NCI), National Institutes of Health (NIH), solicits grant
applications proposing exploratory research projects to evaluate the
performance of emerging molecular analysis technologies and develop
applications for an appropriate cancer-relevant biological system. These
systems may cover cancer-relevant molecular analyses in vitro, in situ,
and/or in vivo. The thrust of effort in the projects proposed in response to
this FOA must be on emerging technology application rather than on
technology development. Emerging technology² is one that has passed the
initial developmental stage and shows promise but has not been
evaluated/developed in the context of the proposed application and has not
been commercialized. Responsive ³technologies² encompass relevant methods,
techniques, tools, instrumentation, and devices (but not software or
informatics solutions). This FOA is part of the broader NCI-sponsored
program Innovative Molecular Analysis Technologies (IMAT). Several IMAT FOAs
of identical or closely related scientific scope using various funding
mechanisms are available. To facilitate selection, a separate Notice in the
NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts provides a brief cross-comparison and
links to all the IMAT FOAs. See NOT-CA-08-003.
<http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-CA-08-003.html
<http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-CA-08-003.html>
<http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-CA-08-003.html >  >

4.6:  Application of Emerging Technologies for Cancer Research (R33)
Purpose. This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) issued by the National
Cancer Institute (NCI), National Institutes of Health (NIH), solicits grant
applications proposing exploratory research projects to evaluate the
performance of emerging molecular analysis technologies and develop
applications for an appropriate cancer-relevant biological system. These
systems may cover cancer-relevant molecular analyses in vitro, in situ,
and/or in vivo. The thrust of effort in the projects proposed in response to
this FOA must be on emerging technology application rather than on
technology development. Responsive ³technologies² encompass relevant
methods, techniques, tools, instrumentation, and devices (but not software
or informatics solutions). This FOA is part of the broader NCI-sponsored
program Innovative Molecular Analysis Technologies (IMAT). Several IMAT FOAs
of identical or closely related scientific scope using various funding
mechanisms are available. To facilitate selection, a separate Notice in the
NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts provides a brief cross-comparison and
links to all the IMAT FOAs; see NOT-CA-08-003.
<http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-CA-08-003.html
<http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-CA-08-003.html>
<http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-CA-08-003.html >  >

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5.  Life on the Outside
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Deborah S. Starewich
Administrative Assistant to Timothy D. Sands, Director
Birck Nanotechnology Center
Purdue University

765-494-3509
dstarewi at ecn.purdue.edu

http://www.nano.purdue.edu/

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