Nanotechnology to Get Bigger at UC Riverside With Two Symbolic Events (1/8/2008)

Two events at the University of California, Riverside on Thursday, Jan. 10, will signal a new milestone in the university's growing interdisciplinary excellence.

First, scientists and engineers from around the world will meet for a symposium from 8:30 a.m.-4 p.m. in honor of UCR Professor Robert Haddon, renowned authority in nanotechnology, and winner of the 2008 James C. McGroddy Prize for New Materials from the American Physical Society (APS).

Next, at 4 p.m., the university will celebrate the groundbreaking of its new Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) Building at a ceremony on the Bookstore Courtyard just west of Bourns Hall, with a view overlooking the construction site across North Campus Drive. The ceremony will be led by Reza Abbaschian, dean of the Bourns College of Engineering, and Donald A. Cooksey, interim dean of the College of Natural and Agricultural Sciences.

The ceremony opens the $56 million project to complete by 2010 the first major building at UCR devoted to nanotechnology research. Haddon will speak on nanotechnology, followed by remarks from Congressmen Jerry Lewis and Ken Calvert. Also offering comments will be Robert D. Grey, UC Riverside acting chancellor; Alexander Balandin, materials science and engineering program director; and Jerome Schultz, distinguished professor and chair of bioengineering. A reception will follow at the adjacent Bourns Hall Courtyard.

(Media note: There will be a groundbreaking photo opportunity at 3:45 p.m. on the actual construction site. The public is not encouraged to participate due to potential safety hazards.)

Thursday's symposium will be held in Engineering Building II, Room 205 beginning at 9 a.m. Registration will begin at 8:30 a.m. Speakers include Haddon; Walt deHeer, Georgia Tech; Roland Kawakami, UCR-Physics; Sakhrat Khizorev, UCR-Electrical Engineering; Ashok Mulchandani, UCR-Chemical and Environmental Engineering; Richard Oakley, University of Waterloo, Canada; Thomas Palstra, University of Groningen, Holland; Christopher Reed, UCR-Chemistry; and Chandra Varma, UCR-Physics.

Nanotechnology is "the final frontier in miniaturization, at least on the surface of the planet," according to Haddon, distinguished professor of chemical and environmental engineering and director of UCR's Center for Nanoscale Science and Engineering. Nanotechnology offers a broad range of advances in science unheard of a few short years ago, and the Materials Science and Engineering Building will be the home of nanotechnology research on the UC Riverside campus.

"Nanotechnology is not confined to a particular field," Haddon added. "It encompasses all of the scientific disciplines including chemistry, engineering, physics, biology, computers and medicine. Thus, nanotechnology serves as a vehicle to create teams of scientists and engineers around a particular problem rather than focusing on what can be accomplished within a particular discipline. This comes about because the focus in nanotechnology is on the basic building blocks of matter - atoms and molecules - and at that level all of the disciplines have a common starting point."

Haddon's McGroddy Prize, awarded for outstanding achievement in the science and application of new materials, is endowed by IBM. He was recognized by APS "for the discovery of high-temperature superconductivity in non-oxide systems." He will receive the prize at the APS annual meeting March 10-14, in New Orleans, where he also will present an invited lecture.

Designed to foster interdisciplinary research among faculty from the Bourns College of Engineering and the College of Natural and Agricultural Sciences, the Materials Science and Engineering Building represents a new model of scientific exploration at UC Riverside that crosses traditional college boundaries. It will provide nearly 77,000 assignable square feet to accommodate the interdisciplinary instructional and research needs of the colleges' joint programs in nanotechnology, materials science and bioengineering.

Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by UC Riverside

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