See also Research Funding | Awards and Achievements

NSF CAREER AWARD Recipients - In Their Own Words (Pati)
Michigan Tech Research Magazine 2008

He Works in Light (Levy)
Michigan Tech Research Magazine 2008

The Smallest of Nanotubes Yielding Big Results (Yap, Pandey)
Michigan Tech Research Magazine 2008

Clearing Up the Physics of Clouds (Fugal)
Michigan Tech Research Magazine 2008

From the Miniature to the Mammoth (Irish)
Michigan Tech Research Magazine 2008

Leading Physicist to Talk on Molecular Nanomagnets
Tech Today, April 18, 2008

Knowing When to Fold: For Proteins, Timing Is Everything (Hansmann)
Tech Today, April 16, 2008

Physics Colloquium Thursday by Distinguished Nanotechnology Researcher
Tech Today, April 1, 2008

Physics Grads Present at GSC Research Symposium
March 25-26, 2008

Deconstructing DNA-CNT hybrids (Gowtham, Scheicher, Pandey, Karna, Ajuha)
Lab Talk, Nanotechweb.org, March 10, 2008

Yap Named as the Chair of CNMS User Group at ORNL
Associate Professor Yoke Khin Yap is the first elected chair of the user group of the Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences (CNMS) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The CNMS User Group (CNMSUG) is an organization whose members serve as the lead principal investigators on approved CNMS user projects. The purpose of the CNMSUG is to provide a formal channel for the exchange of information between the management of the CNMS and the investigators at the CNMS. The CNMSUG will also serve as an advocacy group for the experimental and computational nanoscience-focused research activities at the CNMS. Since 2005, Yap served CNMS as one of the four Charter Members of the User Executive Committee responsible for the formation of CNMSUG. Yap is currently attending the CNMS Advisory Committee Meeting at the Center. Vice President for Research David Reed congratulated Yap on his election. "It's a reflection of the respect people in the project have for him and the quality of his research."
January 30, 2008

"Tracing Cosmic Bullets" Makes Number 3 in Science Magazine's Top 10 Breakthroughs of 2007 (Auger)
Science Magazine, December 21, 2007

"The Highest-Energy Cosmic Rays" Makes AIP's Ten Top Physics Stories for 2007 (Auger)
American Institute of Physics, December 13, 2007

Physics Researchers Participate in Nano Symposium
Nanotechnology research at MTU is gaining attention in an international symposium, “Symposium II: Nanotubes and Related Nanostructures,” being held on Nov. 26-30, in Boston. Associate Professor Yoke Khin Yap is the lead organizer of this symposium, which consists of about 290 contributed papers and 27 invited lectures. Yap research group will deliver five presentations while Professor Ravi Pandey will present an invited lecture, a poster presentation, and serve as a session chair. In addition, Professor Craig Friedrich (MEEM, Director of MuSTI) will serve as a session chair, present an oral talk, and host the symposium banquet to all the invited speakers, organizers, and session chairs of the symposium. Symposium II is the biggest symposium in the 2007 Materials Research Society (MRS) Fall Meeting with a total of 42 symposia and ~4500 presentations.
December 3, 2007

The Highest-Energy Cosmic Rays (Auger)
American Institute of Physics, November 12, 2007

MTU plays key role in project (Auger)
Daily Mining Gazette, November 9, 2007

Universe's Highest-Energy Particles Traced Back to Other Galaxies (Auger)
Science Magazine, November 9, 2007

Auger Observatory Closes in on Long-Standing Mystery; Links Highest-Energy Cosmic Rays with Violent Black Holes
UNM Today, November 8, 2007

Scientists help solve mystery of cosmic rays (Auger)
EurekAlert!, November 8, 2007

Scientists help solve mystery of cosmic rays (Auger)
Science Centric News, November 8, 2007

Michigan Tech Helps Solve Mystery of Cosmic Rays (Auger)
Michigan Tech News, November 8, 2007

Outstanding Meeting Paper by Nadgorny
Presidential Professor Dr. Edward Nadgorny published an online paper in the e-Proceedings of the Materials Research Society meeting which was selected as the outstanding original research paper published in the symposium proceedings. The paper by Edward M. Nadgorny, Dennis M. Dimiduk, and Michael D. Uchic, Size Effects in LiF Micron-Scale Single Crystals of Low Dislocation Density, in "Size Effects in the Deformation of Materials — Experiments and Modeling", edited by E. Lilleodden, P. Besser, L. Levine, A. Needleman (Mater. Res. Soc. Symp. Proc. 976E, Warrendale, PA, 2007), 0976-EE06-24, has been invited for submission to the Journal of Materials Research. If accepted, it will be highlighted in the JMR as an "Outstanding Meeting Paper" from the Fall 2006 meeting.
September 6, 2007

Yap Research Highlighted in DOE Nanoscience Center
Nanoscience research work conducted at Michigan Tech is highlighted in the official web site of the Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences (CNMS). This work is led by Associate Professor Yoke Khin Yap with support from the U.S. Department of Army, Yap's National Science Foundation CAREER award, and CNMS which is sponsored at Oak Ridge National Laboratory by the Division of Scientific User Facilities, U.S. Department of Energy. The Yap research project is one of the twelve research projects having been highlighted so far in the web site since 2003. There are currently more than 140 research projects in CNMS selected to be included in the user research program. Yap research on this project was published in Applied Physics Letters and featured as the cover of the March 12, 2007 issue. This paper was the most downloaded article published during March 2007 in the journal.
August 21, 2007

Yap Joins CINT
Nanoscience research lead by Dr. Yap is selected as a project in the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies (CINT). The project “Synthesis and Characterization of Individual Boron Nitride Nanostructures” was selected based upon the feasibility of the proposed research, the evaluations and prioritization by the external CINT Proposal Review Committee, and the availability of the CINT capabilities requested. CINT is a Department of Energy/Office of Science Nanoscale Science Research Center (NSRC) operating as a national user facility devoted to establishing the scientific principles that govern the design, performance, and integration of nanoscale materials.
August 8, 2007

Biomolecular Simulation Paper Presented
PhD student Parimal Kar presented a poster, "Algorithmic Refinements to an Enhanced Poisson-Boltzmann Approach Used in Biomolecular Simulation," at the From Computational Biophysics to System Biology 2007 workshop, held May 2-4 at John von Neumann Institute for Computing, Forschungzentrum, Juelich, Germany. Kar is part of the Computational Nano - and Biophysics research group of Dr. Ulrich H.E. Hansmann.
July 30, 2007

Michigan Tech Professor Developing Nanomaterials For Military, Auto Applications (Yap)
Michigan Small Tech, July 14, 2007

Jaszczak Co-Authors Paper on Graphite Cones and Tubes
Tech Today, May 29, 2007

Deformation Paper Most Downloaded
A paper co-authored by Dr. Edward Nadgorny proved to be in the Top 10 most downloaded Journal of Statistical Mechanics: Theory and Experiment articles of April 2007, according to IOP. Entitled "Scale-free statistics of plasticity-induced surface steps on KCl single crystals", the paper is freely available for download.
May 23, 2007

ZnO Nanotube Paper Most Downloaded (Yap)
Physics News, April 23, 2007

Single Crystalline ZnO Nanotubes (Yap)
Physics News, March 17, 2007

SQUAN-2007
Associate Professor Yoke Khin Yap attended the Indo-US Shared Vision Workshop on Soft, Quantum & Nano Computing (SQUAN-2007) in Agra, India, Feb 22-25, 2007. Yap delivered an invited lecture, "Nanomaterials and Nanocomputers: Promises and Challenges". This workshop was sponsored by the Indo-US Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF). IUSSTF was established under an agreement between the governments of India and the United States of America in March 2000 to promote and catalyze Indo-US bilateral collaborations in science, technology, engineering and biomedical research through substantive interaction among government, academia and industry.

In addition, Yap presented another invited lecture, "Prospective Nanomaterials for Biological and Chemical Sensing," in the Center for Fire, Explosives & Environment Safety, Defense Research & Development Organization, New Delhi, India on Feb. 26, 2007.

2007 Summer Undergraduate Research Fellows Named (Ben Coupland, Anthony Hegg, SAP and SPH Majors)
Tech Today, February 28, 2007

2007 Quantitative Computational Biophysics Workshop
Physics PhD student Yanjie Wei, from the Computational Nano- and Biophysics Group, presented a poster, "Sidechain and Backbone Ordering in Homopolymers," at the Quantitative Computational Biophysics '07 workshop, held Feb. 18-21 at Florida State University, Tallahassee. PhD student Parimal Kar, also from the Computational Nano- and Biophysics Group, presented a poster, "Systematic Refinement of an Enhanced Poisson-Boltzmann Algorithm Aimed at Semi-Quantitative Description of the Solvated State of Biomolecules." --Tech Today, February 26 & 28, 2007

Pati Gives MEEM Graduate Seminar
Tech Today, January 18, 2007

Nano Activities (Yap)
Physics News, December 6, 2006

Senior Research 2006-7

• Adam DeConinck, Yoke Khin Yap - Growth and characterization of boron nitride films
• Joe Grochowski, Brad Sherril, Michigan State - Improving the S800's Ionization Chamber Resolution
• Carly Robinson, Will Cantrell - Looking at the waiting times for freezing of water droplets
• Katie Schalk, Alex Kostinski - Is it possible to detect climate change by looking for record highs/lows in a time series
• B. Justin Scholfield, Igor Kliakhandler - Visual investigations of the Marangoni effect and various instabilities
• Paul Sneller, Will Cantrell - Analyzing aerosol data from Kaashidhoo Climate Observatory

2006 Electrochemical Society Joint International Meeting
Associate Professor Yoke Khin Yap is attending the Electrochemical Society 2006 Joint International Meeting in Cancun, Mexico, Oct. 29 to Nov. 3. Yap is to deliver an invited lecture, "Growth of Carbon, Boron, Nitride and ZnO Nanotubes for Biological Applications," and co-chaired a technical session, "Fuctionalization: Novel Platforms." Details of the meeting are available at http://www.electrochem.org/meetings/biannual/210/210.htm.

Enhanced Collaboration with National Nanoscale Science Research Center (Yap)
Physics News, September 15, 2006

2006 From Computational Biophysics to Systems Biology Workshop
Two PhD Physics students presented posters at the the From Computational Biophysics to Systems Biology 2006 workshop, held June 6-9 at the Jon von Neumann Institute for Computing in Jülich, Germany. Yanjie Wei presented "Side Chain Ordering of Polyglutamic Acid" and Parimal Kar presented "The Influence of Molecular Surface Composition on the Outcome of Poisson Boltzmann Calculations Performed to Obtain Solvation Free Energies." --Tech Today, September 8, 2006

Slamming Through the Universe?
The Pierre Auger Observatory: Exploring Secrets of the Extreme Universe (Nitz, Fick, Chirinos Diaz)
Michigan Tech Research 2006

Nanotubes: Tubular Technology! (Yap)
Michigan Tech Research 2006

Physics: Exploring the Nano World (Davenport, Yap)
Michigan Tech Research 2006

Senior Research 2005-6

• Matt Merlo and Victor Muzzin, “Restoration of the Radio Telescopes at the Amjoch Observatory.” Advisor: Dr. Bryan Suits.
• Matthew Mosher, “Using GPS Satellites as a Gravity Wave Detector.” Advisor: Dr. Robert Nemiroff.
• Dan Cordell, “Characterizing the Ion Distribution of the Michigan Tech Segmented Anode Bismuth Hall-Effect Thruster.” Advisor: Dr. Brad King.
• Patrick Phelps, “Comparison of Simulated Air Showers from Cosmic Rays with Data from the Auger Observatory.” Advisor: Dr. David Nitz.
• Eric Domeier, “Transition Energies in Gadolinium IV.” Advisor: Dr. Donald Beck.
• Eric Carlson, “Alignment of Carbon Nanotubes on Substrates.” Advisor: Dr. Yoke Khin Yap.
• Adam Kaczynski, “Properties of Ice Crystals from 2D Projections.” Advisor: Dr. Alex Kostinski.
• Matt Davenport, “Films of Carbon Nanotube and Zinc Oxide Nanowires as Electric Materials.” Advisor: Dr. Yoke Khin Yap.

2006 Physics Graduate Student Poster Session
Physics graduate students Jason Moscatello, Ming Xie, Wil Slough, Yanjie Wei, Benjamin Ulmen, and Vijaya Kayastha presented research posters on April 6 in the main lobby of Fisher Hall. Poster abstracts may be found in the Spring Semester 2006 physics colloquiums.

Fat Nanotube Art (Kayastha, Yap)
Physics News, April 3, 2006

Explaining Explosions: Perger Investigates Bomb Basics
Tech Today, March 27, 2006

Global Nanoscale (Yap)
Physics News, March 27, 2006

Nanotechnology Research at Michigan Tech Gains International Attention (Yap)
Physics News, January 10, 2006

Hansmann Begins International Collaboration with von Neumann Institute
Physics News, January 10, 2006

Atom By Atom - Nanotechnology (Yap)
Michigan Tech Magazine, December 2005

Water: Ins and Outs of Ice Nucleation
Research done by Associate Professor Raymond Shaw, Adam Durant (GMES) and Youshi Mi in Tech's Cloud Physics Laboratory was featured in the Dec. 8 edition of Nature. The article appeared in the “News and Views” section.
December 13, 2005

Beck Group Computes Atomic Properties with Groundbreaking Accuracy (Beck, O'Malley, Pan)
Physics News, December 11, 2005

Yap Group Achieves First Successful Growth of Boron Nitride Nanotubes on Substrates at Low Temperatures (Yap, Wang)
Physics News, November 30, 2005

MTU-Oviedo Group Predicts New Properties of Gallium Oxide : Nanoclusters and Crystals (Pandey, Gowtham, He)
Physics News, November 18, 2005

Evaporation Freezing by Contact Nucleation Inside-Out
An article, “Evaporation Freezing by Contact Nucleation Inside-Out,” by Associate Professor Raymond A. Shaw and graduate student Adam Durant (GMES) was published in Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 32, L20814. Geophysical Research Letters is a journal of the American Geophysical Union.
October 31, 2005

Structural Control of Vertically Aligned Multiwalled Carbon Nanotubes by Radio-Frequency Plasmas
Graduate students Jitendra Menda, Benjamin Ulmen, Lakshman K. Vanga, and Vijaya K. Kayastha published an article in Applied Physics Letters (Volume 87, page 173106, American Institute of Physics). This paper is entitled “Structural control of vertically aligned multiwalled carbon nanotubes by radio-frequency plasmas.” This work is conducted under the supervision of Assistant Professor Yoke Khin Yap in collaboration with Scientists from Oak Ridge National Laboratory. In addition, this paper has been selected for the October 31, 2005 issue of Virtual Journal of Nanoscale Science & Technology. The Virtual Journal, which is published by the American Institute of Physics and the American Physical Society in cooperation with numerous other societies and publishers, is an edited compilation of links to articles from participating publishers, covering a focused area of frontier research.
October 31, 2005

NANOPOLIS™ Contribution from Michigan Tech (Yap)
Physics News, October 10, 2005

Nanotechnology Encyclopedia is Best Reference 2005 (Yap)
Physics News, October 10, 2005

Physicist Uses Supercomputer to Fight Disease (Hansmann)
Michigan Tech News, August 8, 2005
John von Neumann Institute for Computing | Computational Nano - and Biophysics (Hansmann Group)

Meet a Slippery Customer
Associate Professor of Physics Dr. John A. Jaszczak has an amazing graphite image featured in the June 10, 2005 volume of SCIENCE Magazine's NetWatch.

2005 CNMS Inaugural User Meeting
Assistant Professor Yoke Khin Yap will attend the CNMS Inaugural User Meeting at Oak Ridge, Tennessee from May 23-25, 2005. The Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences (CNMS) is one of five Nanoscale Science Research Centers sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy. Yap has an active research program in CNMS which is among the first 42 research themes selected nation wide to be included as the user research program in the center. His research theme on “Controlling Nanostructures of CVD-Multiwall Carbon Nanotubes,” is the only selected project from the state of Michigan.

2005 Applications of Diamond and Related Materials
Three physics graduate students are attending the 8th International Conference on Applications of Diamond and Related Materials/1st NanoCarbon Joint Conference (ADC/Nanocarbon 2005) at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Chicago. Vijaya Kayastha, Benjamin Ulmen and Jiesheng Wang will present two oral and two poster presentations in the conference to be held on May 15-19. They will also attend a workshop on nanocarbon on May 15, about the research topics in the Center for Nanoscale Materials (CNM) at ANL. CNM is one of five Nanoscale Science Research Centers sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), offering advanced facilities and expertise to support independent and collaborative research efforts in this area.

This conference is sponsored by ANL, U.S. Department of Energy, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), Naval Research Laboratory, IEEE, MRS Materials Research Society, Elsevier Science, and Advanced Diamond Technologies, Inc.

Shower Power: What's Luck Got to Do with It? (Kostinski, Shaw)
Michigan Tech News, March 31, 2005
Related Abstract | Related Journal Article

Yap's Nanotubes: Totally Tubular
Michigan Tech News, March 25, 2005

Michigan Tech Mines Its Swinging Past (Suits)
The Chronicle of Higher Education (Subscribers only), January 12, 2005

Senior Research 2004-5

• Josua Anderson, “NO-CO Reactions on Small Pd Clusters”. Advisor: Dr. Ravi Pandey.
• Jack McCaffrey, “Differential Geometry and Mathematical Physics”. Advisor: Dr. Clark Givens.
• David Price, “Multiwalled Carbon Nanotubes”. Advisor: Dr. Yoke Khin Yap.
• Paul Schou, “Atmospheric Particle Modeling”. Advisor: Dr. Will Cantrell.

2004 American Geophysical Union Meeting
Physics sophomore Carly Robinson and physics graduate student Eli Ochshorn are presenting posters at the Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union on December 13-17, 2004. Their posters are entitled “A perspective on the influence that biomass burning may have on cirrus clouds: Freezing of solutions catalyzed by high molecular weight organic compounds” and “Ice Nucleation by Long Chain Alcohols: Perspectives on Nucleation Theories and the Structure of Water”, respectively. Their advisor is Assistant Professor of Physics Dr. Will Cantrell.

Doing Battle With Death and Destruction (Suits)
Michigan Tech News, August 13, 2004

Ranjit Pati, PhD, Assistant Professor, Physics, MTU

Fig. 1

Molecular Electronics (Moletronics) has opened up a new frontier aiming at ultimate miniaturization of electronic circuits with ultra high density electronic components. Pati’s research primarily focused on addressing the fundamental challenges in molecular electronics by understanding the complex phenomena like “controlled electron transport” in molecular wires, which forms the basis of molecular electronics. He has published several research articles in this area. One of his recent paper is on “conformational molecular switch”, which he published with his collaborator Dr. S. P. Karna from the Army Research Laboratory. They found the molecular wire (Fig.1) exhibiting current switching between the planar and perpendicular orientations of the two pi-electron moieties with planar configuration (ON state) giving significantly higher current than the perpendicular conformation (OFF state).

Pati and Karna, Phys. Rev. B 69: 155419(1)-155419(4), 2004

Book Chapter for Nanotechnology Encyclopedia (Nadgorny)
Physics News, June 22, 2004

Book Chapter of Wafer Bonding (Levy)
Physics News, June 6, 2004

Kostinski Receives Michigan Tech Research Award
Tech Topics, May 28, 2004

Book Chapter for Nanotechnology Encyclopedia (Yap)
Physics News, May 25, 2004

Cones Photo Featured on CARBON (Jaszczak)
Physics News, December 4, 2003

In 1967 Jocelyn Bell discovered the first pulsar.