Jian Xu, associate professor of engineering science and mechanics, has been awarded an NSF Career Award to study "Two-Photon Pumped Lasing Using Semiconductor Nanostructures by Design".

The project focuses on the development and use of two-photon pumped lasers based on engineered seminconductor nanostructures.

Xu's research interests include seminconductor optoelectronics, nanophotonics and bioelectronics. At Penn State he established an optoelectronics laboratory which bridges the basic research on nanoscale semiconductor materials and engineering studies of their device applications in solar energy, display, lightwave communication and optical sensing.

Congratulations to Jian on his success!

In August 2009, Dr. Akhlesh Lakhtakia, Charles Godfrey Binder Professor in Engineering Science and Mechanics, is to chair two conferences, Biomimetics and Bioinspiration, with Raúl J. Martín-Palma, and Nanostructured Thin Films II, with Geoffrey Smith and Cheng-Chung Lee.

While at the meeting, Dr. Lakhtakia will present four papers entitled “Structural colors, cosmetics, and fabrics,” by Natalia M. Dushkina and Akhlesh Lakhtakia, “The homogenization of piezoelectric metamaterials via the strong-property-fluctuation theory,” by Andrew J. Duncan, Tom G. mackay, and Akhlesh Lakhtakia, “Towards replication of the exoskeleton of Lamprocyphus augustus for photonic applications,” by Akhlesh Lakhtakia, Raúl J. Martín-Palma, and Carlo G. Pantano, and “On limitations of conventional approaches to homogenization applied to dissipative and active composite materials,” by Tom G. Mackay and Akhlesh Lakhtakia.

The conference will be held in San Diego California and for more information, please visit their web site.

The inaugural IEEE Women in Electromagnetics (WiEM) workshop was held on the University of Utah campus June 5-8, 2009. Penn State associate professor of engineering science and mechanics, Elena Semouchkina, was one of three organizers of the international workshop. She is a senior research associate in the Materials Research Institute. Dr. Semouchkina’s interests are in electromagnetic metamaterials and the development of materials integration concepts for electronic and photonic devices.

Read more about the conference in the latest issue of Materials@Penn State.

Source: eMaterials Volume 9, Issue 3

Dr. Jian Xu, Associate Professor in Engineering Science and Mechanics and Adjunct Professor in Electrical Engineering is attending the Asian Optical Communications Annual Meeting. The conference will be held in Hongkong from July 12 – July 20. Another stop on Dr. Xu’s agenda will be at the OSA Optoelectronic Symposium in Wuhan, China on August 8 – August 10.

Dr. Patrick Lenahan, Distinguished Professor in Engineering Science and Mechanics, is to attend and present at the Rockey Mountain Conference on Analytical Chemistry. The conference is scheduled from July 19 – 23 in Snowmass Colorado. For more information about the conference, please visit their web site.

Barbara Bogue, associate professor of engineering science and mechanics and women in engineering, appeared before a House subcommittee on July 21 to discuss female student involvement in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). Bogue spoke to the Committee on Science and Technology's Subcommittee on Research on Science and Education at a hearing titled "Encouraging the Participation of Female Students in STEM Fields." The meeting was held in the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, D.C.

For Bogues testimony, visit, this website.
Read the full story on Live.

Source: Penn State Newswire

Dr. Dinesh Agrawal, Professor of Materials, Engineering Science and Mechanics, and Director of Microwave Processing and Engineering Center gave an invited public lecture at Bangkok, Thailand on June 29, 2009. The lecture was jointly sponsored by the National Science & Technology Development Board, Thailand and Siam Cement Group Companies, Thailand. He also gave an invited talk at the International Conference on Materials for Advanced Technologies (IUMRS-ICA 2009) held at Singapore on “ Microwave High Temperature Materials Processing: A Global Perspective” on July 3, 2009.