Brookhaven Hosts College Students in Science and Technology Mini-Course

February 19, 2009

Nineteen students from 15 New York State colleges and universities spent five days at Brookhaven Lab exploring the latest research and technology in energy and environmental sciences.

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College students in science majors hope to return as Brookhaven research interns, thanks to CSTEP instructors and coordinators.

For the fourth year, in partnership with the New York State Department of Education's Collegiate Science and Technology Entry Program (CSTEP), Brookhaven Lab offered the CSTEP mini-course to introduce underrepresented undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) students to cutting-edge research and possibilities for their future academic and career paths.

This year's mini-course focused on research in energy and environmental sciences, and lectures were given by Brookhaven researchers. The lectures included topics on climate and global change, alternative energy sciences, computational sciences, nanomaterials, addiction, physics, chemistry, crystallography, and plant biology.

Students were also able to tour Brookhaven facilities, including the Center for Functional Nanomaterials, the Linear Electron Accelerator Facility (LEAF), the Center for Computational Sciences, which houses the New York Blue supercomputer, and the National Synchrotron Light Source.

"They were a very focused and engaged group of young people," said John Miller, a chemist at Brookhaven, who guided the students on a tour of LEAF and discussed his research that uses an accelerator and lasers to find new sources of solar energy.

Devinder Mahajan, another Brookhaven chemist, spent nearly a day with the students exploring alternative energy science and biofuels.

"They were very engaged in the lectures setting a good stage for the lab session, in which I showed them how we make biofuels," Mahajan said. "They were very inquisitive during the hands-on experience, in which we used a gas chromatograph to analyze gas and liquid products."

Students also engaged in hands-on workshops in citric acid remediation and global change.

Lindsey Klinge, a chemistry student from Purchase College, State University of New York, was selected to return for a summer research internship at Brookhaven.

"I hadn't considered using chemistry for environmental remediation before I saw the scientists' (AJ Francis and Cleveland Dodge) presentation, but now I would like to pursue a career doing research to that end," Klinge said.

Nina Leonhardt, the CSTEP Director at Suffolk County Community College, said, "The opportunity for NYS CSTEP students to spend a week at a national laboratory is priceless. Interacting with world-class scientists, doing scientific research, and visiting amazing facilities will surely cultivate our next generation of STEM professionals."

For more information on Brookhaven Lab's educational programs, see http://www.bnl.gov/education.

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