The goal of this workshop is to bring together American and Turkish Scientists/Technologists/Academicians, who work in Nanoscience and Nanotechnology areas for the ultimate purpose of preparing joint research projects on various aspects of nanoscience and nanotechnology and to start collaborative research programs. The Workshop will be organized and managed by Prof. E. Sancaktar in collaboration with his Turkish counterpart, Prof. H. Unlu, Chair of the Physics Department at Istanbul Technical University (ITU). The Workshop will be held concurrently with NanoTR 4 ((www.nanotr4.itu.edu.tr/) scheduled for June 9-13, 2008, in Istanbul, Turkey, at the campus of ITU. This Workshop will be useful to both the U.S. and Turkey, as it will allow American scientists/Technologists/Academicians to interact with their regional counterparts from Turkey, as well as those from other countries, including Canada, Germany, Ireland, Japan, the Netherlands and the U.K., to increase their awareness on nanoscientific and nanotechnological activities in the U.S., and Turkey, as well as different countries around the world, and to encourage collaboration in these areas.
The American attendees will have an excellent opportunity to accomplish the goals of the Workshop with the ability to interact with a large number of internationally renowned scientists/technologists. Thus, these interactions will constitute the yearly phases of developing and coordinating research and education activities with foreign partner(s) (NSF). The American attendees of the Workshop are academicians (13) and graduate students (5) representing 13 Universities from 10 different states, as well as 2 scientists from U.S. Federal research organizations. The participating academicians hold ranks varying from assistant professor to distinguished professor. These prospective participants were invited pursuant to nomination by their peers from the U.S, as well as by the Scientific Advisory Board and the Organizing Committee of NanoTR 4. The intellectual merits of this proposal reside in the originality of the research to be presented by 14 prominent American researchers (Drs. I. Aksay, A. Erdemir, B. Hinds, N. Horing, J. Irudayaraj, A. Isayev, L. Jia, A. Madakannan, R. Martini, H. Onyuksel, J. Rogers, J. Ross, R. Ruoff, E. Sancaktar, T. Yildirim), as well as 5 promising American doctoral students (T. Lewis, T. McNeish, M. Saunders, M. Wadley, J. Weatherall), two of whom from the African-American minority group, and the furthering of these research activities by constructive discussions and possible future collaborations to be established. The topics to be covered and advanced are of vital importance to a wide range of modern technologies in most industries, healthcare, conservation of materials and energy, biology, environment, and education, and thus, will have broad impacts on our society. In this Workshop, we will address fundamental issues with particular emphasis on the nanomaterials solutions to a wide range of problems. The Workshop will bring together researchers from physics, chemistry, materials science and engineering to review the current status, to share new ideas and results to delineate outstanding problems and to guide future research. This Workshop will also have a strong educational and student outreach component and will provide opportunities for young investigators to present their research findings and to learn about the most recent developments in this rapidly moving field. This project is jointly funded by CMMI and the Office of International Science and Engineering.
