This award supports a new REU site located at Idaho State University with a focus on applied nuclear physics. Undergraduate students will be recruited for ten weeks of summer research and will work with to work with ISU researchers in Accelerator, Nuclear, and Materials Science Facilities in the Idaho Accelerator Center (IAC) and associated laboratories. Weekly lectures on advanced topics in materials science and physics are also planned, as are opportunities for students to improve their communication skills through presentations on their work. Once accepted into the program, but prior to arrival at ISU, REU students will be assigned to work in pairs with one or two specific faculty mentors. Assignments will be based on prior student experience and communications between students and mentors. Each pair of REU students will spend almost all of their time working with faculty mentors on a specific research project. Brigham Young University Idaho (BYUI) and the College of Southern Idaho (CSI) will serve as partner institutions in these activities. A variety of social activities that allow students to explore the area and to interact with other students are also planned.
This project supported forty undergraduate students from across the U.S. in summer research projects at Idaho State University. The projects were each 10 weeks long in areas of applied nuclear science. The students worked with faculty, graduate students, post-doctoral fellows, and other undergraduates in laboratories in the ISU departments of Physics, Biology, Chemistry, Anthropology, Nuclear Engineering, and at the Idaho Accelerator Center. All participating students gained valuable research experience ranging in advanced computation, data analysis, and experimental methods. They learned to use a wide range of experimental equipment common in research and industry ranging from nuclear instrumentation, detector systems, electronics, gas chromatography, chelation columns, electron microscopes, gel electrophoresis, to particle accelerators. Thirty six participating students successfully completed a radiation safety course. They learned about radiation effects, hazards, dosimetry, safe practices, and regulations on the use, storage, and disposal of radioactive materials. The other four students were not involved in projects requiring radiation safety training and did not take this course. All students attended daily lectures on research topics, nuclear science, data analysis, experimental techniques, electronic instrumentation, computer simulations and modeling techniques by research faculty. They also improved their communication skills in weekly meetings where they presented project status, and in two formal seminars where they presented their work in both poster format and in PowerPoint presentations. General descriptions of the undergraduate research projects and the numbers of supported students involved in each are as follows: Two students helped develop a polarized photon beam to induce photo-fission in strategic fissionable materials of interest to Homeland Security. A third student performed Monte-Carlo simulations to optimize beam energies for this experiment. One student designed, constructed, and tested the scintillation detectors used in the polarized beam projects. One other student used an unpolarized beam to determine the quantity and identity of fissionable materials in cargo containers by examining delayed neutron emission from photo-fission events. Four students used laser ablation, photon activation analysis, and plasma mass spectroscopy to study trace elements in artifacts and human remains to determine ancient migration patterns, dietary preferences, trading behavior, and occupations of ancient humans. One additional student used next-generation genetic sequencing of human remains to contribute to a database that will allow inferences on genetic histories and migrations. Two students performed computer simulations and computations of neutron flux, reaction rates, and heat transfer within nuclear reactors to help design next generation electrical production reactors and research reactors. Six students investigated radiation survival mechanisms and cellular genetic repair mechanisms in extremophile bacteria. This work improved understanding of how cells react to and resist radiation damage. Two students investigated survival of the same extremophiles with regards to extreme heat and cold to explore possible origins of radiation resistance mechanisms. Two students preformed calculations of U.S. nuclear power plant emissions of gaseous and liquid effluents. This data was used by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). Six students worked on developing process for the photonuclear production of 67Cu, 111In, and 117Lu using particle accelerators. These isotopes are useful as medical tracers and for cancer therapy. The students performed simulations and calculations to optimize this production, and used linear accelerators at the Idaho Accelerator center to produce these isotopes. One additional student helped develop chemical separation techniques of these radioisotopes from the activated target materials. Four students worked on a project to design, construct, and test a positron annihilation spectrometer to detect the decays of positrons created inside materials to be studied. Positrons were created through pair production from a photon beam produced using a linear accelerator. Two students used this spectrometer to determine defect concentrations in aerospace materials after different annealing processes. Two students helped develop and analyze multivariate calibration techniques for predicting product variations based on pre-production sampling. These techniques will be used in quality control in the pharmaceutical industry. One student optimized data from a prototype quartz Cherenkov detector. The long term goal of this project is to design and construct a much larger detector for the MOLLER experiment at Jefferson national Accelerator Laboratory. One student constructed and tested GeS conductive bridging RAM devices with multiple enhanced resistance states, and confirmed that these devices have a high degree of radiation hardness. One student demonstrated that photon activation can be used to detect the amount of gold in ore samples at levels far below current cut-off concentrations in use in the mining industry, and optimized irradiation levels and cooling times for this technique. One student demonstrated that photon activation can be used to convert the long lived 226Ra in needles left over from cancer treatment and stored in national repositories into the medically useful and short lived isotope 225Ac. This work was disseminated by the students supported and their faculty mentors in over one hundred presentations in seminars and at regional and national professional meetings, and in at least six publications.
