This award supports the continuation of the Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) site at the Department of Physics at Alabama A&M University (AAMU). The site will provide research opportunities to 27 talented undergraduate students from institutions with limited access to basic research in science and engineering. Participating students will be actively engaged in cutting edge research under the direct supervision of energetic faculty mentors through the completion of self contained ten week projects in a collaborative research environment. The projects available to participants include forefront research in Materials Science, Photonics, Space Science, and Nanotechnology. Exposure to a dynamic and diverse research in physics enhances the REU participants' understanding of scientific research and broadens their perspective on related professional careers in STEM. Each participant will have an individual research project with one on one mentoring from a faculty member as well as ample interactions with graduate students. Each participant will be making unique advances in experimental design, instrumentation, data acquisition and analysis, as well as engaging in hands on research experience with state of the art equipment.
