The Bucknell University "Summer Research Program in Physics" will give 8 undergraduate students per summer the opportunity to collaborate with a member of the faculty for 10 weeks on his or her research. Projects offered cover many areas of physics. Theoretical research areas include problems in statistical mechanics, quantum optics, modeling of nerve impulses, and computer simulations. Experimental research areas include pattern formation and chaos in complex systems, phase structures and transitions of biological liquid crystals, exotic atoms (positronium), laser diode optical pumping of atomic vapors, and particle physics. In addition, three faculty have research programs in observational astronomy and two more faculty have interdisciplinary projects in mathematics (modeling fluid flow) and chemical engineering (imaging biological materials using evanescent waves). Although Bucknell is an undergraduate institution, the physics department has 10 faculty members contributing projects to this proposal. Bucknell's setting as a small liberal arts college provides the perfect environment for some student's first encounter with full-time research. Approximately six faculty will offer projects each summer, so the level of student faculty interaction will be high. This immersion in a research environment is intended to complement traditional classroom experiences of the students. For many it will be their first contact with the excitement and demands of full-time research. Participation will help students make career choices, and will provide specific preparation for those that continue on to graduate studies in physics. Students will be recruited from around the country. All of the students will live together on the Bucknell campus, conduct most of their research in on-campus facilities, and participate in weekly departmental seminars and colloquia. Students will have the opportunity to present their work in regional and national conferences. Finally, it is anticipated that much of the work of the participants will be published in peer reviewed journals and these papers will include students as co-authors.
The Bucknell University Summer Research Program in Physics & Astronomy is an NSF-Funded Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) site that provided research opportunities for 50 undergraduates during the six years of the award. The students were selected from national pools that averaged 112 applicants/year. Our site attracted a pool of relatively young applicants, with little previous research experience: 48% of the NSF-sponsored participants were rising sophomores or juniors, and this was the first research experience for 78% of our participants. We also attracted students from institutions that may not have extensive research opportunities. The majority of our participants (56%) came from schools without graduate programs, with 52% from four-year colleges, 4% from community colleges, and 44% from research universities. In the six years covered by grant, 40% of the REU participants at our site were women. (Our undergraduate summer research program also included 18 additional students who were not funded through the NSF REU program; these students were full participants, along with the REU-supported students, in all aspects of the program.) Our program had two goals: to help students develop research skills and to help students determine whether a career in scientific research is appropriate for them. Even though our program focused on a one-on-one (or nearly one-on-one) relationship with a faculty mentor, we also had a parallel focus of connecting peers both socially as well as professionally. During our program the students not only learned the details of a specific scientific research project, but also received an introduction to the culture of doing scientific research. Our students learned about scientific research from their faculty mentors and from other participants in the program (faculty and students) and from invited speakers. We are particularly proud of our record of publication and conference presentations with REU student co-authors. Although we start with a relatively young and inexperienced cohort of students, we succeeded in engaging them in real research at a level that merited dissemination to the scientific community. We continued our involvement with our students in the years following their summer residence on our campus, as they prepare conference presentations and assist in the development of manuscripts for publication. In the last six years, 12 different NSF-supported undergraduates were co-authors on 12 papers published in, or recently submitted to, peer-reviewed journals. In addition, 31 different REU-supported students from our program were co-authors on papers presented at professional meetings of the American Physical Society, the American Astronomical Society, the Optical Society of America, and other societies. Most of these students went well beyond simply being named co-authors: 27 of REU co-authors attended the conference along with the faculty mentor and presented the work. Students worked on a broad range of projects, with many different faculty mentors. The research areas included astronomy and astrophysics, experimental atomic physics, theoretical statistical mechanics, computational condensed matter physics, experimental non-linear dynamics and fluid mixing, experimental fluid mechanics, computational neuroscience, experimental microscopy, and theoretical quantum optics.
