Our group (Laboratory for Astrophysics and Surface Physics (LASP), Department of Materials Science and Engineering) focuses on understanding the physical and chemical processes occurring on the surfaces of planetary bodies in our Solar System and beyond. We work on characterizing extraterrestrial and analog materials using specialized analytical instruments, develop new types of analytical instrumentation, and try to understand how molecules/materials are synthesized (and destroyed) on grains. For this project, the student(s) would be involved in developing an instrument to accurately measure the beam current (a Faraday Cup) for use in the new KEVION ion accelerator.
With a mentor, USOAR student(s) will be involved in one or more aspects of designing, testing, building, and/or utilizing novel instrumentation (a Faraday Cup for beam current measurement) for our new KEVION ion accelerator. The specific project will be tailored to the student interests and abilities (e.g., mechanical design, sample analysis, instrument set up, computational simulation), with the goal of skills building in the laboratory, ion beam interactions, mechatronics, vacuum science, and/or computer simulations. Each week, each student is expected to: (1) meet with the mentor (~30 min), (2) attend a LASP team meeting (~90 min), and (3) work on project with mentor/independently (2-8 hours/week). This is a NASA-funded project, geared toward understanding the interaction of radiation with planetary surfaces, but is also directly applicable to materials characterization, physics, astronomy, and nuclear engineering.
Preferred skills: Interest in Physics or Planetary Science; Experience with Hand and/or Power tools; High School Level Mechatronics or Engineering Experience; Microsoft Office Skills (Word, Excel, PowerPoint); Programming (Python, LabView; Matlab; or other); Previous Job Experience (retail, mowing, babysitting, etc.); Mechanical Design Software (e.g., Inventor, Autocad)
Preferred Educational Background: AP Physics; AP Calc (or community college coursework)
USOAR students will develop laboratory and soft skills during the year, as well as complete an individual project. Potential resume-building skills that could be developed include: optical microscopy training/experience, AUTOCAD (or other) mechanical design experience, instrument building, vacuum hardware experience, ion beam alignment, optical alignment, software-instrument integration, programming, experimental design, and/or presentation skills. At the end of the project the deliverable will be the Faraday Cup, which will be installed and tested on the new system.