Cornell faculty participate in nanoscience workshops in China

Cornell faculty on the Bund, a waterfront promenade in Shanghai, looking across the Huangpu River toward Pudong. The faculty recently participated in nanoscience workshops in China. From left: Ulrich Wiesner, Lara Estroff, Barbara Baird, Dan Luo, Shefford Baker, Edwin Kan and Stephen Sass.

Exploring new possibilities in research collaborations and faculty exchanges, a seven-member contingent of Cornell faculty recently finished a series of nanoscience workshops at two Chinese universities.

Participant Stephen Sass, professor of materials science and engineering and a Stephen H. Weiss Presidential Fellow, said that while many consider the 20th century to have been dominated by the United States, the 21st century may well be the century of China.

"It's important to form relationships with the strongest Chinese universities so that Cornell can participate in the growth of science and technology in China, and in a small way, help to shape the future," Sass said.

A group of computer science faculty from the College of Engineering had earlier visited Beijing's Tsinghua University in November 2005 for a two-day meeting, the Tsinghua-Cornell Workshop on Information Science and Technology. The present group of faculty from the College of Engineering and the College of Arts and Sciences gave presentations in the 2006 Tsinghua-Cornell Workshop on Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, held Oct. 9 and 10.

Following that event, the group attended another workshop on Oct. 12 and 13 at Jiao Tong University in Shanghai called the 2006 SJTU-Cornell Nanoscience and Technology Symposium.

Cornell participants in the intensive workshops dealing with nanomaterials, nanodevices and nanocomposites included Barbara Baird from the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Edwin Kan from Electrical and Computer Engineering, Dan Luo from Biological and Environmental Engineering, and Shefford Baker, Lara Estroff, Ulrich Wiesner and Sass, from Materials Science and Engineering.

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