Program
| arrival | Wednesday, October 20, 2021 Registration desk will be open at the Graduate Lincoln hotel between 6:00pm - 8:00pm. Students who arrive on this day can use the Graduate Lincoln restaurant to have dinner and put charges on their room (only Wednesday dinner, no alcoholic beverages please!). |
| Thursday, October 21, 2021 Nebraska Champions Club | |
Shuttle Bus Schedule 8:30 a.m. & 8:45 a.m. - Graduate Hotel to Champions Club | |
| 8:30 a.m. - 6:00 p.m. | Registration will be open all day (Nebraska Champions Club) |
| 9:00 a.m. | Welcome Remarks/Meeting Kick-Off Daniel Claes (Department Chair, Physics & Astronomy), Matt Andrews (Director, Nebraska EPSCoR), Rebecca Lai and Jocelyn Bosley (Conference Chairs, Nebraska MRSEC) |
| Morning Session I (Session Chair: Rebecca Lai) | |
| 9:30 a.m. | Keynote Speaker: Maria Becker (Nebraska Wesleyan University) “Mother Nature: A Woman of Two Worlds” |
| 10:30 a.m. | Coffee Break |
| Morning Session II (Session Chair: Jeff Shield) | |
| 10:50 a.m. | Keynote Speaker: Tamara Floyd Smith (Tuskegee University) “Competent, Engaged, Diverse and Realized (CEDaR) Scientists” |
| 11:50 a.m. | Invited Student Speaker: Abigail Hartline (University of Mississippi, Oxford, MS) “Ionic Liquids for Aqueous Stabilization of Organic Dyes” |
| 12:10 p.m. | Invited Student Speaker: Alyssa Simpson (University of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE) “Ferroelectric Domain Studies on Free-standing PZT Membranes” |
| 12:30 p.m. | Lunch |
| 1:30 p.m. | Debra Hope (Dean, Graduate Studies) and Rick Bevins (Interim Associate Vice Chancellor, Office of Research & Economic Development) |
| Afternoon Session III (Session Chair: Shireen Adenwalla) | |
| 1:50 p.m. | Invited Student Speaker: Tessa Hoffman (Nebraska Wesleyan University, Lincoln, NE) "Characterization of Substrate Channeling in SmPutA" |
| 2:10 p.m. | Invited Student Speaker: Swan Klein (George Mason University, Fairfax, VA) “Two-Qubit Quantum Circuit Synthesis” |
| 2:30 p.m. | Invited Student Speaker: Alexis Paskach (Illinois College, Jacksonville, IL) “Nickel-phosphine Complexes for Cross-Coupling Reactions” |
| 2:50 p.m. | Invited Student Speaker: Abbeigh Schroeder (Clarion University of Pennsylvania, Clarion, PA) “The Evaluation of a Specimen Orientation Adjustment Procedure” |
| 3:10 p.m. | Coffee Break |
| Afternoon Session IV (Session Chair: Ken Bloom) | |
| 3:30 p.m. | Keynote Speaker: Indara Suarez (Boston University) “Colliding Worlds” |
| 4:30 p.m. | Poster Session |
| 6:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. | Dinner Buffet |
| 8:00 p.m. - 10:00 p.m. | "Activate Awesome" at Urban Air Adventure Park! |
| Friday, October 22, 2021 Nebraska Champions Club | |
Shuttle Bus Schedule 8:30 a.m. & 8:45 a.m. - Graduate Hotel to Champions Club | |
| 8:30 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. | Registration open (Nebraska Champions Club) |
| Morning Session V (Session Chair: Brad Shadwick) | |
| 9:00 a.m. | Keynote Speaker: Rebecca Belisle (Wellesley College) “Stacking Up Solar: Designing New Semiconductors for Multijunction Photovoltaics” |
| 10:00 a.m. | Coffee Break |
| Morning Session VI (Session Chair: Lucía Fernandez-Ballester) | |
| 10:20 a.m. | Keynote Speaker: Shudipto Dishari (University of Nebraska) "Addressing the Challenges of Biomedical and Sustainable Energy Technologies by Designing Polymeric Nanomaterials" |
| 11:20 a.m. | Invited Student Speaker: Mary Beth VanLandingham (University of Mississippi, Oxford, MS) “Characterization of a Full-Mouth Prosthodontic Restoration” |
| 11:40 a.m. | Invited Student Speaker: Brooke Smith (North Carolina A&T State University, Greensboro, NC) “Pulsed Laser Deposition and Characterization of Titanium Nitride and Oxynitride Thin Films for Alternative Energy Applications” |
| 12:00 p.m. | Meet Diocles! Extreme Light @ UNL |
| 12:15 p.m. | Lunch with UNL faculty |
| Afternoon Session VII (Session Chair: Tia Barth) | |
| 1:30 p.m. | Graduate School and Career Panel |
| 2:30 p.m. | Keynote Speaker: Maria Emelianenko (George Mason University) “Crossing the Boundaries” |
| 3:30 p.m. | Coffee Break |
| Afternoon Session VIII (Session Chair: Rebecca Harbison) | |
| 4:00 p.m. | Keynote Speaker: Richa Sirohi (NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory) “Dare Mighty Things: To Psyche & Beyond” |
| 5:00 p.m. - 6:30 p.m. | open |
| 6:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. | Dinner at food trucks (Jorgensen Hall Atrium) |
| 7:30 p.m. - 8:30 p.m. | Friday Night Talk (136 Jorgensen Hall) Stephanie Castillo (University of Vanderbilt) “What Does it Mean to be a Science Communicator?” |
| 8:30 p.m. | Student Observatory Open Night |
| Saturday, October 23, 2021 Jorgensen Hall, Room 136 | |
Shuttle Bus Schedule 8:45 a.m. - Graduate Hotel to Hamilton Hall and Scott Engineering Center | |
| 9:00 a.m. - 9:30 a.m. | Chemistry lab tours (Hamilton Hall) Engineering lab tours (Scott Engineering Center) |
| 9:45 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. | Physics and NCMN lab tours (Jorgensen Hall) |
| Morning Session IX (Session Chair: Xia Hong) | |
| 11:30 a.m. | Keynote Speaker: Helen Tran (University of Toronto) “Stretchable and Fully Degradable Semiconductors for Transient Electronics” |
| 12:30 p.m. | Lunch at the Physics Department |
| Afternoon Session X (Session Chair: Rebecca Lai) | |
| 1:30 p.m. | Keynote Speaker: Raychelle Burks (American University) “Light It Up: On Embracing Inclusive Excellence Along Our STEM Journeys” |
| 2:30 p.m. | Invited Student Speaker: Thummim Mekuria (Pomona College, Claremont, CA) “Developing an Algorithm to Model the Evolution of a Binary System” |
| 2:50 p.m. | Invited Student Speaker: Elizabeth Kellstedt (University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN) “Nanoporous Membranes from Polyethylene Block Copolymers” |
| 3:10 p.m. | Coffee Break |
| Afternoon Session XI (Session Chair: Kayleigh McElveen) | |
| 3:30 p.m. | Keynote Speaker: Roselin Rosario-Meléndez (fmly. L'Oreal) “Non-Linear Career Path: Navigating Through Different STEM Fields as a Latina Inventor” |
| 4:30 p.m. | Bus or Walk to the Graduate Lincoln hotel |
| 6:30 p.m. | Conference Dinner at the Graduate Lincoln (Scarlet Ballroom) |
| Departure | Sunday, October 24, 2021 |
