{"id":24497,"date":"2017-07-08T06:00:41","date_gmt":"2017-07-08T11:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/?p=24497"},"modified":"2017-07-07T20:17:50","modified_gmt":"2017-07-08T01:17:50","slug":"apsu-student-white-wins-first-place-at-international-glass-and-optics-meeting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/2017\/07\/08\/apsu-student-white-wins-first-place-at-international-glass-and-optics-meeting\/","title":{"rendered":"APSU student White wins first place at international glass and optics meeting"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"AustinClarksville, TN<\/strong> – Held in Waikoloa, Hawaii, the 2017 Glass and Optical Materials Division Meeting (GOMD) of the Materials Ceramic Society was an international affair, attracting hundreds of scientists from over 25 countries.<\/p>\n

More than just a professional conference, GOMD also welcomed students from around the world, giving each a chance to learn from experts and discover the next steps in their academic and professional careers.<\/p>\n

\"APSU<\/a>

APSU chemistry major Maria White.<\/p><\/div>\n

By its nature, research is competitive, and GOMD\u2019s student poster competition is no different. Held each year, the competition provides students the chance to weigh their work against peers and attract the attention of major corporations, laboratories and graduate programs.<\/p>\n

This year, it was Austin Peay State University that turned heads as chemistry major Maria White received first place for her project.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have worked very hard on this project now for a long time, and (first place) means so much because this conference was exclusively for glass and ceramics and was full of experts,\u201d White said. \u201cI always say that I\u2019m not that interested in awards and honors and I do it because I love being in a lab, working on a problem and learning.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I will say I was secretly happy about winning.\u201d<\/p>\n

White\u2019s project, titled \u201cTechnological Aspects and Characterization of Solution-based Arsenic Selenide Thin Films,\u201d edged out projects from major universities, including UC Davis, Brigham Young, UCLA, as well as international universities from the UK, France, Turkey, Germany and Korea.<\/p>\n

A member of APSU\u2019s \u201cGlass Group,\u201d a partnership of physics and chemistry students conducting research on crystalline materials, White\u2019s work focused on preparing thin films of glass for use in infrared optics.<\/p>\n

\u201cObtaining the technological aspects to make arsenic-rich spin coated thin films took time and dedication,\u201d White said. \u201cI was able to obtain good quality films last summer and since then I have been bettering them, so now, we get good reliable and reproducible films.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first part (of the presentation) was the making of the films, and the second part was the analysis. We presented all aspects that we have been studying at the conference.\u201d<\/p>\n

White credited APSU physics professor Dr. Andriy Kovalskiy for preparing her to present her findings. Because she would be held to a high standard of examination, White said Kovalskiy\u2019s expertise reinforced her strengths \u2014 and ensured she could answer questions on unfamiliar concepts.<\/p>\n

Kovalskiy is one of a number of APSU Department of Physics and Astronomy faculty members who work alongside and mentor the APSU Glass Group. The longtime researcher and educator said that his student\u2019s success is the product of intense work \u2014 as well as the help of her fellow research teammates.<\/p>\n

\u201cStarting in the Spring 2016 semester, Maria spent hundreds of hours in the lab, optimizing quite complex technological process for spin-coating of these films and she finally got results which deserved international recognition,\u201d Kovalskiy said. \u201cHer award is also really a shared success of our entire group, including current physics majors Joshua Allen and Jonathan Bunton, as well as recent graduate Laura Nicholls.\u201d<\/p>\n

[320left]APSU physics professor Dr. Justin Oelgoetz works with White\u2019s Glass Group and said her GOMD experience will be valuable in both the immediate and long-term future of White\u2019s career.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think one of the big things is that it validates her role in the work,\u201d Oelgoetz said. \u201cThis award is the kind of thing that will be on her CV even after she has earned her Ph.D. She was talking to scientists from a number of R1 research universities and major corporations, and she was being compared to other students and graduate students from all over the world. This award tells us that they\u2019ve found her, and her efforts are among the best they\u2019ve seen.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although she will graduate from APSU with a degree in chemistry, White said her time working with Kovalskiy\u2019s Glass Group has opened her eyes to physics. The opportunity to conduct hands-on research as an undergraduate alongside experts in the field, White said, has prepared her for the future and given her opportunities she never considered possible.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe beauty about the physics department at APSU is that they treat students as graduate students. Our research is serious, and our professors are also serious about it,\u201d White said. \u201cI think the physics department is tremendous not just for their knowledge, but because they believe in their students. This is the kind of environment any student can succeed in, and I hope in my graduate years and beyond, I can learn from a group of people like the ones in the physics department at APSU.\u201d<\/p>\n

For more information on APSU\u2019s College of STEM, visit www.apsu.edu\/costem<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Clarksville, TN – Held in Waikoloa, Hawaii, the 2017 Glass and Optical Materials Division Meeting (GOMD) of the Materials Ceramic Society was an international affair, attracting hundreds of scientists from over 25 countries. More than just a professional conference, GOMD also welcomed students from around the world, giving each a chance to learn from experts […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5],"tags":[30613,23,26537,13778,262,30611,825,9797,9208,22298,29530,11092,1251,30614,30609,9939,30610,30612,18666,30608],"class_list":["post-24497","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community","tag-andriv-kovalskiy","tag-apsu","tag-apsu-department-of-physics-and-astronomy","tag-apsu-student","tag-austin-peay-state-university","tag-brigham-young","tag-clarksville-tn","tag-france","tag-germany","tag-jonathan-bunton","tag-joshua-allen","tag-justin-oelgoetz","tag-korea","tag-laura-nicholls","tag-maria-white","tag-turkey","tag-uc-davis","tag-ucla","tag-united-kingdom","tag-waikoloa-hi"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4xGYI-6n7","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24497","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24497"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24497\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24498,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24497\/revisions\/24498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24497"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24497"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24497"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}