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November 5, 2008
UPTON, NY — Ning Zhang, a
graduate student at Stony Brook University’s Department of
Materials Science and Engineering, has won the fourth annual
Dr. Mow Shiah Lin Scholarship. The Asian Pacific American
Association at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven
National Laboratory initiated the scholarship, which
consists of $1,000 and a plaque, to honor the distinguished
late Brookhaven Lab scientist for which it is named.
“My deep and sincere
gratitude goes to Dr. Lin’s family and to all others who
made this scholarship possible,” Zhang said. “My career goal
is to become a research scientist like Dr. Lin at an
institute like Brookhaven Lab.”
Mow Shiah Lin began his
career at Brookhaven Lab in 1975 as a postdoctoral fellow
and advanced to co-lead a research team working with an
environmental remediation company to use selected bacteria
to convert toxic oil wastes, such as used motor oils, into
useful products. In 2001, Lin shared the R&D 100 Award,
given by R&D Magazine to the top 100 technological
achievements of the year, for a technology to recover silica
from geothermal brine. Lin died suddenly due to a brain
aneurysm at the height of his career in 2003, and his
coworkers, friends and family contributed funds to establish
the scholarship.
In honor of Lin’s
research, achievements and inventions, the scholarship is
granted annually to an Asian immigrant with a student visa
who is matriculating toward a graduate degree at an
accredited institution of higher education in environmental
and energy technology, biology, or chemistry, in remembrance
of the manner in which Lin began his career.
Ning Zhang earned a B.S.
in materials science in 2006 from Fudan University,
Shanghai, China. Later that same year, he came to Stony
Brook University, where he expects to earn his Ph.D. in
materials science by 2010.
At the ceremony, Zhang
gave a talk on “Defect Structures in Silicon Carbide.” He
explained that silicon carbide is gradually replacing
conventional semiconductor materials, such as silicon and
gallium arsenide. Silicon carbide eventually may be used in
the photvoltaic solar panels in spacecraft, high-power
electronic devices in electric vehicles, and power devices
in the public electric power distribution system, which
would result in greater efficiency and energy savings in
each of these applications. Defects in the material can
cause negative effects in its performance and yield. Zhang
studies these defects at the atomic level at Brookhaven’s
National Synchrotron Light Source and at the Advanced Photon
Source at DOE’s Argonne National Laboratory in Chicago,
Illinois.
http://www.bnl.gov/bnlweb/pubaf/pr/PR_display.asp?prID=861&template=Today
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