February 2012 - BNC-all - ecn.purdue.edu

Reminder: Prof. Shakouri NSAC/NCN Seminar on February 15, 2012
by Black, Nancy Lee 15 Feb '12

15 Feb '12

NSAC/NCN Seminar Series 2012 Title: Nano solutions to our impending energy crisis Abstract: In this talk we review some of the advances in nanoscale energy conversion devices and discuss about the challenges and opportunities to provide a clean energy infrastructure. Couple of examples from solar and thermoelectric materials, devices and systems will be given and the scale of the necessary change will be discussed. Speaker: Prof. Ali Shakouri, Director, Birck Nanotechnology Center Date/time: Wednesday, February 15, 2012 , 12:00 PM-1:00 PM at Birck 1001 Refreshment will served. Hope to see you there today. Nancy Black Secretary Birck Nanotechnology Center 1205 West State Street West Lafayette, IN 47907-2057 (765) 494-8675 Email: blackn(a)purdue.edu

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FW: Hot Chocolate Event - Today @ 2
by Black, Nancy Lee 14 Feb '12

14 Feb '12

Dear graduate students, staff and faculty at Birck: The Nanotechnology Student Advisory Council would like to invite you once again for Hot Chocolate today at 2PM in the kitchen. Come to relax and chat for a few minutes while drinking some delicious hot chocolate. We hope to see you there! Alfredo NSAC Treasurer [images/cleardot.gif] -- PhD Candidate Purdue University School of Mechanical Engineering Birck Nanotechnology Center 1205 West State Street (Office 2234) West Lafayette, IN 47907-2057 973.462.6810

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Lights on in the parking lot
by Totten, Mary J 14 Feb '12

14 Feb '12

There is a red Chevy HR with Florida plates in the west parking lot with their lights on. Thank you, Mary Jo Totten Building Logistics Coordinator Birck Nanotechnology Center Purdue University/Discovery Park 1205 W. State Street West Lafayette, IN 47907-2057 765-496-1173 "Individually, we are one drop. Together, we are an ocean." -Ryunosuke Satoro

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Updated Birck Operations Policy
by Shakouri, Ali 13 Feb '12

13 Feb '12

Dear All, As we move forward together here at the Birck Nanotechnology Center we are implementing a series of operational changes that are designed to promote increased staff-student collaboration and to reward student processing excellence. At the same time we also want to implement additional educational initiatives that will provide a broader processing background that can be tailored to the specific needs of students from a variety of engineering and scientific disciplines. The changes, effective March 1st, 2012, are as follows: (1) Each resident faculty at Birck will receive 8 free hours of "technical staff" time per fiscal year to help with their research projects in the cleanroom and/or laboratories. Faculty who are heavy users will get an additional 8 hours for every $100K they spend in recharge. This will be tracked in Coral and reported monthly. (2) Super Users will be identified by our Engineering Staff members for each of the main tools in the cleanroom and labs. The role of a Super User is to help train new students and assist staff members. Super User status will be evaluated on a month-by-month basis. If the Super Users spend at least 6 hours supporting staff they will receive double reservation time for their own equipment use during the month, and free monthly lab or cleanroom access (depending on where their tool is located). This also will be tracked using Coral and reported monthly. (3) Prior to starting a process in the cleanroom, new students will present a 15min summary of their proposed research to key staff members. Ron Reger will lead this activity and appoint the staff members who will participate in this review process. Also, as process problems arise, please contact Ron directly via e-mail or in person to discuss the problem. He and his staff will be happy to assist you in solving the problem and/or providing alternative solutions. (4) We are revamping our processing class to appeal to a broader user base: EE, ME, Physics, Chemistry, and Biology. This will become a required class for every student who will need access to the Birck cleanroom. This class will include both theory and hands on work in the cleanroom so that students will be ready to do great processing after they have taken this class. Our plan is to eventually have this class accepted as one of the elective graduate classes in all the appropriate departments. Please note that this initiative will take more time to fully implement as new course material must be created. (5) If students are careless and don't follow procedures and break any equipment or contaminate it, their advisor will be charged for the staff time needed to re-train the student. We realize that mistakes happen and this is part of the learning process, but repeated gross negligence will result in retraining charges. These retraining charges will be assessed when students misuse the equipment on a repeated basis after a written warning to the student and his/her advisor has been ignored. This affects all of the users of the cleanroom and their productivity. (6) For repeated "major" safety, procedural, and/or citizenship issues (misuse of equipment, not using Coral to log in, or a behavior which will put other students in danger), technical staff manager and director can and will forbid access to the cleanroom for one week or longer, depending on the severity of the action. (7) Recharge billings are distributed monthly to faculty for approval. We are working to make sure that all expenses are reported in a timely fashion. However, on the other hand, some bills remain unapproved for several months. This causes a problem with understanding and tracking budget performance throughout the year. The new procedure will continue to provide monthly billings to faculty, but if these go unapproved or unchallenged for a period of one month, payment will automatically be processed. Thank you all for supporting our initiatives. Together we can improve the educational experience of our student researchers and continue to provide a world-class research environment and experience. I welcome your comments and suggestions. Best regards, Ali Ali Shakouri Mary Jo and Robert L. Kirk Director Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering Birck Nanotechnology Center, Room 1027 Purdue University 1205 West State Street West Lafayette, IN 47907-2057 (765) 496-6105; Fax: (765) 496-8299 shakouri(a)purdue.edu

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Birck Social
by Me 09 Feb '12

09 Feb '12

Dear Birck Friends, You are invited to enjoy an evening with your colleagues hosted by NSAC, the Nanotechnology Student Advisory Council! Where: Buffalo Wild Wings, 360 Brown St, across from W. Lafayette movie theater When: Thurs, Feb 9th, 5:30 PM Who: ALL Birck staff, faculty, students, and family Food is subsidized by NSAC. See you there, Drew Candebat NSAC Committee Search: NSAC Purdue

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Possible telephone outage tomorrow
by Totten, Mary J 08 Feb '12

08 Feb '12

We are informing you that there will be a potential 3 minute outage of telephone service for a small portion of your building telephones on Thursday morning, February 9th, between 6am and 6:15am when software changes are made to the University telephone switch. Thank you, Mary Jo Totten Building Logistics Coordinator Birck Nanotechnology Center Purdue University/Discovery Park 1205 W. State Street West Lafayette, IN 47907-2057 765-496-1173

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Hot Chocolate at 2PM (BRK Kitchen)
by Alfredo Tuesta 07 Feb '12

07 Feb '12

Dear graduate students, staff and faculty at Birck: The Nanotechnology Student Advisory Council would like to invite you once again for Hot Chocolate today at 2PM in the kitchen. Come to relax and chat for a few minutes while drinking some delicious hot chocolate. We hope to see you there! Alfredo NSAC Treasurer -- PhD Candidate Purdue University School of Mechanical Engineering Birck Nanotechnology Center 1205 West State Street (Office 2234) West Lafayette, IN 47907-2057 973.462.6810

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Parking restrictions on Airport Road
by Weaver, John R 03 Feb '12

03 Feb '12

Dear BNC Community - I was approached by several people about the restriction of parking on Airport Road, and the inconvenience that posed to those working in the BNC. I contacted Parking Services about the issue, and received the following reply from Holly Alexander, who is in charge of parking at the university. Following are key excerpts from her reply. Please note that she has made the option of a "C" permit available to certain students who have parking needs that they can't otherwise accomplish. John John R. Weaver Facility Manager Birck Nanotechnology Center Purdue University (765) 494-5494 jrweaver(a)purdue.edu Airport Road is a state road and parking should never have been allowed there. Over the years, it was overlooked as Purdue owns the land on both sides of it. Parking was manageable then. With the onset of the 231 project, the traffic has increased in this area. Also with the new permit requirement at the airport this year, some students that didn't want to buy a permit, also started parking on Airport Road. It has become a safety concern and Chief John Cox decided it was time to have the state sign the road as No Parking during the peak traffic hours. The parking was getting out of hand as with no signage, people were parking anywhere. (frontwards, backwards, sideways) There was no order and no ability to enforce without the signage. If students have a real need for a C permit (and live too close) I do write exceptions for those. I require a letter from the student and/or the advisor/professor. If there are no other solutions, I'll allow them to purchase a permit if they live within the 1.5 mile boundary. Students may also ride CityBus for free by showing their Purdue ID. Some students now ride Citybus to campus and home at the end of the day and then bring their car back to campus to park free after 5:00 if they need to be on campus late/later. The bottom line is that campus visitors/Fac/Staff/Students need a permit to park on campus unless they park in the Grant Street garage (pay garage) or use a meter.

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