The Department of NanoEngineering (NE) now offers the M.S. and Ph.D. degree in NanoEngineering with a new, unique curriculum centered on our strong research position in nano-biomedical engineering and nanomaterials synthesis and characterization activities. The NanoEngineering Graduate Program provides a course of study for both the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees, with a focus on underlying scientific, technical and engineering challenges for advancing nanotechnology in the controlled synthesis of nanostructured materials, especially for biomedical, energy, and environmentally-related technologies. Our graduate degree program is uniquely designed to educate students with a highly interdisciplinary curriculum, focusing on core scientific fundamentals, but extending the application of that fundamental understanding to complex problems requiring the ability to integrate across traditional science and engineering boundaries. Specific courses in our core cluster address both the fundamental science and the integration of this science into engineering problem solving. Three main educational paths within the single degree title ‘NanoEngineering’ are proposed:
- Biomedical Nanotechnology
- Molecular and Nanomaterials
- Nanotechnologies for Energy and the Environment
The new NE curriculum has the following objectives:
- Prepare students for nanotechnology by providing them with a sound grounding in multidisciplinary areas of nanoscience and nanoscale engineering
- Increase students' understanding of materials and their properties at the atomic and nanometer level, including an understanding of the intimate relationship between material scale (nanostructure) and the properties/functionality of materials
- Prepare graduates who, while skilled in areas of nanoscience and nanoengineering, will be qualified for jobs in traditional science-based industries and government laboratories and, as the nanotechnologies emerge and mature, will be positioned for jobs in these applied areas. This program will be anticipating trends and providing students with integrated, cross-disciplinary scientific knowledge and professional skills
- Educate a new generation of engineers who can participate in, and indeed seed, new high-technology companies that will be the key to maintaining jobs, wealth and educational infrastructures as nanotechnology results in a new industrial revolution
- Enable the students to develop a range of professional, scientific and computational skills that will enhance employment opportunities in a wide range of industrial and governmental institutions
- Prepare students for the workplace through developing their ability to contribute constructively to multidisciplinary teams, learn team engineering principles and methods, to communicate both orally and in written form, and to be familiar with modern, computer-based communication technology. This will be achieved using non-traditional education techniques including group-based problem-based learning, flexible delivery and web-based interactive tutorials.
In NanoEngineering, we design and manufacture devices and systems that exploit the unique properties of nanoscale materials to create entirely new functionality and capabilities. Due to the scale of engineering involved, the field of NanoEngineering is inherently interdisciplinary that often utilizes biochemical processes to create nanoscale materials designed to interact with synthetic inorganic materials. The curriculum is built to address the educational needs of this new engineering field.