The National Science Foundation's Materials Research Science and Engineering Centers Program Looking Back, Moving Forward (2007) / Chapter Skim
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1 Introduction
1 Introduction
Pages 29-44
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From page 29... ...
The many remarkable technologies that are now part of daily life are enabled by newly developed materials, including transistors and memory devices, artificial body parts that extend useful life for the physically impaired, high-strength concrete enabling modern construction, lightweight materials enabling air travel, and many, many more. How did these materials come to be available and where do we expect the next generation of materials to emerge from?
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From page 30... ...
• Support for shared experimental facilities, properly staffed, equipped and main tained, and accessible to users from the Center, the participating organizations, and other organizations and sectors. Each MRSEC has the responsibility to manage and evaluate its own operation with respect to program administration, planning, content and direction.1 1National Science Foundation, Program Solicitation for Materials Research Science and Engineering Centers, NSF 04-580, Washington, D.C., 2004.
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The process of development and transition to market is a complex story, but underlying it is the materials research and development supporting the invention and fabrication of such new materials. • Materials research -- The subject of the MRSEC program technical agenda is the study of materials.
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suggested that the United States adopt the principle of being among the world leaders in all major fields of science so that it could quickly apply and extend advances in science wherever they occur. In addition, the report recommended that the United States maintain clear leadership in fields that are tied to national objectives, that capture the imagination of society, or that have a multiplicative effect on other scientific advances.
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From page 33... ...
• MSE research continues to provide solutions to problems in health care with the development of new materials for the delivery of life-saving drugs and new implant technologies. • MSE research is producing advanced materials solutions for more efficient energy-production and -transmission systems.
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In the autumn of 1971, Douglas Osheroff, a graduate student of David Lee, while studying how his Pomeranchuk refrigerator worked, discovered a kink in a curve of the melting pressure in the cell versus time. This kink was found to be extremely reproducible, and Osheroff and his mentors realized that it was the signa ture of some highly reproducible phase transition within this mixture of liquid and solid 3He.
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From page 35... ...
The solid signal did not move, but the liquid signal shifted continuously to higher and higher frequencies, until they saw the pressure signature of the B transition, at which point the liquid signal disappeared as it moved back under the much larger solid signal. Clearly, both the A and B transitions were in the liquid, and the ordered liquid exhibited very strange NMR properties.
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From page 36... ...
As an element of the NSF portfolio in the Division of Materials Research, the MRSEC program is necessarily tasked to advance the frontiers of research in ma terials research science and engineering. 2National Science Foundation, "National Science Foundation Strategic Plan," http://www.nsf.gov/ nsf/nsfpubs/straplan/vision.htm.
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. Searching for some structure that would distinguish these block-funded, locally managed entities from the individual research on similar topics funded by the Foundation, NSF instituted the idea of Materials Research Laboratories (MRLs)
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. NSF's NSEC program is more similar to the MRSEC program, al though the 5-year award can be renewed only once.
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concept of materials centers was motivated by perceived national needs in materials that were unlikely to be met by the "stovepipe" mentality that resulted from departmental and college organizational structures. IDLs were created as one of the earliest elements of the present-day Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)
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The biotechnology centers have an aggregate funding level of $131 million, representing an average per center level of funding similar to that of the MRSEC program (29 centers, $52 million)
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Centers for 1995 2 7.07 6.39 6.46 0.07 1.1 Analysis and Synthesis Chemistry Centers 1998 6 3.00 1.48 3.00 1.52 102.7 Earthquake 1988 3 6.00 6.00 -- –6.00 –100.0 Engineering Research Centers Engineering 1985 19 62.31 63.42 62.79 –0.63 –1.0 Research Centers Materials Research 1994 29 52.41 53.66 55.70 2.04 3.8 Science and Engineering Centers Nanoscale Science 2001 15 36.40 37.21 37.35 0.14 0.4 and Engineering Centers Science and 1987 13 49.65 62.38 67.48 5.10 8.2 Technology Centers Science of 2003 4 19.83 22.71 27.00 4.29 18.9 Learning Centers Total 91 236.67 253.25 259.78 6.53 2.6 NOTE: Totals may not add due to rounding. SOURCE: National Science Foundation, FY 2006 Budget Request to Congress, Washington, D.C., p.
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From page 42... ...
($ millions) Participantsd Percentage NSF Support Centers for 4 20 7 2 736 28.6 105.1 Analysis and Synthesis Chemistry 53 19 3 4 269 133.3 89.7 Centers Earthquake 65 155 6 10 1,130 166.7 188.3 Engineering Research Centers Engineering 280 482 62 72 8,310 115.6 133.4 Research Centers Materials 103 325 52 42 5,274 80.1 100.6 Research Science and Engineering Centers Nanoscale 130 269 36 16 1,630 44.0 44.8 Science and Engineering Centers Science and 94 306 50 28 2,118 56.4 42.7 Technology Centers Science of 20 11 20 8 366 40.3 18.5 Learning Centers Total 749 1,587 237 182 19,833 76.9 83.8 NOTE: Statistics reported for Science and Technology Centers are for 2004 only.
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From page 43... ...
By contrast with the NSF MRSEC program, these MURIs do not require expenditures on equipment or outreach. 6The III-V notation refers to chemical compounds, typically metal oxide in nature, formed with elements from the third and fifth columns of the Periodic Table of the Elements.
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From page 44... ...
LOOKING FORWARD The MRSEC program is the latest stage in the evolutionary development of group research in materials funded by the National Science Foundation. The chal lenge faced by this study committee was to examine the health of this program after more than a decade in the present mode and to suggest opportunities for improvements as NSF contemplates the next stage in this evolution.
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