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The 1996 summer students. From left to right, front row: Aomawa
Baker, Becky Lamkin,.Lourdes Rodríguez, Nina Menezes, Dona Hertel,
Lymari Castro; back row: Dave Goldbrenner, Matt Schwartz, Luis Wilkes, Cindy
Hancox, César Tavárez, Sven Schrecker. Photo by Tony Acevedo.
Typically, the Arecibo summer student program receives applications from many more talented undergraduates than the program can accommodate. For the summer of 1996, we had a record number of applications (two hundred) for ten REU positions.
We continue to stress outreach to Puerto Rican science and engineering students. This summer we were happy to include four excellent Puerto Rican students as summer students besides two Puerto Rican graduate students, José Salgado and Antonio Algaze, who are doing their thesis research with Observatory staff. We also invited interested students and faculty from the University of Puerto Rico campuses to attend some of the summer student colloquia. This has proven an effective means of involving local science students in the program.
Aomawa Baker (Mass. Inst. Tech., adviser Mike Nolan) explored various mechanisms for the resurfacing of Europa, using an impact simulation model, once used to test ballistic missile impacts at Los Alamos.
Lymari Castro (Univ. Puerto Rico-Mayagüez, adviser Edgar Castro) characterized various types of fiber optic cable to be used for signal transfer with the new Gregorian feed, and made recommendations as to the best ones to use at each stage.
David Goldbrenner (Harvard Univ., advisers Edgar Castro and Angel Vásquez) compared the relative accuracies over time of several clock standards that will be used in future pulsar and VLBI observations.
Cindy Hancox (Univ. Cal.-Berkeley, adviser Murray Lewis) developed an algorithm to more accurately measure velocities of narrow spectral-line features and applied this algorithm to supergiant stars with strong OH masers to study the variation of their line structure with time.
Dona Hertel (W. Wash. Univ., adviser Sixto Gonzáles) constructed a Web-based real-time data monitor for the Arecibo atmospheric radar that can display the results of, for example, the World Day experiments.
Rebecca Lamkin (Rutgers Univ., adviser Brett Isham) analyzed the chirped plasma-line data set collected during several Arecibo and EISCAT experiments. The objective of this work was to understand the details of the Langmuir dispersion relation for both the naturally occurring and the HF-enhanced plasma lines.
Nina Menezes (Cornell Univ., adviser Paul Castleberg) studied the wavelength dependence of scattering by stratospheric aerosols.
Lourdes Rodríguez (Univ. Metropolitana, adviser Susan Nossal) developed a means to access the TIME-GCM model atmosphere that runs on the NCAR supercomputer. She built the local interface through a Web page and set up the structure to display the model results at Arecibo.
Sven Schrecker (San Diego St. Univ., adviser Jo Ann Eder) studied the environments of dwarf irregular galaxies to test theories of dwarf galaxy formation.
Matthew Schwartz (Univ. Penn., adviser Jo Ann Eder) designed a 3-D computer simulation of a flight through the Pisces-Perseus supercluster using the positions in space of approximately 5000 galaxies derived from 21-cm Arecibo measurements.
César Tavárez (Univ. Puerto Rico-Mayagüez, advisers Tapasi Ghosh, Edgar Castro, and Rey Vélez) studied the RFI environment at the Observatory, using data accumulated over the past year.
Luis Wilkes (Univ. Puerto Rico-Humacao, adviser Kiriaki Xilouris) investigated the multifrequency pulse-to-pulse intensity modulation for strong pulsars, as well as the manner in which individual pulse profiles combine to form a stable integrated profile.
Applications are now being accepted for the 1997 Arecibo summer student program. Ten or eleven visiting research assistantships in the fields of radar and radio astronomy, and atmospheric science will be awarded. The assistantships include a stipend and round-trip air transportation between San Juan, Puerto Rico and the student's home or school address in the U.S. This ten-week program is sponsored by the National Science Foundation.
ELIGIBILITY: Undergraduate student participants must be citizens or permanent residents of the United States and must be enrolled in a degree program (part-time or full-time) leading to a bachelor's degree. NAIC also anticipates funding for one additional unrestricted position to be awarded to an applicant who will be a first- or second-year graduate student in the academic year 1997-98.
RESPONSIBILITIES: Students will work with the Observatory's scientific staff, participating in research projects such as searches for pulsars, studies of galaxies, giant stars, or the interstellar medium, investigations of the neutral and ionized parts of the Earth's atmosphere, and studies of the surfaces of asteroids, planets and planetary satellites.
APPLICATIONS: For an application packet write to:
Office of the Director, NAIC
Space Sciences Building
Cornell University
Ithaca, NY 14853-6801
or to: morrison@astrosun.tn.cornell.edu.
Applications, including three academic references, official transcripts, and a statement describing interest and relevant experience must be received no later than February 15, 1997. Successful applicants will be notified around March 1, 1997.
Copyright 1996, Cornell University
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