30 graduate students from across Canada came to the University of Toronto (U of T) this month (June 2011) to spend nine days learning how to make nano-sized devices. From the June 22, 2011 news item on Nanowerk,
The summer institute was conceived by Professor Stewart Aitchison of electrical and computer engineering, and was hosted by U of T’s ECTI (Emerging Communications Technology Institute), which provides open research facilities for micro- and nanofabrication. Funding was received from the University’s Connaught Fund to foster connections and collaborations among students, postdoctoral fellows and other scholars.
In six three-hour lab sessions, students learned how to operate equipment and perform the processes crucial to fabricating nano-scale devices. Aju Jugessur, a senior research associate with the ECTI, was part of the planning committee for the summer institute, and helped develop the training sessions.
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The unique nature of the training is what attracted Rahul Lodha, a doctoral student in materials engineering from the University of British Columbia.
“I’m currently working with both micro- and nano-size particles, and what I’ve been doing is to add the nano-particles to micro-structures. What I’ve learned here is how to combine the two,” said Lodha. “What’s of great interest to me is how the properties of a material change when you get to the nano scale. Nano-titanium dioxide can be used for water purification, because when regular light hits it, ultra-violet rays are emitted in the range required to purify water. But regular sized titanium dioxide by itself doesn’t do this.”