Mussel-inspired adhesion has much to teach about the chemistry and processing of polymers and provides a glimpse of some remarkable physical properties exhibited by this complex fluid. . Mussel adhesive processing has been mimicked by Waite, Tirrell and Israelachvili mixing a recombinant mussel adhesive protein (MAP) with hyaluronic acid (HA) to form a fluid coacervate. Significantly, these unique materials were shown to be shear-thinning,

The Renewable Energy MRSEC at the Colorado School of Mines held a ten week Research Experiences for Undergraduates program on renewable energy in which over half of the 20 students were women.

The Renewable Energy MRSEC at the Colorado School of Mines in collaboration with the outreach division at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory held a two week workshop for math and science teachers from public school catering to under-represented minorities.  The teachers were given hands-on experiences for projects in renewable energy to incorporate into their lesson plans.  

Silicon nanoparticles are promising new materials for photovoltaic applications that combine materials property tunability on the nanoscale with silicon’s established performance in photovoltaics. We have succeeded in synthesizing crystalline silicon nanoparticles in a continuous flow plasma reactor and established control over particle size. By carefully tuning the plasma parameters, we have synthesized particles with radial precision of a couple atomic layers and characterized them structurally and optically.

The Renewable Energy MRSEC at the Colorado School of Mines was instrumental in establishing a renewable energy undergraduate minor  that is unique because it features both a renewable energy track and a traditional energy track.  This approach is important because both types of energy will be important for the foreseeable future.