• UC Plans for $300 Million in Cuts in 2003-04
  • Volleyball Star to Keynote Sports Day
  • Chancellor Approves More Parking Changes
  • Car Pool Permits Slashed to $17
  • JASON to Explore Channel Isles
  • New Center Aids Defense Sector
  • Science, Religion Studies Can Build Vital Bridges
  • Templeton Lecture Series Set for 2003
  • Rev. Martin Luther King Remembered
  • Researchers Probe Ocean Bacteria
  • United Way Brings Back Browniegrams
  • Campus Contract and Grant Awards
  • Campus Notes
  • Calendar
  • Credits
    •

    New Center Aids Defense Sector

    A Center for Nanoscience Innovation for Defense (CNID) has been created with components on three UC campuses to promote the rapid transition of nanoscience research innovations into applications for the defense sector. It is headed by UCSB physicists David Awschalom and Andrew Cleland.
    UCSB, UCLA, and UC Riverside are sharing federal funding of $13.5 million equally. A second increment is anticipated that will ultimately bring total funding to more than $20 million over three years. CNID is sponsored by two federal agencies: the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and Defense MicroElectronics Activity.
    Awschalom, who also directs the UCSB Center for Spintronics and Quantum Information Processing, spearheaded establishment of the new center. Additional participants include the UC-managed national labs (particularly Los Alamos), and 10 industrial partners.
    UCSB and UCLA two years ago formed the California NanoSystems Institute (CNSI), under whose administrative umbrella the new center will operate. State money is being used principally to build a CNSI research facility at each of the two campuses. The CNID money will equip these facilities with state-of-the-art instrumentation. It will also fund graduate fellowships that will enable UC to attract the best graduate students worldwide, according to Awschalom.
    "CNID will act as a conduit," he said, "through which industrial partners can recruit highly trained students in the areas of nanoscale science and engineering, and will allow students to obtain contact with 'real world' research and development."