New committees aim to increase size of ASME's nanotech community

ASME's Nanotechnology Institute launched five new committees at the International Mechanical Engineering Congress last November. The chairs and co-chairs of these committees have been selected. However, the Institute is still looking for ASME members with an interest in nanotechnology to join their community.

The five new committees cover the areas of education, nanomanufacturing, devices and systems, nanoscale phenomena, and government/venture/social impact. Leaders of these newly formed committees represent a number of ASME technical divisions, said Arun Majumdar, chair of the Nanotechnology Institute Advisory Board.

Pamela Norris of the University of Virginia is chair of the Education Committee, which was formed to develop an educational infrastructure and delivery system in the area of nanoscale science, engineering and technology. Gang Bao of Georgia Tech and Emory University and Vinayak Dravid of Northwestern University are the committee's co-chairs.

The Nanomanufacturing Committee, which aims to foster the growth of manufacturing techniques related to nanotechnology such as synthesis and integration, is being chaired by Margaret Blohm of the General Electric Co. The committee co-chairs are Steven Girshick of the University of Minnesota, S.V. Sreenivasan of Molecular Imprints Inc. and the University of Texas at Austin, and Vanita Mani of the General Electric Co.

Chang-Jin (C.J.) Kim of the University of California, Los Angeles, is the chair of the Devices and Systems Committee. This committee will focus on functional devices and systems that exploit nanoscale phenomena. Systems of interest include energy, information and biomedical technologies. Mark Shannon of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Ken Goodson, from Cooligy Inc. and Stanford University, are the committee's co-chairs.

The new Nanoscale Phenomena Committee will concern itself with the fundamental understanding of nanoscale science that could have relevance in engineering, in areas such as solid/fluid mechanics, heat transfer, thermodynamics and materials. Gang Chen of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology chairs the committee. Zhigang Suo of Harvard University and Kenny Breuer of Brown University are the co-chairs of the committee.

The fifth new nanotechnology group, the Government/Venture/Social Impact Committee, was developed to encourage communication and contact between the science/engineering communities and government, private investment and media. Tom Kalil of the University of California, Berkeley, is the committee's chair. Tom Mackin of the University of Illinois, Rosalyn Berne of the University of Virginia and Kitu Bindra of the law firm Burns Doane are co-chairing the committee.

To learn more, visit www.nanotechnologyinstitute.org, or contact Raj Manchanda, (212) 591-7789, e-mail manchandar@asme.org.

 

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