Nanonews November 2009
WORDS FROM THE DIRECTOR
Over the last 12 months I detected a substantial public interest in nanoscience and nanotechnology. This gave us the opportunity to be present in a number of glossy magazines as well as in some local newspapers and newsletters. Our research is being observed with interest by the political authorities, companies and educational institutions. In order to meet this demand for information about the background of the buzzword nano we intensified our pro-active engagement in outreach activities. In addition, our network of collaborating companies is growing steadily, emphasizing an important and continuous interest from industry. Next year, the University will celebrate its 550th birthday and an staggering number of outreach activities are planned. I'm looking forward to a still growing awareness of our visibility and a lot of interesting discussions with our visitors.
Best regards
Christian Schönenberger
REVIEW PANEL
The next visit of the NCCR Review Panel will take place on 27 and 28 April 2010. Please make a note of these important dates in your agenda.
EVENTS
Nanu? Nano!
On Saturday,12 September, the "Museum Baselland", at Liestal, invited the public to another topical Saturday event, this time focussed on nanoscience. Far more than 150 guests arrived, instead of the expected 30-50. Among the 6 speakers were 4 professors of the SNI: Hans-Joachim Güntherodt, Christian Schönenberger, Dominik Zumbühl and Dagmar Klostermeier.
With the help of our highly motivated Nano-students we also organized an attractive kids program with a variety of creative and exploratory lab works dealing with nano in the widest sense. The kids assembled small particles together to bigger "molecules" and investigated the properties of the resulting "material" or just play in the nano-sandbox where sand never gets wet.
Café Scientifique
Once a month, the University of Basel organizes a Café Scientifique, a round-table discussion on recent progress in research, followed by an open discussion between the scientists and the guests. Beside the talks and the discussion forum there is a kids lab in the adjacent building, where the kids are introduced to the topic by a hands-on approach.
On 11th october 2009 the Café scientifique dealt with CERN. The SNI was invited for the hands-on part where we built colliders for glass marbles.
Science Days
It already has become a tradition that we participate in Germany's biggest annual science festival, the science days in Rust. The topic of this year's event was the climate change and future technologies for energy production. We presented recent progress of nanotechnology in the production of cheap and resistant solar cells based upon flexible organic material.
We are proud that representatives of the Science Days scientific council were so much impressed that they will try to make nanotechnology the big overall topic of the Science Days 2010. We are invited to write a letter of intent and to meet the head of the council in order to defend nanotechnology as an upcoming topic in December. The search for sponsors has already started and we are well prepared. Now, we await the scientific council's decision with great anticipation.
TecD@y an der Kantonsschule Reussbühl
Already for the 4th time, the SNI participated in an SATW Tecd@y. The module on Nanomedicine presented by Meret Hornstein and Tibor Gyalog was totally overbooked. Proof that the interest of the pupils in present research in the field as well as in the future of medicine in our daily life, was enormous. The Tecd@ys are a wonderful instrument to bring some of our fascination about science into classrooms. There are another 7 Tecd@ys to come until December 2010 and we are hopefully invited to participate.
ERASMUS ABKOMMEN UNTERZEICHNET
Das ERASMUS-Programm, ein Unterprogramm des EU-Bildungsprogrammes "Sokrates", unterstützt unter anderem die studentische Mobilität zwischen europäischen Hochschulen. Die Schweiz beteiligt sich mit ihren Universitäten als so genannter "Silent Partner" an diesem Programm, in dessen Rahmen die Nanowissenschaften derzeit Partnerschaften mit der TU Delft (Niederlande) und der Universität Aarhus (Dänemark) unterhalten. Von diesen Verträgen, die ständig erweitert werden, können die Studierenden unseres Studienganges profitieren.
Die Vorteile studentischer Mobilität sind bekannt: Durch ein Auslandstudium kann man den eigenen Horizont erweitern, andere Lebens- und Lernformen kennen lernen, fachliche Kontakte knüpfen und Freundschaften schliessen. Je nach gewähltem Ziel kann man die eigenen Fremdsprachenkenntnisse erweitern oder perfektionieren. Das Leben und Studieren in einer neuen Umgebung zu organisieren verhilft zu vielen praktischen Erfahrungen, die sich später als nützlich erweisen. Im weiteren Studium sowie im Beruf sind die im Ausland erworbenen Schlüsselqualifikationen hilfreich und können ein Plus bei Bewerbungen sein.
Mehr...
NEW SNI MEMBERS
We are happy to welcome our new SNI members:
Since 01.09.2009:
Dennis Weber
Since 01.10.2009:
Prof. Dr. Richard Warburton
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