Statewide nanotechnology partnership wins $600,000 NSF Grant

By Anne Buckley

The Virginia Partnership for Nanotechnology Education and Workforce Development, which includes the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Engineering, has received a National Science Foundation grant to offer distance-learning graduate degree and certificate programs.

The newly formed partnership received a “Partnerships for Innovation” grant that totals $600,000, which will enable it to offer the opportunity to students at six Virginia universities and to engineers in the workplace.

The Virginia Partnership for Nanotechnology and Workforce Development is a collaboration of the engineering institutions at VCU, the College of William and Mary, George Mason University, Old Dominion University, the University of Virginia and Virginia Tech.

The Partnership builds upon the state’s Commonwealth Graduate Engineering Program and the Virginia Microelectronics Consortium. CGEP was founded in 1984 to offer distance-learning engineering education at the master’s level. The consortium was founded in the mid-1990s to support development of the microelectronics industry in Virginia through collaborations between universities and the corporate community.

The partnership will begin offering graduate-level engineering classes in the spring of 2007.  Distance-learning courses will be organized around five educational tracks: nanomanufacturing; nanomaterials and characterization; nanomodeling and simulation; nanoelectronics; and nanobiotechnology.

In addition to contributing courses for use in traditional graduate degree programs, the partnership will also offer opportunities for working professionals in the field of engineering to study only the specific aspects of nanotechnology that interest them. By completing a sequence of four to five classes in a specific area of nanotechnology, i.e., nanoelectronics, professionals can earn a certificate in a program that may not have been taught when they went to school. 

Corporate partners for the program include Qimonda, formerly Infineon Technologies;  Luna Innovations; Materials Modification; Micron Technology; NanoSonic; NanoTitan; Northrop Grumman – Newport News; and Philip Morris.

“Qimonda’s focus on innovation, such as our cutting-edge semiconductor wafer fabs in Richmond, requires a workforce that is creative and passionate in delivering new memory solutions to market,” said Henry Becker, president, Qimonda North America.  “A strong engineering talent pool in Virginia will ensure both our company’s future success as well as economic development for the region, and we are committed to continuing our strong collaboration with local universities to support these types of programs.”

Terry Leslie, manager of university and academic relations at Micron Technology Virginia and member of the Virginia Research and Technology Advisory Commission, said Micron’s “partnerships in education and technology with individual universities, such as Virginia Commonwealth University, are critical to our success, but a joint collaboration with all of the major Virginia universities on nanotechnology education and workforce development brings incredible leverage to Micron Technology and other companies in the Commonwealth."