COLLEGE STATION, Texas - Dr. Xinghang Zhang, assistant professor in Texas A&M University's Department of Mechanical Engineering and a researcher in the Texas Engineering Experiment Station, has received the National Science Foundation's Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) award for his research into thin films.

The prestigious award - a minimum $400,000 grant over five years - is intended to advance his research and teaching.

By his research, Zhang plans on strengthening polycrystalline, metallic thin films through growth of twin crystals, an action termed twinning, with few nanometers between the twin crystals. It may affect the manufacturing of electronics, micro-electro-mechanical systems, nano-electro-mechanical systems and semiconductors.

Zhang intends to involve his undergraduate and graduate students; faculty members and undergraduate and graduate students from minority-serving institutions; and high-school teachers in his research. In addition, he plans on developing instructional materials for undergraduate and graduate students, and putting together a Web site that features his research and teaching.

Zhang joined the Department of Mechanical Engineering in 2005 after a postdoctoral fellowship with the Los Alamos National Laboratory. He earned his bachelor's from Jilin University in Changchun, China; his master's from the Institute of Metal Research in the Chinese Academy of Sciences; and his doctorate from North Carolina State University.

For more information, contact

Source: Dr. Xinghang Zhang
979/845-2143

zhangx@tamu.edu

Reporter: Susan E. Cotton
s-cotton@tamu.edu
(979) 845-7147

News Story 1431, March 8, 2007

Direct page link:
http://engineeringnews.tamu.edu/news/1431

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