By Amanda Olavarria

The UConn MRS Student Chapter hosted a Welcome Event for new MSE graduate students at Grille 86 in downtown Storrs as part of their graduate student orientation. This new event, initiated by Director for Graduate Studies Professor Bryan Huey, provides students time to mingle and get to know one another before the semester takes off.

MRS chapter president Gyuho Song and his fellow officers helped make the event a great success. New and current students alike gave positive feedback and were pleased to have attended. One student stated, “It was a lot of fun, and entering into a new place has not at all been intimidating.”

The MRS Student Chapter at UConn serves to educate and recruit future scientists and engineers, as well as provide support for current graduate students in materials science through social events and resources available to the organization. The UConn chapter regularly attends the annual MRS Fall Meeting & Exhibit in Boston where they present their research via short talks and posters, have the opportunity to network with graduate students from around the world, and interact with industry professionals and top researchers.

By Amanda Campanaro

Dozens of students attended an MSE graduate lab and research session April 19 hosted by UConn MRS to learn about the opportunities available in graduate studies and compete for a number of prizes.

MSE graduate students Gyuho Song of Dr. Seok-Woo Lee’s group, Rohit Batra of Dr. Rampi Ramprasad’s group, Sumit Suresh of Dr. Avinash Dongare’s group and Kenneth Ogueri of Dr. Cato T. Laurencin’s group (tied) won prizes for their lab research presentations.

“It was so wonderful to see our colleagues giving witty presentations of their work,” Gyuho says. “We had a lot of fun together with the undergraduate students.”

The MRS chapter is currently led by MSE Ph.D. students Gyuho Song, Cain Hung, Sergey Galitskiy, and Kenneth Ogueri. Gyuho, Chapter President, conceived of the idea to host the event to help increase awareness of the work being done at the graduate level, and to inform undergraduates of the many IMS and MSE graduate research options.

Six graduate students presented, five of them from MSE. Two MSE undergraduates who conduct research in Dr. Harold Brody’s lab also gave brief, impromptu presentations. The presentations lasted five minutes and were judged by the undergraduate audience by how well they expressed the research being done in a fun and engaging way.

The presenters competed for three gift cards to Price Chopper of varying amounts, awarded to the presentation that was the most entertaining for the undergraduates. Gyuho says “I wanted to show the undergraduates that lab life can also be fun.”

The undergraduate prizes included two $10 gift cards for the student who asked the best questions, which were judged by Cain, MRS treasurer.

“This year, we had great support from our MSE department and the overarching MRS,” Gyuho says. “The faculty advisor, Dr. Lee, gave a lot of advice which made the team work hard and ultimately made it more enjoyable.”

There are currently no solid plans for a similar event next semester, but the current president hopes to continue hosting informational events for undergraduates and increasing the MRS participation.