Students gain valuable experience through undergraduate research

Jazz Kroeger’s LinkedIn page tells the world how much he valued his undergraduate research experience at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

“Over the years in school, the most experience I got was being involved in research,” wrote Kroeger, a December graduate of Illinois Nuclear, Plasma, and Radiological Engineering (NPRE). “This allowed me to develop skills like making a program to process signals from a medical imaging device and produce images. Additionally, I was able to get better at public speaking skills when presenting that material in a poster.”

Currently, half of NPRE’s 140 undergraduates participate in research. Department Head Rizwan Uddin would like to see that opportunity available for all of NPRE’s undergrads.

“Many of NPRE’s faculty members welcome the assistance of undergraduates,” Uddin said. “Such opportunities enhance what the students learn here, add to their qualifications for future jobs, and gives them a glimpse of what they might expect as graduate students. We would like to be able to offer a research experience to any NPRE undergrad who wants to take it, and we hope to have 100 percent of our undergrads get internships or research experience.”

Kroeger, who is pursuing medical school, found numerous project opportunities, and wound up working with two NPRE groups, that of Prof. Ling-Jian Meng and of Prof. Clair Sullivan. Meng develops radiological imaging devices and Sullivan, who has since left the university, worked in radiation detection.

“I worked on creating a 3D model of a mouse brain to print and use it for testing the positron emission tomography machine,” Kroeger said. “Also, I was involved in using a program called Monte Carlo neutron projection to create a model of distributed radioactive source.”

Current NPRE graduate student Dhruval Patel, who earned a bachelor’s degree from the department in December, also conducted research as an undergrad. Transferring into NPRE as a sophomore, he was impressed with the wide array of projects being conducted in the Center for Plasma-Material Interactions, which NPRE Prof. David Ruzic directs. Patel emailed Ruzic, who encouraged the student’s involvement.

“I just wanted to learn more about the major in general; I figured the easiest way to do so would be to work on any available projects,” Patel said. “I was lucky enough to be a part of three different research teams over a period of two and a half years. All of the projects that I had worked on dealt with Physical Vapor Deposition (PVD).”

Patel found that assisting in research helped him better absorb classroom lessons.

“I did not realize what I had acquired from my research experience until I started taking some of the plasma-focused courses (NPRE 421, NPRE 423 and NPRE 429),” he said.

“One of the reasons I was able to keep up with the dense material presented was because I was able to draw from my research experience. In addition, conversing with the graduate students can often give you a different perspective to a problem than one presented in classrooms. This can sometimes give you a better grasp of the class material.”

NPRE Prof. Zahra Mohaghegh’s team has actively sought undergraduate researchers, most recently, during the Illinois Engineering’s Undergraduate Research Resource Fair held earlier this semester. The event provides engineering undergraduate students the opportunity to gather information on how to get involved in research, meet people from different research laboratories and undergraduate research programs, and learn more about engineering research.

Mohaghegh directs the Socio-Technical Risk Analysis (SoTeRiA) Laboratory, which is dedicated to positioning Illinois as a global leader in socio-technical risk analysis. At the recent research fair, Grant Schumock, an Informatics Research Fellow and NPRE undergraduate working in the SoTeRiA Lab, explained his project involving Uncertainty Quantification.

Undergraduate research candidates who visited the SoTeRiA booth included majors in nuclear, industrial, and mechanical engineering, computer science and statistics. Many students showed interest in using applied risk analysis concepts, while some were interested in the methodological, statistical and computational aspects of the topic.

According to Becky Meline, NPRE Coordinator of Academic Programs, students are introduced to research possibilities through a variety of means, including:

• faculty presentations in NPRE 100 (the freshmen/first semester transfer student orientation course)
• faculty seminars designed to explain research projects to students
• the NPRE 199 Undergraduate Seminar
• discussions with the students’ chief advisors
• American Nuclear Society student chapter presentations

Additionally, students gain information from the College of Engineering and the campus Office of Undergraduate Research, Meline said.

Among benefits that conducting research can offer an undergraduate is the possibility of being published in an academic journal.

Case in point is Daniel Johnson, an Engineering Physics and Computer Science major who has worked with NPRE Research Assistant Prof. Daniel Andruczyk on the Hybrid Illinois Device for Research and Applications plasma/fusion facility.

Findings from this research have recently been accepted for publication in Fusion Engineering and Design under the title "HIDRA Control System (HCS): A LabVIEW-based program to control the Hybrid Illinois Device for Research and Applications." Johnson, recently recognized as a Knight of St. Patrick of the College of Engineering, one of the highest honors bestowed upon engineering undergraduates, will be listed as first-author.

Many undergraduates come to a greater realization of the importance of research experience as they make their ways through their academic careers.

“Every undergrad in science should be involved in research,” said Gregory Romanchek, currently an NPRE graduate student working with Prof. Shiva Abbaszadeh, an expert in developing biomedical imaging instrumentation. As an undergraduate majoring in Engineering Physics and NPRE at Illinois, Romanchek was involved in the Illinois Scholars for Undergraduate Research.

“I did not fully understand what it meant to be a researcher until I worked as one,” Romanchek said.

Patel seconded Romanchek’s belief: “I cannot think of any other activity that has been this rewarding. You learn a lot everyday by interacting with the folks over in the research group. The best part is that none of it is binding. There are no contracts to sign before you start working with a team. The group will often try to work around your hours. If you find some other project more eye catching, then you can always switch teams/research groups.

“The whole idea is to get a peek at the possibilities that Illinois Engineering has to offer,” Patel said.

 

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