Quantum Theory Project
2234 New Physics Bulding #92
Gainesville FL 32611-8435
Phone: (352) 392-1597
Fax: (352) 392-8722
Email:"lastname"
qtp ufl edu
Impact on University Outreach
The Quantum Theory Project (QTP) at the University of Florida (UF) has a long and distinguished history in educating theorists, both as graduate students (73 Ph.D.'s) and as postdoctoral associates and long-term visitors (well over 200 since QTP's inception). QTP also presented winter and summer schools for nearly 30 years in Florida and Scandinavia. QTP presently is the U.S. partner in a program of biannual inter-American theory workshops that bring together Caribbean, Latin American, Canadian, and U.S. participants.
An important continuing QTP activity is the annual Sanibel Symposium, a meeting on all aspects of the quantum theory of matter ranging from atoms through biological systems and isolated molecules through bulk matter. Now in its fortieth year, there are typically over 300 attendees, making it the largest {\em annual} meeting in the field. Virtually every quantum chemist, dynamist, and chemical physicist has attended it in two generations. QTP is also the U.S. home of the International Journal of Quantum Chemistry (John Wiley and Sons) and Advances in Quantum Chemistry (Academic Press). During the period 1983--1993, QTP members offered short courses, primarily for industrial scientists, on Applied Molecular Orbital Theory. Those schools led to strong, continuing collaborations between industrial participants and the faculty at QTP. Since 1993 RJB has offered short courses geared to the use of the ACES-II program system (developed at QTP). MCZ has participated at many workshops organized by Molecular Simulations Inc. as a teacher in quantum methods and members of this team have participated in well over a dozen NATO workshops in the last decade.
Under this NSF program we propose to increase the current graduate student population in our team by 10 students (Chemistry, Physics, and Materials Science); six in the budget and four from institutional matching. All will participate in this research as team members, will attend monthly group meetings, and maintain current research status summaries on the team's internal Web site.
Furthermore, we propose to establish a three-part summer program. One component will target juniors in undergraduate school. Both the Physics and Chemistry departments at UF have REU programs for some 60 undergraduate students, and several students have already expressed interest in working with team members in Summer 1999. In addition a new UF Undergraduate Scholars Program supports 60 students in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences this summer, most of whom are expected to be science majors. We expect to attract several of these Undergraduate Scholars to our team.
Secondly, we will target faculty from undergraduate universities. The short courses mentioned above have helped to identify many faculty who would be interested. The expectation is that after intense summer research participation they would return to their home institutions and incorporate undergraduates into their projects, thereby exciting their better students to science and engineering careers. We anticipate that other NSF funds for summer research by faculty of undergraduate institutions can be used for this purpose. Together, this creates a summer program for several participants. Such a multi-faceted program for future theoreticians, or well trained experimentalists, and faculty from undergraduate institutions will be unique in that it will focus on the full range of computational modeling of materials rather than just a single item like quantum chemistry, dynamics, or finite element analysis. In addition to lectures, participants will learn from coordinated computational exercises that illustrate the nature of the various methods employed. A well-designed summer research program should result in a published paper. Rather than being a by-product, we consider this program to be a focus of our research proposal.
Thirdly, we will target ethnic minorities in this program as much as possible. The University of Florida was one of eight institutions to receive an NSF Graduate Minority Award ($2.3 M) in Fall 1998. The program will identify sophomores and juniors at Florida A&M University (FAMU) for involvement in UF science programs (e.g., REU-like summer projects). Ultimately, some of these students will be attracted to UF as graduate students with support from the Minority Award grant in the first year. The team already has strong contacts with members of the faculty at FAMU as well as strong connections with Jackson State University and Florida International University.
