West M grad completes nuclear physics internship
Posted in Physics Articles on October 27th, 2010 by adminHundreds of college students across the nation apply for internships through the Investigation Encounter for Undergraduates program, which is funded via the National Science Foundation.
Parker was one of only 14 undergraduate students nationally chosen for the REU at Michigan State University’s lab.
Parker, the daughter of Jennifer and Robert Parker, graduated from West Muskingum High School in 2008.
“I knew when I was a senior in high school that this was what I wanted to study,” she mentioned. “I appreciate physics because it explains every thing. I do not assume I could study anything else simply because I’d usually be thinking about physics.”
She earned the Rickey Scholarship at Marietta.
“There were 300 applications for this program,” mentioned Michael Thoennessen, her internship adviser at MSU. Thoennessen is a professor at the university’s Department of Physics and Astronomy plus the associate director of the NSCL. “The NSF project was designed to bring in about 15 bright undergraduate students from smaller colleges to work with individual research groups. It provides them an chance to see what investigation is like.”
Parker’s internship involved a fantastic deal of analysis. She also participated in a main experiment involving the Modular Neutron Detector Array, which is “a large-area, high-efficiency neutron detector intended for neutrons stemming from breakup relations of rapidly rare isotope beams,” based on the project’s description.