Ren Wins Inaugural MSE Doctoral Thesis Award

The Department of Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) is pleased to announce that Shenqiang Ren is the winner of the 2009 Materials Science and Engineering Doctoral Thesis Award. The new annual award is presented to a senior graduate student who has done outstanding doctoral research as part of his or her Ph.D. degree. Ren will also represent MSE in a Ph.D. student award competition at the Clark School level.

"All of the nominations submitted by the MSE faculty for this award were very strong, and determining the winner was not an easy task," says Professor and Chair Robert M. Briber. "I want to congratulate all of the faculty and students for the exciting and innovative research that is taking place in the Department."

Ren, who is advised by Professor Manfred Wuttig, was recognized for the high level of creativity and intellectual insight he has demonstrated in his development of new multiferroic nanocomposite materials. The work has resulted in four papers published between 2007-2009 in Applied Physics Letters with Ren as first author. Two of these papers were also selected for the Virtual Journal of Nanoscience and Technology.

"He is uniquely qualified for this award because of his outstanding intellectual contribution to materials science and his high productivity," Wuttig wrote of Ren in his nomination letter. "He created a new field of materials science, diblock copolymer templated nano-oxide composites, and he used his unique synthetic skills to create novel nano-magnetoelectrics with very high magnetoelectric coupling coefficients….In my opinion, Shenqiang embodies the ideal of [the] most successful graduate student: highly intelligent, dynamic, hard driving but even tempered, forward looking and not intimidated by seemingly insurmountable obstacles."

Published April 28, 2009