A new online class being taught this fall at the University of Iowa Microfabrication Facility allows students from across the country to participate in laboratory experiments and exercises in real time via state-of-the-art instrumentation that takes them inside the lab despite their physical location.
Online Microfabrication offers remote lab sessions in clean-room environments designed to provide a more interactive and immersive experience for students.
Students in this course can visualize all the key components of the experiments via various interactive technologies, including a Zoom video conferencing session hosted by the lab instructor that provides them with a sense of their actual presence in the lab.
“Remote students can see the actual tool interface on their own computer screen and are able to operate the tools remotely,” says Aju Jugessur, director of the UI Microfabrication Facility, which is part of the Optical Science and Technology Center. “There is also a separate high-definition camera that students can control to familiarize themselves with the lab environment and tools. In real time, remote students are able to see the tools in action after activating the various steps and processes of the tool user interface.”
By offering this class, the UI is helping answer the call for training people in the emerging field of nanotechnology: the study, manipulation, and application of extremely small objects—some 10,000 times smaller than a human hair. Research has shown that an estimated 2 million professionals trained in nanotechnology will be needed by 2025, more than half that number in North America alone.
Nanotechnology is applicable in many scientific fields, including chemistry, biology, physics, materials science, medicine, and engineering.
“This online course is a great introduction to the theory and practical applications of nanofabrication,” says Krissy Do, a development engineer at the California Nano Systems Institute located at the University of California, Los Angeles. “Being able to do a portion of the lab remotely is innovation at its finest.”
Do is one of the students enrolled in the class this fall. Others are working professionals closer to the UI campus.
“The interactive remote labs are an excellent method to reinforce the lectures and textbook,” says Bill Tollefson, principal systems engineer at Rockwell Collins in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. “Our experiments with microfabrication processes, materials, and equipment have a good balance of theory and application.”
“We think the exposure of working professionals and students at every educational level—from K–12 schools, community colleges to universities—to state-of-the-art nanotechnology equipment will inspire and spark their interest to continue their education in this field. The online, real-time remote lab approach is key to enabling the UI to bring these high-tech instruments to students anywhere in the world.”
—Aju Jugessur, director of the UI Microfabrication Facility
Tollefson was so intrigued by what he was learning online that he visited the lab in person.
During the visit, he met with the lab’s teaching assistant Andrew Textor, a UI junior from Wilmette, Illinois, majoring in chemical engineering. Textor says the online lab experience is exceeding expectations even in its first semester.
“The students are more involved than I expected them to be,” he says. “I think that is a good thing because it keeps them engaged. It’s very much on par with what they would do in person.”
Textor, who plans to graduate in May 2019, says he planned to go to pharmacy school when he first came to the UI. When his interest in computers led him to consider the microchips needed to run them, he switched majors.
“I was like, ‘This is really cool. What if I could do more of this and what if I could get a job where I could make these computers better?’ When I found out the UI had a course where they taught you how microchips work and there was a facility on campus where you could learn about these principles and mechanisms, I thought that was really interesting,” he says.
Textor says he feels lucky because he knows most colleges don’t offer similar classes or experiences for undergraduates. Being a lab teaching assistant as a junior is a rare opportunity.
“I think ultimately I’d like to be a research scientist at a company that does a lot of research and development. Or I’d like to design and build the machines that are used to make micro- and nano-scale devices,” he says. “I am ahead of the game.”
The course was designed with help from UI Distance Learning and Online Education, and was made possible by a UI Innovation in Teaching Technology Award and funding from the National Science Foundation.
The course’s approach demonstrates that state-of-the-art science and engineering labs can be taught remotely if the right tools and technologies are in place, Jugessur says.
“It is imperative to build the foundation that will prepare students for various careers in this field,” says Jugessur. “We think the exposure of working professionals and students at every educational level—from K–12 schools, community colleges to universities—to state-of-the-art nanotechnology equipment will inspire and spark their interest to continue their education in this field. The online, real-time remote lab approach is key to enabling the UI to bring these high-tech instruments to students anywhere in the world.”