Environmental Science Institute lecture
about the potential of nanoscience Nov. 21

Dr. Paul Barbara will discuss the current state and possible future advances of nanoscience at a free lecture at 7 p.m., Friday, Nov. 21, at The University of Texas at Austin. The lecture will be preceded by a reception and interactive exhibits beginning at 5:45 p.m. A question-and-answer session will follow the lecture at 8 p.m.

Barbara’s lecture, “Nanoscience: Big Science at Tiny Scales,” will be held in Welch Hall 2.224, with the reception in the Welch Foyer.

This lecture is part of the Outreach Lecture Series, sponsored by the Environmental Science Institute and the Department of Geological Sciences, to update the public about new research developments. The lectures include interactive exhibits, discussions with presenters and the distribution of compact discs to teachers about the lecture topics that also assist with state-mandated standardized test preparation.

Barbara is the director of the university’s Center for Nano- and Molecular Science and Technology, which focuses on manipulating atoms and molecules to build devices on the scale of human cells and to create materials and structures from the bottom up with novel properties. Nanotechnology is a national priority because it has the potential to affect the way almost everything is designed and made, and to produce advances such as wrist computers more powerful than desktop computers and new vaccines. Barbara will discuss what nanotechnology is, and how researchers at the university are helping to shape our nanotechnology future.

Barbara, the Richard J.V. Johnson-Welch Regents Chair in Chemistry and a fellow in the American Physical Society and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, has lectured nationally and internationally, is a co-author of more than 180 scientific articles and is on the editorial boards of such professional journals as Molecular Physics, the Journal of the American Chemical Society and the Journal of Chemical Physics.

More information is available on the Outreach Lecture Series Web site, where the lecture can also be viewed via live webcast.

For more information contact: Larry Diamond, 512-471-5847.