A summer well spent in the lab

The Research Experience for Undergraduates brings young students into professors' groups for the whole summer so that they can fully experience engineering research first-hand. Going well beyond the theory of the classroom or the standard outcomes of lab exercises, students participate in creating new knowledge while working on real problems and challenges. This video features four students who spent the summer of 2009 working on projects in mechanical engineering and materials science and engineering.

• Investigating an exotic materials phase transition that could lead to improved computing and energy storage technology
• Making a plane that can perch on walls like a fly
• Improving the efficiency of using sunlight to harvest clean hydrogen energy from water
• Studying root causes and possible treatments for osteoarthritis