The Rice Thresher, Vol. 91, No. 15, Ed. 1 Friday, January 16, 2004 Page: 4 of 24
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THE RICE THRESHER NEWS FRIDAY, JANUARY 16,2004
by Ian Everhart
THRESHER STAFF
Kamran Khan was named vice
provost for information technology
late last month and will begin March
1. Khan is currently the vice presi-
dent for information technology and
chief information officer at Marist
College in Poughkeepsie, NY.
Provost Eugene Levy said Khan
will assume responsibility for the IT-
related aspects of the vice president
and CIO position at Rice. Vice Presi-
dent and CIO Chuck Henry currently
oversees both IT and Fondren Li-
brary.
[Henry] made a lot of very
important improvements in the in-
formation technology enterprise,
but as time went on, it became
increasingly clear that this was a
job that really needed full-time
attention," Levy said. "A year or
so ago, we concluded that it would
be in the best interests of the in-
stitution to make [the vice presi-
dent and CIO position] two sepa-
rate positions."
Henry said his responsibilities to
both IT and the library have ex-
panded and could no longer be ful-
filled by a single person.
"Each of the organizations [IT and
the library] has become far more
selected Rice researchers make
pure nanotube fibers
he is looking forward to meeting stu-
dents at Rice and hearing what they
have to say, particularly by having
lunch in the colleges and interacting
with students in other contexts.
The position of vice president and
by Katherine Corley
THESHER STAFF
C0URTESY MEDIA RELATIONS
Kamran Kahn
complex over the last four to five
years," Henry said. "These were two
full-time jobs. In order to best sup-
port Rice, these two organizations
both require a senior administrator."
Khan, who has been at Marist for
almost six years, said he was im-
pressed by Rice's faculty and the
academic environment.
"For me, I think what really ap-
pealed to me about Rice was the
intellectual climate and the opportu-
nities provided by the university,"
he said.
Khan said his most valuable expe-
rience at Marist has been the chance
to work with students in various set-
tings, including the IT office. He said
7 think what really
appealed to me about
Rice was the
intellectual climate and
the opportunities
provided by the
university.'
— Kamran Kahn
Incoming vice provost for
technology
CIO was created to supervise IT and
the library when the previous IT
administrator returned to teaching
in 2000. Prior to his current position,
Henry was vice provost and univer-
sity librarian, a position to which he
will return in March.
A new material created by Rice
researchers could eventually replace
all copper and aluminum wires in the
world. A research team led by Univer-
sity Professor Rick Smalley and
Chemical Engineering Professor
Matteo Pasquali has discovered a pro-
cess for making continuous fibers out
of nanotubes, cylindrical carbon mol-
ecules with special properties.
"Nanotubes were discovered in
1991," Pasquali said. "Very quickly
after the discovery, researchers re-
alized that these molecules had spec-
tacular properties: very high
strength and electrical conductivity."
Researchers have been trying to
create continuous fibers out of
nanotubes since they were discov-
ered. However, though the tubes have
a diameter of one nanometer (one
billionth of a meter) and they have
been stymied by their tendency to
clump together. The current project
began when researchers managed to
dissolve nanotubes in sulfuric acid,
separating the sticky strands perma-
nently for the first time.
"We needed some trick of nature
to have the fibers align spontane-
Do you believe the environment is getting worse?
Do you think the data supports your belief?
Are you willing to learn the facts?
Bjorn Lomborg
Associate Professor of Statistics, University of Aarhus, Denmark
and
Director of Denmark's Environmental Assessment Institute
Author of
The Skeptical Environmentalist
Measuring the Real State of the World
Wednesday 21 January 2004
4:00pm lecture followed by Q&A
Shell Auditorium
Jones Graduate School of Management
Rice University
Comments about The Skeptical Environmentalist
"... a remarkable hook, probably the most important book on the environment ever written."
Daily Telegraph
"This is one of the most valuable books on public policy - not merely environmental policy - to have been
written for the intelligent general reader in the past ten years. . . . 7he Skeptical Environmentalist is a
triumph."
The Economist
"The Skeptical Environmentalist is the most significant work on the environment since the appearance of its
polar opposite, Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, in 1962. It's a magnificent achievement."
Washington Post Book World
"The Skeptical Environmentalist should be read by every environmentalist, so that the appalling errors of
fact the environmental movement has made in the past are not repeated. A brilliant and powerful book."
Matt Ridley, Author of Genome
Analye the Data
Free Your Mind
ously," Smalley said.
When the sulfuric acid was
washed away by ether, the tubes
had re-assembled and aligned like
uncooked spaghetti. Researchers
then experimented with spinning
continuous fibers, which have the
dimensions of a human hair, from
the aligned tubes.
The next step in the ongoing
project will be improving the fibers
and making them functional.
"We can't make a mile of perfect
fiber. We can't even make a meter of
perfect fiber right now," Pasquali said.
"Hopefully in 10 years this will be
something that people are buying."
Eventually, the fibers could be
used in airplanes, space stations, and
power cables.
The [fiber] molecules
themselves are much
lighter and stronger
than steel/
— Matteo Pasquali
Chemical Engineering
professor
"The [fiber] molecules them-
selves are much lighter and stron-
ger than steel," Pasquali said. "[In]
buying an aluminum bike versus
buying a steel bike, it is not only the
strength that matters, but also the
strength per unit weight."
Scientists estimate that
nanotubes are about one-sixth the
weight of steel and about 1 (X) times
stronger. However, not all nanotubes
have the same properties. For ex-
ample, some tubes conduct electric-
ity better than others.
"In your future, you may see elec-
trical power transmission cables
made out of [these] tubes instead of
aluminum, with much greater effi-
ciency," Smalley said.
The research project began in
May 2001 and involved more than 15
Rice stuJentsand faculty members,
including Will Rice College senior
Jason Longoria and Jones College
junior Valentin Prieto. Longoria and
Prieto prepared samples for re-
search, a process that could take up
to a week, and tested the samples,
which could take days.
"It's exciting to see all that goes
on behind the scenes of a big discov-
ery. I understand better what it takes
to actually get there," Longoria said.
Current nanotube research stems
from the discovery of buckyballs,
the spherical counterpart of
nanotubes. Smalley and University
Professor Robert Curl made the
Nobel-Prize winning discovery in
1985. Rice recently established the
Carbon Nanotechnology laboratory
in order to continue work on the
nanotech frontier.
Provost and Professor of Physics
and Astronomy Eugene I^evy said
the research is part of an increas-
ingly important area of science.
"Science and technology over the
next several decades is going to be
dominated by and shaped by a grow-
ing understanding of the relationship
between the structure and the func-
tion of molecular matter," I^evy said.
An article on the team's research
was published this month in (he jour-
nal Macronwlecules and their dis-
covery was picked up in many na-
tional newspapers including The New
York Times. A valuable boost for
scientific research at Rice, the paper
was also an educational exercise for
those involved.
"I learned from Dr. Smalley that
you can't control certain things,"
Pasquali said. "What you can do is
tiy to be prepared and have your
eyes open so when nature tells you
something, you understand it, Right
now, we are still running on faith."
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Berenson, Mark. The Rice Thresher, Vol. 91, No. 15, Ed. 1 Friday, January 16, 2004, newspaper, January 16, 2004; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth398454/m1/4/: accessed June 20, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.