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1. Ultrastable Nanostructured Polymer Glasses by Matrix Assisted Pulsed Laser EvaporationRodney D. Priestley, Princeton University, DMR 1053144 Glasses have a liquid-like structure, solid-like strength, and unlike crystalline materials are usually spatially homogeneous. The structural homogeneity of glasses is a basis for their widespread use in optics, displays and solar cells. The properties of glasses depend on the route to which they enter the vitreous state. However, from a practical viewpoint, materials engineers are only able to tune key material properties by insignificant levels using standard processing methods. Using a state-of-the-art laser processing method, we have been able to form glasses with tremendous tunability in key material properties. More importantly, the combination of material properties that we are able to engineer into the glasses, make them truly new and transformative materials. For instance, we are able to generate glasses with 40 K higher thermal stability, factor of 500 improvement in kinetic stability but 40 % reduction in density. The glasses have a novel nanostructure morphology (see image) comprised of nearly spherical nanoglobubles, but are still optically transparent. References: Y. Guo et al., Ultra-Stable Nanostructured Polymer Glasses, Nature Materials, 11, 337 (2012). K. Shepard et al., Nanostructured Morphology of Polymer Films Prepared by Matrix Assisted Pulsed Laser Evaporation, App. Phys. A, DOI:10.1007/s00339-012-7151-8.

2. Ultrastable Nanostructured Polymer Glasses by Matrix Assisted Pulsed Laser EvaporationRodney D. Priestley, Princeton University, DMR 1053144 • In summer 2012, I continued to coordinate the ACS Project Seed Program at Princeton University. The ACS Project SEED is a summer research program that gives high school juniors and seniors a rare chance to conduct research. To the left are pictures of the six students whom have worked in my lab delivering end of the summer presentations. To date, all graduating seniors have enrolled at a university. • This year, I also gave presentations at Nanodays, the Princeton University Materials Academy, and the IVY Plus STEM Symposium at UPENN. All presentations were targeted at young or underrepresented audiences. • In April 2012, I submitted an NSF PASI proposal to host a workshop for graduate students and postdoctoral fellows on the Physics, Processing and Application of Polymer Thin Films in summer 2013. S u m m e r 10 S u m m e r 11 S u m m e r 12