Category Archives: Group members

Nicholas Tjahjono wins the Outstanding Teaching Assistant Award

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Nicholas Tjahjono, a fourth-year doctoral student in our group and a NASA Space Technology Graduate Research Opportunities Fellow has been awarded the Outstanding Teaching Assistant Award of the Rice’s MSNE Department.

Tjahjono’s research aims to aid in NASA’s Artemis mission to the moon and beyond. His objective is to develop mechanically robust and self-healing materials capable of operating under, and protecting astronauts from, extreme space environments such as extreme heat and cold, bombardment from micrometeoroids and orbital debris, and galactic cosmic radiation.

Nicholas Tjahjono awarded NASA space tech research fellowship

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Rice PhD student aims to aid in NASA’s Artemis mission to the moon and beyond

Nicholas Tjahjono, a first-year doctoral student in Yakobson Research Group,  has been awarded the NASA Space Technology Graduate Research Opportunities Fellowship.

His research proposal, “Virtual Prototyping of Multifunctional Boron-Nitrogen Nanostructures and their Composites for Extreme Space Environments,” aims to aid in NASA’s Artemis mission to the moon and beyond.

The goal of Artemis is to land two astronauts on the moon by 2024 and explore the feasibility of establishing sustainable colonies, in preparation for sending the first astronauts to Mars by 2030. Tjahjono’s objective is to develop materials capable of operating under, and protecting astronauts from, extreme space environments such as extreme heat and cold, variable gravity, abrasive lunar dust, galactic cosmic radiation and solar particle events.

Nicholas earned his B.S. in the joint major of bioengineering and materials science and engineering, and his B.A. in music, from the University of California at Berkeley in 2018. Before coming to Rice, he worked as a research assistant in the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s Molecular Foundry in Berkeley, Calif.

CNT-graphene-borophene specialty cake

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A sweet way to say “Happy Holidays”

Not everyone can make cakes, but a great cake can come from anyone… or so it seems. Combining many years of experience in modeling the synthesis of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and 2D materials, and obviously some serious culinary skills Ksenia Bets has scaled-up their production to say “Happy Holidays” on behalf of Yakobson’s group and the MSNE department.

The cake blends a candy nanotube (CNT), graphene and borophene from sugar (or possibly other solid sources) on a stepped glazed surface. The MSNE logo can also be seen on the top terrace.

For recipes visit this page.