Scores of undergraduate students from around the country and around the state get a taste of graduate school through summer research programs at Clemson University.

The university's Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) programs, sponsored by the National Science Foundation, offer research opportunities in biological sciences, bioengineering, chemical engineering, electrical and computer engineering, mathematical sciences, mechanical engineering, physics and Clemson's Center for Advanced Engineering Fibers and Films (CAEFF).

One of these summer offerings is the Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (SURE) in Wireless Communications.

"The SURE program includes 15 electrical engineering and computer engineering undergraduate students-mostly rising seniors-from universities around the country who are residents at Clemson for 10 weeks," said Dan Noneaker, a professor in the university's Holcombe department of electrical and computer engineering and the SURE program director. "Each student is conducting a directed research project in a topic related to wireless communications under the direction of a faculty member."

"My research in the SURE program has broadened my understanding of numerical methods in electromagnetics," observed Brad Ellis a senior from Harvard University. "It's nice to work one-on-one with a professor, which I don't get to do during the academic year."

Students in the Summer Undergraduate Research Program in chemistry, another of the university's summer offerings, conduct hands-on, original research under the guidance of a Clemson mentor, either a faculty member, a graduate student or a post-doctoral student.

"This research program gives students a taste of what graduate school, particularly chemistry study, is going to be like," said program coordinator Bill Pennington, a professor in the Clemson chemistry department.

Pennington said he has had numerous alums of his program return to the university to pursue full-time graduate study.
"It lets them have an experience as an undergrad that shows them that they can do graduate-level work," said John Kennedy, a mechanical engineering professor who is the deputy director of the CAEFF and the director of the REU program in mechanical engineering.