２０１４年６月１６日−２０日

June 16th, 17th:

I spent the first couple of days this week consulting with my professor exactly on what procedures I will working on. I sent an email to my professor to figure out exactly what I need to do to get an A in the class, and more importantly, to ask if I will be able to publish any of the work I have done in the lab so far. The answer I received was surprising. Not only did Professor Kondoh agree to let me publish my work, he offered for me to go to the annual "The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society" (TMS) symposium next March to share my findings -- all travel expenses paid... He told me there will be representatives from big time aerospace companies like Boeing and Airbus there looking at our research. This opportunity just seems too good to be true. Of course, I couldn't pass up on it. So I am currently busting my ass.. The last 2 months, I've analyzed 3 samples. This upcoming month alone, I will be analyzing 6: half the time to do twice as much work. At least I got one thing going for me, experience. I expect cleaner and more efficient data collection this month. Anyhow, that's the big news from this week. I'm excited to get to work.
Oh also, I corrected 2 abstracts and 2 manuscripts this week for the non-native speakers in the lab. I'm starting to feel more and more useful.

June 18th-20th:

I have a presentation the week after this one, so I had to begin assimilating my data into a powerpoint. Unfortunately, I was still waiting for data to come in, so the PowerPoint would not be conclusive. Here is a video/pictures from the lab work this week. The rocking mill was finally fixed! which meant I was able to prepare the titanium samples with dispersed nanotubes again.

My corrections on a paper, and some useful equations I used from Jia Sensei's paper.

Was working with the saw, and almost cut all the way through a piece of titanium. I decided to try to break the rest of it manually by bending it. Instead, my hand slipped and the sharp edge of the titanium piece ripped into my hand. 

Here's a little tour of one of our facilities with some goofy looking machines.

Friday evening was nice. Some friends and I decided to head out to grab Conveyor Belt Sushi together. It's always a good time.

Duncan, Yo, and Erika.

Too cute. Duncan and his Japanese girlfriend. I forgot her name sorry.

After a long productive week, I went home and rested up for Saturday.