The prize for the Best Student Presentation for the IREAP Graduate Student Seminars for Spring 2013 was awarded to Thomas Rensink for his presentation titled "Quantum Model for Laser Field Ionization". Thomas' advisor is Prof. Tom Antonsen.

The IREAP Graduate Student Seminars for the Spring 2013 semester are now complete. Seminars for Fall 2013 are scheduled for Fridays at 12:00 p.m. in the Large Conference Room (1207), Energy Research Facility. Everyone is welcome. Pizzas with a variety of toppings will be provided free of charge for graduate students; others will have to contribute a small fee of $5.00. Submit your requests for pizza toppings and refreshments to David Meichle (dmeichle@umd.edu ).

The mission of the IREAP Graduate Student Seminars is to give graduate students the opportunity to practice short presentations of their work. This is a stepping stone for preparing them for their thesis defense, PhD proposals, or even conference presentations. It is a valuable skill for all professionals, and students should be eager to present their work.

The talks will be informal with an approximate duration of 30 to 45 minutes allowing questions for about 15 minutes. There shouldn't be any stress since there is no evaluation committee coming up with grilling questions. Everyone is welcome to be the audience.

After the conclusion of each talk, graduate students in the audience will fairly rate the speaker on a scale of 1-5 for Technical Merit and on a scale of 1-5 for Presentation. The total score will be averaged and the highest scoring speaker at the semester's end will receive a monetary prize for "Best Speaker." In the case of a tie, the winner shall be the speaker with the largest number of audience members providing ratings. For additional information regarding the IREAP Graduate Student Seminar Series, please contact David Meichle (dmeichle@umd.edu).

Past Winners of the IREAP Graduate Student Seminar Best Speaker Award