Marietta students present research at American Physical Society meeting

by Liz Nedved

Marietta, Ohio (04/22/2019) — Marietta College's David Erzen '19 (Bethel Park, Pennsylvania) and Xuan Zhu '19 (Shandong Province, China) recently shared their research at the spring meeting of the Ohio-Region Section of the American Physical Society.

The meeting was held at the College of Wooster.

Erzen, who will graduate in May with a Bachelor of Science degree in Applied Physics, shared his research titled "Enhancing a solar energy technology lab." His adviser was Dr. Dennis Kuhl.

Zhu, who will graduate with a BS degree in Physics, presented "Evaluating the effectiveness of a cleaning procedure of Au(111) surfaces using a residual gas analyzer." His adviser was Dr. Craig Howald.

The theme of the meeting was "Frontiers in Nonlinear Science," and nine Marietta students and four faculty members participated in seven plenary presentations while contributing to multiple other presentations.

The other students who attended the meeting were Alex Blackston '22 (Lancaster, Ohio), Matthew Chih '20 (Worthington, Ohio), Tom Farish '20 (Brunswick, Ohio), Ryan McGuinness '21 (Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio), Kyle O'Donnell '22 (Vienna, West Virginia), Benjamin Pratt '20 (Tallmadge, Ohio) and Yisi Wang (Haidian District, Beijing). The other faculty members were Drs. Ann Bragg and Cavendish McKay.

Located in Marietta, Ohio, at the confluence of the Muskingum and Ohio rivers, Marietta College is a four-year liberal arts college. Tracing its roots to the Muskingum Academy back in 1797, the College was officially chartered in 1835. Today Marietta College serves a body of 1,200 full-time students. The College offers 49 majors and is consistently ranked as one of the top regional comprehensive colleges by U.S. News & World Report and The Princeton Review, as well as one of the nation's best by Forbes.com. Marietta was selected seventh in the nation according to the Brookings Institution's rankings of colleges by their highest value added, regardless of major.

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