
Category: Research


ACU’s NEXT Lab awarded infrastructure grant from Department of Energy
The U.S. Department of Energy’s Nuclear Energy University Program (NEUP) announced a grant of $367,793 to be used for infrastructure at ACU’s Nuclear Energy eXperimental Testing Lab. The funding will support the radiochemistry aspect of NEXT Lab – specifically, establishing new and unique real-time direct chemical analysis capabilities for molten salt systems. For 2021, NEUP … Continued

ACU awarded CCCU STEM research grant
Abilene Christian University is one of nine recipients of a grant to enhance science, technology, engineering and mathematics research through the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities and its U.K. subsidiary, Scholarship & Christianity in Oxford. Nine CCCU member institutions were selected to receive the grant, which will provide funding to advance scientific research and … Continued

NEXT Lab student researcher awarded National Science Foundation fellowship
When Keaton Brewster graduates in May with a degree in physics and mathematics, he’ll be taking with him more than a diploma. A research proposal stemming from his work in ACU’s NEXT Lab has earned him a prestigious fellowship from the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowships Program. With his annual stipend of $34,000, Keaton … Continued

NEXT Lab advances reliable nuclear energy
Energy and electricity topics are dominating conversations in Texas after residents spent a week battling a major winter storm. Abilene Christian University, along with two other Texas universities, is at the forefront of advancing nuclear technology to address problems plaguing traditional energy sources – including unpredictable weather. Nuclear is the most dependable form of electricity … Continued

Research by ACU students, faculty published in Nature magazine
Abilene Christian University students and faculty in the Department of Engineering and Physics contributed to research being published this week in Nature, one of the world’s leading science magazines. “The asymmetry of antimatter in the proton” was published in the Feb. 24 issue. Understanding the properties of the proton helps physicists answer fundamental scientific questions. … Continued

NASA grant brings engineering intern’s project to ACU campus
Mitchell Schneller calls his summer internship at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida an “amazing opportunity.” Several other students call it amazing, too, because a grant from NASA to ACU’s Department of Engineering and Physics brought Schneller’s project to the Abilene campus. Now Schneller and fellow seniors Michael Ranger, Koby Rodgers and Cole Shannon are … Continued

10 Questions with ACU trustee and energy expert Doug Robison
A thin volume of Galileo’s 1610 landmark treatise The Starry Messenger sits on a bookshelf at oil and gas executive Doug Robison’s Abilene home. Within its pages, the famous astronomer, who turned his telescope to the stars to provide firsthand observation that ours is a sun-centered solar system and not an Earth-centered one, describes his … Continued

ACU students complete work on STAR detector components through Brookhaven National Laboratory
In spite of challenges presented by the pandemic, undergraduate students at Abilene Christian University have devoted the past several months to preparing components for a hadron calorimeter as part of the STAR detector project – an experiment at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven National Laboratory – and for the first time were able … Continued

Love of chemistry, research combine to make NEXT Lab a perfect fit for ACU grad
Alli Mae (Bulkley ’20) Berry joined the team in ACU’s NEXT Lab as a research scientist just a month after graduating and five days before getting married. Despite the blur of life changes in such a short period of time, Berry jumped right into her work by learning the ins and outs of NEXT Lab’s … Continued