RIMSE Summer Schools: Training Opportunities for Graduate Students, Undergraduate Students, Post-Graduate Trainees, High School Students, K-12 Educators, Visiting Scholars, and Researchers from Industry, Government, and National Laboratories.

What is RIMSE? RIMSE stands for Research Immersion in Materials Science and Engineering. Sponsored by the U.S. National Science Foundation as part of the UC San Diego Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (MRSEC), the RIMSE Summer Schools are immersive, hands-on courses meant to prepare trainees to work in Materials Science and Materials Engineering research laboratories.  They generally run for 8 to 10-weeks each summer on the UC San Diego campus. The UC San Diego MRSEC currently runs three RIMSE schools:

Who can participate in RIMSE? The RIMSE schools are unique in that they blend researchers from a wide range of backgrounds and educational levels - your team may include local high school students, undergraduate students (including incoming UC San Diego transfer students and REU students), graduate students (including incoming UC San Diego PhD and MS program students), post-doctoral trainees, k-12 teachers (through the RET program), and visiting international scholars, industry researchers, or government laboratory researchers (through the Researcher in Residence program).

What are the Program Elements of RIMSE? Focused on materials science research in topics of interest to the UC San Diego MRSEC, each of the RIMSE Summer Schools are run by MRSEC faculty who serve as senior mentors and/or instructors. Each RIMSE begins with an intensive training in theory, techniques and laboratory methods, and includes  a capstone “Discovery Project”—an independent research project implemented by the trainee in a small team and under the mentorship of a current UC San Diego MRSEC researcher. Though each Summer School runs its own topical curriculum, they share common activities including:

  • Training on several of the key analytical instruments used in materials science (in the MRSEC Materials Characterization Facility).
  • “Pathways” luncheon seminars given by academic, industry, and government laboratory scientists that give insights into STEM career paths.
  • Professional development workshops (research safety, research ethics, science communication, information literacy, graduate school / career preparation).
  • Team-building activities including nature hikes, beach days, a San Diego Padres baseball game, and a kayak tour of the La Jolla cove.
  • A final projects day (oral presentation at the UC San Diego Summer Research Conference or a poster presentation).

Each school emphasizes different research aspects related to the MRSEC, including soft materials and biomaterials, self-assembled materials, and computational design, and they share a set of core training elements focused on: research-critical instrumentation (electron microscopy, Raman and FTIR spectroscopy, x-ray and electron diffraction methods); integration of computational methods; critical laboratory safety and the safe handling of chemical, biological, and nanotechnological hazards; and research ethics.

Dates: In Summer 2025, the RIMSE summer schools will run from Monday, June 23 through Friday, August 15, 2025 (8 weeks). Trainees have the option to extend their laboratory research participation for longer periods either before or after the formal training program, depending on the particular Summer School and participant category.

Expectations of Participants: Full-time commitment to immersive lab work and engagement in program activities (Monday – Friday, 9am – 4pm), including presentation at the UC San Diego Summer Research Conference (SRC) in mid-August.

Application: The different participant categories have different application processes (see below). The deadlines vary by participant category. In addition to completing a registration form, you will be asked to select a RIMSE school (and potential MRSEC faculty mentor) that best fits your interests, and to submit the following application materials:

  • Personal Statement
  • CV/Resume - It is recommended that you seek out academic recommenders (university/college faculty members, rather than your RA or your high school coach) who in their letters can address your accomplishments, skills, knowledge, scholarly dedication and suitability for undergraduate research. Be sure to contact recommenders at least 3-4 weeks in advance of the application deadline. Send thank you notes once recommendation letters have been submitted and follow up to let your recommenders know the outcome of your application. 
  • Current Transcript (if applicable)
  • 2 Letters of Reference

Participant Categories and Application Links:

  • Undergraduate Students at UC San Diego - Application Deadline April 1, 2025
    Application is managed through the RIMSE ETAP application portal. You should reach out to your potential MRSEC IRG Project or Seed Project Faculty Mentor prior to applying, and list them as one of your references in the application. Funding may be available to support housing and stipend (see "Funding" topic below for possible funding sources).
  • Undergraduate students from California State University at Long Beach (CSULB) - Application Deadline April 1, 2025
    The UC San Diego MRSEC has a partnership with the California State University at Long Beach (CSULB) that is funded through the sponsorship of the UC DDI program that recruits CSULB undergraduate students to participate in RIMSE with the aim of facilitating their successful transition to doctoral programs. The program covers accepted participants' stipends, on-campus housing, and limited travel costs. Applicant selection process is managed through CSULB, please visit the CSULB DD Initiative page.
  • Undergraduate students from North Carolina Agriculture & Technology (NCAT) - Application Deadline April 1, 2025
    The UC San Diego MRSEC has a partnership with the NCAT that is funded through the sponsorship of the NSF Partnerships for Research and Education in Materials (PREM) program that recruits NCAT undergraduate students to participate in RIMSE. Applicants must contact the lead NCAT faculty representative, Dhananjay Kumar, prior to applying as they must be one of your references in the submitted application. UC San Diego and NCAT PREM covers accepted participants stipends, on-campus housing, and limited travel costs.
  • Undergraduate Students from Other Schools Who are US citizens or Permanent Residents - Application Deadline January 30, 2025
    Undergraduate students who are citizens or permanent residents of the United States or its possessions currently enrolled in a 2-year or 4-year program should apply through the UC San Diego MRSEC RIMSE REU ETAP application portal, or the allied SDNI REU program, which allows some of its participants to be part of the UC San Diego MRSEC RIMSE program.  Funding is provided for summer housing, travel, and a stipend.
  • Undergraduate or Graduate Students from Other Schools Who are not US citizens or Permanent Residents - Application Deadline January 30, 2025
    A select number of undergraduate, graduate, or post-graduate students who are not citizens or permanent residents of the United States or its possessions can participate in the program.  Generally these are persons whose home research group has an existing collaboration (or is initiating a new collaboration) with a UC San Diego MRSEC faculty lab (MRSEC IRG Project or Seed Project faculty). The applicant's faculty mentor at their home institution is expected to arrange the collaboration with one of the MRSEC faculty prior to application.  Applications are managed through the RIMSE ETAP application portal. The UC San Diego MRSEC faculty collaborator should be listed as one of your references in the application. Stipends are not available for international participants, and they must provide their own funding, either through personal funds or through their home institution. Temporary housing can be reserved in the undergraduate dormitories at the summer rate (in 2025, the rate was $62-$74/night).  Trainees are responsible for paying this directly. The MRSEC administration (j2bond@ucsd.edu, tlkhagvasuren@ucsd.edu) can coordinate your on-campus housing application.
  • Entering UC San Diego MS or PhD students - Application Deadline April 15, 2025
    Students entering the MS or PhD programs in departments allied with the UC San Diego MRSEC (Bioengineering, Biology, Chemistry & Biochemistry, Electrical & Computer Engineering, Materials Science, Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering, Nanoengineering, or Physics), and who have interests in joining a MRSEC-funded IRG Project or Seed Project for their graduate studies are eligible. Your graduate school application serves as your application to the RIMSE program, so you need not submit an additional application. However, you must reach out to your proposed UC San Diego Faculty mentor, who must submit a letter of nomination to the MRSEC Associate Director (Janka Bond) on your behalf. Participant slots are limited. Funding for a summer stipend is available. Temporary housing can be reserved in the undergraduate dormitories at the summer rate.  Trainees are responsible for paying this directly. The MRSEC administration (j2bond@ucsd.edu, tlkhagvasuren@ucsd.edu) can coordinate your on-campus housing application.
  • Researchers from Industry, Government Laboratory, or Academic Institutions - Application Deadline April 1, 2025 (January 30, 2025 for non-US citizens who will need a visa)
    Researchers from companies, US Government laboratories, or other academic institutions participate in RIMSE via the Researcher in Residence program.  Examples of these types of participants are scientists with PhD or MS degrees working in an industrial research lab, visiting faculty from other colleges or universities, or Senior Scientists working at a government laboratory. Your Faculty host must submit a letter of nomination on your behalf to the MRSEC Associate Director (Janka Bond).  Generally the living and travel expenses for participation in RIMSE are covered by this participant's home institution. If the visitor will need a visa in order to enter the US and participate in the program, the application deadline is January 30, 2025 to allow adequate time for visa processing.
  • K-12 educators - Application Deadline April 1, 2025
    K-12 educators from US schools generally participate through the UC San Diego MRSEC RET (Research Experiences for Teachers) program.  Application is managed via the RIMSE RET ETAP application portal; however, you should reach out to a MRSEC  IRG Project or Seed Project Faculty prior to applying.  It is expected that the prospective trainee will have already engaged with this faculty member or a member of their research team who has agreed to serve as their mentor, and have worked with them to formulate a “Discovery” project that resonates with that faculty's research interests.  The personal statement in the application should propose a project that is of a scope and complexity suitable for the summer period, and it should identify the potential RIMSE mentor(s). Participants receive a stipend, and UCSD on-campus housing, if needed, is covered.
  • High School Students - Application Deadline January 30, 2025
    A select number of high school students who live locally (the residential program cannot accommodate minors) are incorporated into the program. Application is managed via the RIMSE ETAP application portal; however, you should reach out to a MRSEC  IRG Project or Seed Project Faculty prior to applying, to identify areas of mutual research interest.  It is expected that the prospective trainee will have sufficient independence and initiative to have researched the potential faculty member, have already engaged with this faculty member or a member of their research team who has agreed to serve as their mentor, and have worked with them to formulate a “Discovery” project - an independent research project implemented by a team of trainees under the mentorship of a current research group member - that resonates with that faculty's research interests.  The personal statement in the application should propose a project that is of a scope and complexity suitable for the summer period, and it should identify the potential RIMSE mentor(s). No funding is available from MRSEC for high school participants.

Alternate Funding: There is no charge for participation in the RIMSE program. However, participants must have their own support for travel, living expenses, health insurance, and foreign participants must cover any applicable visa fees. For participants needing support for travel, housing, and other living expenses who do not fit into any of the funding categories listed above, the UC San Diego MRSEC coordinates with a number of programs that might provide full or partial support for your participation in RIMSE:

  • The CENTER Undergraduate Summer Research Award program supports summer research activities for UC San Diego Undergraduate Students that can be used to support your participation in RIMSE.  You are encouraged to engage with one of the MRSEC IRG Project or Seed Project Faculty to work up a suitable project and application. MRSEC RIMSE leadership can provide a letter of support, if needed (APPLICATION LINK).
  • NETPORE organization: NETPORE is a European Union-funded COST (Cooperation in Science and Technology) action that supports research and education in porous semiconductors and oxides. NETPORE partners with the UC San Diego MRSEC for research exchange activities involving the various faculty involved in NETPORE and their students.
  • MSCA Staff Exchanges via the EU's 2023 HORIZON-MSCA-2023-SE-01 "Program-Material" project: This is a European Union-funded Horizon Europe project, under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions grant No. 101182883 that supports research and education in DNA nanotechnology, materials chemistry, tumor biology, bio-nano interactions, biomedical imaging, and computational modeling. PROGRAM-MATERIAL partners with the UC San Diego MRSEC for research exchange activities involving the various faculty involved and their students.
  • RIMSE Summer Graduate Fellowships: Students entering the MS or PhD programs in departments allied with the UC San Diego MRSEC (Bioengineering, Biology, Chemistry & Biochemistry, Electrical & Computer Engineering, Materials Science, Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering, Nanoengineering, or Physics), and who have interests in joining a MRSEC-funded research lab for their graduate studies, are granted Research Assistantship stipends and assistance with on-campus housing for the summer prior to the commencement of their graduate studies. Anyone accepted into the PhD or MS programs of the the above listed departments is eligible, though the number of these summer fellowships is limited and the prospective RIMSE participant must be nominated by one of the MRSEC faculty. If you are interested, please engage with a MRSEC faculty member whose research interests are most aligned with your interests, and request that they submit a letter of nomination to the MRSEC RIMSE program leadership. Your graduate school application serves as your application to the RIMSE program, so you need not submit an additional application. However, you must submit a letter of intent to participate, and your MRSEC faculty member must submit a letter of nomination on your behalf.  The number of RIMSE Summer Graduate Fellowships is limited; early application is encouraged.
  • UC San Diego Undergraduate Research Hub: The UC San Diego Undergraduate Research Hub maintains links to numerous programs that support summer research activities and that can be used to support your participation in RIMSE. Most of the programs described at the above links require an application that proposes the research project on which you will be working. You are encouraged to engage with one of the MRSEC IRG Project or Seed Project Faculty to work up a suitable project and application. MRSEC RIMSE leadership can provide a letter of support, if needed.

RIMSE Summer Schools are coordinated with the following UC San Diego MS and PhD programs:
Chemistry & Biochemistry | Nanoengineering | Bioengineering | Materials Science & Engineering

If you have questions, please contact mrsec@ucsd.edu

UC San Diego MRSEC RIMSE Summer Schools flyer

2025 RIMSE Summer Schools:

Summer School for Silicon Nanotechnology

Nanoscale silicon materials
The intellectual focus of this RIMSE Summer School is on preparing, characterizing, and exploiting the properties of photonic crystals, thin films, nanoparticles, and quantum dots prepared from mesoporous silicon. Technological touchstones for these materials include nanomedicine, drug delivery systems, chemical sensors, biosensors, in vivo imaging, taggants, batteries, photovoltaics, and thermoelectric devices. Led by Professor Michael Sailor, the course provides training on synthesis and characterization of these materials. If you have questions about the RIMSE Summer School on Silicon Nanotechnology, please contact Professor Michael Sailor

Summer School on Predictive Assembly

A computational framework for rational materials design and development.
The intellectual focus of this RIMSE Summer School is on understanding how nanoscale building blocks can be assembled into functional, tunable materials that operate at the meso- to macroscales. Such materials are broadly relevant to energy, environmental sustainability, and human health problems. Led by Professor Tod Pascal, the course provides training on the computational aspects of the self-assembly problem—students will learn how to deploy high-performance computing to build predictive models that capture the chemical and physical complexities of mesoscale materials and the dynamics of their formation.  Students will be employ a multiscale theoritical framework to solving these problems, combining first-principles electronic structure calculations, atomistic and coarse-grained (CG) models. The structure and dynamics of these system will be explored by means of molecular dynamics (MD) simulations, while Monte-Carlo (MC) simulations will be used to determine the long-term, thermodynamic behavior. Trainees will learn how to: (1) simulate assembly at atomistic, nanoscopic, and mesostructural scales; and (2) how to predict the properties of the resulting structures. If you have questions about RIMSE on PA, please contact Professor Tod Pascal.

Summer School on Engineered Living Materials

Exploiting biology in functional materials
The intellectual focus of this RIMSE Summer School is to engineer living systems to generate new polymeric materials. These composite materials can be responsive to diverse stimuli and are capable of generating complex, genetically encoded material outputs. Such materials can enable biosynthetic electronics, chemical threat decontamination, synthesis and/or delivery of therapeutics, and soft robotics, among other applications. Led by Professor Jonathan Pokorski, the course offers an introduction to skills relevant to synthesis and fabrication of engineered living materials. Trainees will learn techniques to create materials at the living/non-living interface, including polymer chemistry, additive manufacture, and soft matter characterization. If you have questions about RIMSE on ELM, please contact Professor Jonathan Pokorski.

RIMSE not a good fit for you?

Check out some of UC San Diego's other summer programs that pursue research in materials science: