Three Physics and Astronomy students presented posters at the Spring Undergraduate Research Festival (SURF) on April 3 at the University Capitol Centre.

The Iowa Center for Research by Undergraduates hosts SURF, held in celebration and recognition of undergraduate researchers' contributions to research, scholarly, and creative work at the University of Iowa. It is a low-stress platform for undergraduate students to practice communicating their research, scholarly, and/or creative work to a broad audience. Many students use SURF as a platform for presentation practice in preparation for conferences or professional development events.

Noah Wessels was awarded the Andrew Nelson Poster Prize for having the top Physics and Astronomy poster at SURF.

Physics and Astronomy students who presented posters are listed below with their major(s), expected graduation date, faculty mentor, and poster title:

Will Meiners (Physics and Astronomy, Spring 2025)
Mentor: John Prineas 
Ultrafast Spectroscopic Characterization of Long-Wave Infrared Photodetector Devices

Noah Wessels (Physics, Spring 2025)
Mentor: Denis Candido
Topological Magnons in the Bi-layer Honeycomb Ferromagnet

Mary Haag (Astronomy, Physics, Spring 2024) 
Poster 1- Mentor: Lori Adams (Iowa Sciences Academy)
Burning Bright: How I wrote a children’s book about the Sun
Poster 2- Mentor: Allison Jaynes (Physics and Astronomy)
Verifying a Machine Learning Algorithm for Detecting Aurora