COD Student Spends Summer Working on IceCube Neutrino Project

College of DuPage student Robert Zill of Burr Ridge is spending his summer at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls working on IceCube, the Antarctic-based neutrino cosmology experiment.

IceCube, a particle detector telescope located at the South Pole, records interactions of nearly massless subatomic particles called neutrinos. The telescope searches for dark matter that can reveal the physical processes associated with the origins of the highest energy particles.

Zill's internship is going so well that he has already been selected as a backup candidate to travel to the McMurdo Research Station in Antarctica and the South Pole during winter break.

"I am so excited that I am even being considered to go to Antarctica," he said. "I am thankful to Professor Tom Carter for pointing me in this direction. I was in his office asking about a homework problem one day, and I wasn't even thinking about applying for internships. But after talking about it with Dr. Carter, I decided it couldn't hurt to apply."

During the internship, Zill is mostly working in the lab on the actual sensors, called digital optical modules or DOMs, that go down into the ice at the South Pole.

"They really did a good job of looking at each intern's background and placing them with the project that best fits their interests," he said. "It has been extremely easy to become friends with all the other interns and we hang out on the weekends and after work all the time."

Zill has always been interested in the sciences. In fact, it's rare for him to earn other than top grades in science or math classes. College of DuPage has particularly developed and enriched his love of science.

"I've had some great teachers at COD along the way who have motivated me to be the best I can be," he said. "They really have helped me to develop as a person."

Zill will pursue a bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering at Northern Illinois University, where he has received the Leadership Tuition Program Scholarship Award. He would eventually like to earn a doctorate degree but is open to any opportunities that come along, including the possibility of traveling to Antarctica next winter.

"I enjoy learning and discovering new things," he said. "I think the world does not value research as much as it should, and yet it is the most important aspect of human life right now."

For more about the COD Engineering program, email codengineering@cod.edu or visit www.cod.edu/engineering.