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Engineering student set to study nuclear power policy during 9-week D.C. internship

For Abbey Hageman, nuclear is one of many interests

Abbey Hageman in a lab wearing lab coat, gloves and face protection, using tongs to hold a small cup with pink liquid, which she is pouring into a pan. Another person, facing away from the camera, is in the background.

Undergraduate researcher Abbey Hageman pours glass April 27 in Professor Carlson鈥檚 lab.

Engineering student set to study nuclear power policy during 9-week D.C. internship

For Abbey Hageman, nuclear is one of many interests

Undergraduate researcher Abbey Hageman pours glass April 27 in Professor Carlson鈥檚 lab.

Abbey Hageman in a lab wearing lab coat, gloves and face protection, using tongs to hold a small cup with pink liquid, which she is pouring into a pan. Another person, facing away from the camera, is in the background.

Undergraduate researcher Abbey Hageman pours glass April 27 in Professor Carlson鈥檚 lab.

College is about exploring: so goes the aphorism found in recruitment pamphlets.

For College of Engineering junior Abbey Hageman, whose interests range from nuclear power to biomaterials, it’s a way of life.

This June, her attention will focus on nuclear power policy as she heads to Washington, D.C. to participate in the nine-week Washington Internship for Students of Engineering (WISE) program. She is one of a handful of students from across the nation to participate in WISE this summer. To be selected, students must be nominated by one of the engineering societies that sponsor the program: in Hageman’s case, that was the American Nuclear Society (ANS).

Abbey Hageman sits at a desk with a microscope, looking at the camera
Abbey Hageman will participate in the WISE program this summer in Washington, D.C.

“It offers a unique opportunity to meet legislators and learn about the legislative process,” Chemical & Engineering faculty member Nick Tsoulfanidis, who taught Hageman last spring, said. 

During the WISE program, Tsoulfanidis wrote, participants attend a series of seminars to learn how government officials make decisions on complex technological issues and how engineers can contribute to legislative and regulatory policy issues. Each intern completes an independent research project and paper dealing with a technology policy issue.

Hageman also has a little inside information on WISE — her brother, Matthew Hageman, a graduate student at Oregon State University, went through the program last year.

“Life is funny,” she said about the coincidence.

Pursuing many interests

Hageman, who is majoring in materials science with minors in math and mechanical engineering, has a wide range of academic and personal interests. Nuclear power caught her attention after taking Tsoulfanidis’ Nuclear Materials class last spring. She became involved with the student chapter of ANS and even developed a program for middle school-aged Girl Scouts to help them earn the Get to Know Nuclear badge. In April, she attended the ANS Student Conference in Knoxville, Tenn.

She fits in time to pursue other interests: Wolf Pack Marching Band, Society of Women Engineers, Engineering Earthquake Research Institute and Material Advantage, a student program for materials science and engineering. In February, she added another activity: research assistant for Chemical & Materials Engineering Associate Professor Krista Carlson.

And so, these days in Carlson’s lab, Hageman has been making microspheres — small, spherical particles made from glass — for use in biomedical applications; in this case, dental pulp capping materials used in an attempt to prevent root canals.

This work has led to an interest in biomimetic materials: the development of synthetic materials that mimic natural materials.

It’s a lot, but Hageman seems determined to make it work. 

“I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” Hageman joked.

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