A research team led by an assistant professor in the department of mechanical engineering at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor has received a five-year, $6.8 million multidisciplinary university research initiative award from the US Air Force Office of Scientific Research in Arlington, Va., to study heat transfer between materials, a challenge for engineers building jet engines, nanoscale transistors and personal electronics. The investigators will use ultrafast lasers in an x-ray technique that allows them to watch the vibrations of the atoms that carry heat across an interface. Using nanotechnology, they will reengineer the surfaces of materials to regulate the flow of heat. The team is made up of scientists and engineers from three universities, including Brown in Providence, R.I., and the University of California, Santa Cruz.