This summer, Burr Ridge resident Robert Zill did some light reading — literally.
Zill, a student at Northern Illinois University, spent his summer internship helping to get readings from light sensors on a particle detector telescope at the South Pole. He was part of the University of Wisconsin-River Falls’ IceCube project, an Antarctic-based neutrino cosmology experiment.
IceCube is a particle detector telescope at the South Pole that records interactions of nearly mass-less subatomic particles called neutrinos.
Zill said he took measurements of the LED lights at the South Pole from the River Falls campus. The NIU junior said work he was doing was graduate school-level stuff.
“I learned a lot about spectrometers and physics lab,” Zill said. “We had to write things down in notebooks and calculate errors. It was crazy. We all had to present and have collaboration. IceCube has its own Wikipedia page; and we had our own page where we listed everything we did.”
Zill said he loved the Friday phone conferences where individuals from Germany and other countries would talk about what they were working on as part of IceCube, as well as share their readings and findings.
He was so successful in his internship that he was chosen as a backup for the two students picked to travel to the McMurdo Research Station in Antarctica and to the South Pole during winter break.
“I am super excited about the opportunity. I really hope it happens although I don’t wish harm on somebody,” Zill said.
Not being a UW student, Zill was surprised by even the backup selection.
“I am keeping my fingers crossed,” he said. “The number of people who have been to the South Pole is not that many.”
Not bad for a guy who didn’t even finish high school. Zill dropped out of Lyons Township High School his junior year.
“I had to figure out what I wanted to do,” Zill said.
Once he did figure things it, it was full steam ahead. He earned his GED with a score of 98 percent and started his studies at COD in 2009. Going to school part time, he thrived during his time at the community college.
It was while in COD professor Tom Carter’s office that he saw a poster seeking students to go to the South Pole as part of a program internship.
“I said it sounding interesting and that I would apply for it,” Zill said. “Dr. Carter said why not do it for the summer, that they needed people for their internships. I was the first applicant. They did not even have everything up on the website yet.”
Zill said he did not hear anything for a while and in late September of last year got an internship at Argonne National Laboratory. It was shortly thereafter that he heard that he was selected for the IceCube project.
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“I went to the people at Argonne and told them about the opportunity,” Zill said. “They said take the summer off and come back in the fall and work there. As one professor said, I got to have my cake and eat it too.”
Zill said liked the research aspect of his summer employment and likely will pursue such avenues as a career.
“I think I want to go into research more than industry,” Zill said. “I am going into mechanical engineering with a focus on sustainable energy. I am a big tree hugger.”
Kevin Beese is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.