The Grainger College of Engineering

Celia M Elliott

Celia M Elliott
Celia M Elliott
  • Instructor
(217) 244-7725
215 Loomis Laboratory

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Biography

Celia Elliott is an academic professional with extensive experience in grant and proposal writing and journal publishing. She works closely with the department head and associate heads to develop external and internal resources to allow the department to meet its missions of education, research, and public service, and she works with faculty to increase external funding of their research programs.

In addition to her administrative responsibilities, Celia has been involved with the development of the senior thesis sequence for undergraduate physics majors since its inception in 2000. She is currently team-teaching (with Professor Taylor Hughes) a course on technical communications and research skills, Physics 496. In Spring 2013, she assisted Professor Lance Cooper with a new writing course for graduate students, PHYS 595. Celia has also contributed to the development of programmatic activities for the department's NSF-sponsored "Research Experiences for Undergraduates" program since 1996.

Physics words to live by: Never confuse motion with action--Benjamin Franklin
You must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool--Richard Feynman

Research Statement

From 1993 to 2008, Celia assisted former nuclear weapons and bioweapons scientists from the former Soviet Union (FSU) to adapt to their new world, traveling to the FSU 34 times. She has helped them write technical reports and scientific papers in English, prepare proposals for Western funding agencies, and find U.S. collaborators so that they can redirect their research to peaceful civilian applications. She has presented workshops on these topics at Moscow State University, Moscow Engineering Physics Institute, the Institute of Theoretical and Experimental Physics (Moscow), the Science Information Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow), the Institute of Physics and Power Engineering (Obninsk), the Institute of Metal Physics (Ekaterinburg), the Institute of Chemical Physics (Chernogolovka), the Science and Technology Center (Nizhnyi Novogorod), Tomsk Polytechnical University, Kemerovo State University, the State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology (Koltosovo), South Ural State University, the State Research Center of Applied Microbiology (Obolensk), the Russian Federal Nuclear Center/Institute of Experimental Physics (Sarov), and the Russian Federal Nuclear Center/Institute of Technical Physics (Snezhinsk).

Supported by the U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and Sigma Xi, Celia has conducted training workshops on grant-writing and Internet resources for scientists for the Moldovan Research and Development Association, the National Foundation for Science and Technology of Armenia, the Georgian Research and Development Foundation, and the Azerbaijan Academy of Sciences. She conducted workshops for scientists in Tbilisi, Georgia and Baku, Azerbaijan in June 2003, Odessa, Ukraine in October 2004, and Almaty, Kazakhstan in September 2006.

Celia is the author of two books that have been published in Russian by the International Science and Technology Center, one on preparing grant proposals and one on preparing scientific papers for publication in Western technical journals. Her work in Russia was featured in the November/December 2004 issue of the UI Alumni Association magazine.

Resources for Proposal Writers

Resources for Technical Writers and Students

Chapters in Books

  • "Rosalyn Yalow," Women and Ideas in Engineering: Twelve Stories from Illinois," eds. Laura D. Hahn and Angela S. Wolters (University of Illinois Press, Urbana, Illinois, 2018), pp. 55-61.
  • "Joan Mitchell," Women and Ideas in Engineering: Twelve Stories from Illinois," eds. Laura D. Hahn and Angela S. Wolters, (University of Illinois Press, Urbana, Illinois, 2018), pp. 43-46.

Selected Articles in Journals

Articles in Conference Proceedings

Honors

Recent Courses Taught

  • PHYS 496 - Communicating in Physics
  • PHYS 496 - Intro to Physics Research

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