The following is the first of two reports on Iranian students and scientists at Stanford. Part two will run in Wednesday's issue of The Stanford Daily (reprinted with permission)

Mahdiyar Noorbala's acceptance letter to Stanford's highly competitive physics doctoral program was only the first step in an arduous journey from Iran to California. After a multitude of embassy visits, visa interviews and background checks, the Iranian citizen arrived at Stanford in 2006 � almost a year after he was originally set to begin his graduate studies.

Noorbala's is one of many cases in which a U.S.-bound Iranian student has been delayed by ramped-up security measures put in place following the attacks on September 11, 2001 [1], and President Bush's declaration that Iran is a member of an " axis of evil [2]."

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