EMA 2012: Beautiful weather beckoned conferees outdoors during the break. Credit: ACerS.
2013 will be a big year for big meetings, and January starts of with two of ACerS’ biggest: the Electronic Materials and Applications meeting and the 37th International Conference and Exposition on Advanced Ceramics and Composites. Society divisions organize both meetings.
First up is EMA, coorganized by the Basic Science Division and the Electronics Division, and will be held Jan. 23-25 in Orlando, Fla. I attended this meeting for the first time last year and was warmly welcomed by the community. Attendees I spoke to enjoyed the specificity of the meeting and the accessibility of the talks. There are some concurrent tracks, but for the most part, the meeting is small enough to allow a deep dive into the symposia that pertain to your field.
EMA organizers are rolling out three new symposia this year: Structure and Properties of Interfaces in Electronic Materials, Ceramic Composites for Defense Applications, and Nanoscale Electronic Materials and Devices. These new symposia are testing new avenues of exploration, and seem tailor-made to tie in with recent, high profile initiatives, such as the Grand Challenges’ call for improved understanding of interfaces and oxide electronics and the Materials Genome Initiative. Full details on all 16 symposia are available in the technical program.
Other highlights include three plenary speakers, a student-organized symposium highlighting student research, a poster session, and conference dinner, as well as meet-and-greets for young professionals, and “old” ones, too. As of today, we are expecting the largest attendance ever—225 attendees—big enough to be worthwhile, small enough to be satisfying. We would love to see you there, too.
The following week, Jan. 27-Feb. 1, the 37th ICACC will convene in Daytona Beach, Fla. This is the official meeting of the Engineering Ceramics Division. Each year, as part of the meeting, organizers host a special “international summit” to highlight work taking place in a particular geographic region. This year’s summit will focuses on the Americas. Also, building on last year’s success, ICACC planners will host a second Global Young Investigators Forum, which will take place Monday and Tuesday, to showcase the research of graduate students from around the world. GYIF organizers hail from Sweden, Singapore, Germany, Spain, and the United States.
The five-day meeting features three plenary speakers, the Mueller Award lecture, and 13 full symposia of technical programming in addition to the two special events already mentioned. There are also four “Focus Sessions,” which are smaller sessions for covering newer, emerging topics. As of now, we are expecting more than 1,000 attendees!
A vendor and customer talk shop at the 2012 ICACC Expo. Credit: ACerS.
Two other parts of ICACC warrant special mention. First—the Exposition at ICACC is a perennial highlight. Nearly 70 vendors will be there to talk to customers about their equipment, supplies, characterization, testing, etc. needs. Plenty of delicious refreshments, a poster session, and the student Schott glass drop contest, make networking easy. If the full technical meeting is more than you need, consider an Expo-only registration for $60 and come network with the vendors and attendees.
Finally, the short course, “Mechanical Properties of Ceramics and Glass,” will be Jan. 31-Feb. 1. Stuff breaks. Do you know why? The instructors, George Quinn and Richard Bradt, are fracture experts who explain the science behind failure.
I’ll be at EMA, and Peter will be at ICACC. We are easy to find—we carry around the no-nonsense camera—and would love to talk to you about your work and maybe even take your picture!