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The Interactive Technology Forum gives researchers creative ways to present their work.

Want your research to be highly visible and remembered long after the conference ends?

Then, think about presenting your research and technology in a new and innovative approach to poster sessions—the Interactive Technology Forum—at ICC4.

“The ICC Interactive Technology Forum will be much more than a 21st Century poster session. With LCD displays, tablets, and laptops for displaying simulations and 3D visualizations, we expect to provide a richer experience for presenters and participants alike,” says Katherine Faber, meeting organizer and professor at Northwestern University.

Soon to be gone are the days of plain posters tacked up on bulletin boards. The wave of the future will be interactive multimedia presentations. Companies and institutions already use a technology-incorporated format for presentations. More and more, traditional presentations are morphing into a multi-media enriched format with a hands-on approach.

Chris Dosch, materials scientist at GE Global research, explains how multimedia presentations were a success at this year’s (internal) GE TechFest.

“In order to showcase the work being done here at GE’s Global Research Center in a more creative and contemporary way, traditional poster presentations were discouraged this year at our internal TechFest. It was an overwhelming success. The key was getting viewers to interact with your display. Instead of wandering around an exhibit hall skimming posters, people were fully engaged in the presentations. In all presentations, the increased engagement resulted in more interest/understanding which in turn led to many fruitful discussions which may not have occurred if a poster on the same topic had not peaked someone’s interest as they walked past.”

Not everyone has used this form of poster presentation but many are excited about trying it out.

“If the general audience (at ICC4) is anything like me, they don’t read the poster top-down from the abstract to the conclusions. The interactive technology presentations give the presenter the opportunity to lead the discussion by controlling the sequence of the delivery and therefore receive more focused feedback from their audience,” says Michelene Hall, founder, Excelerant Ceramics.

To take part in this innovative forum, submit your abstract by Jan. 17, 2012. For more information on the Interactive Technology Forum, visit the ICC4 homepage.

The International Congress on Ceramics will be held July 15-19, 2012 in Chicago. To learn more about this dynamic meeting, visit the ICC4 homepage

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The Ceramic Leadership Summit opened with an audience-driven discussion on business opportunities featuring, from left, Rod Lanthorne (Kyocera), Joel Moskowitz (Ceradyne) and David Morse (Corning).

For two students who are used to attending technical conferences like MS&T and ICACC, the experience at the first Ceramic Leadership Summit was an exciting departure from the conference norm.

The Summit, held June 21-22, 2010 in Baltimore, Md., replaced the typical research presentation sessions with content that was far more global in its perspective. Discussions focused on technologies and materials that could shape the future, from energy, to medical, to military technology. A session on global business trends gave insight into the predicted growth of a large number of aspects of the ceramics/materials industry, and even the products that were driving those areas of the market. For example, the growth of the lithium-ion battery market was surprisingly traced to a recent surge in sales of electric bikes in Asia.

Of particular interest, though, was the education session, directed by Doreen Edwards (Alfred University) and Wayne Huebner (Missouri S&T). Edwards’ talk on education curricula led to a discussion amongst the roughly 200 attendees (nearly 60% of whom were from industry) about subjects that should be included in undergraduate coursework. Some of the subjects mentioned were energy materials and technology, coatings, and even proper usage of analytical and processing equipment.

Huebner delivered a passionate call-to-arms for members of industry and academia alike, to actively support university ceramics and materials programs across the country, thereby ensuring the graduation of competent engineers able to find jobs in the ceramics industry. Talking with a number of different Summit attendees revealed similar concern for the well-being of today’s students, which is always exciting for those who are currently students to hear.

On the topic of talking with different people, arguably the networking opportunities that came from attending the Summit represented the most exciting part of the two-day event. We met all sorts of people, including alumni from our current schools, researchers and industry representatives. Learning about the different career paths available to students after graduation was a highlight of the event. We found out that graduates could go on to be Congressional fellows charged with bringing materials expertise to legislation passed on Capitol Hill; or they could become 50% of a company’s research and development staff; or they could even go on to become vice-presidents, presidents or CEOs of multimillion dollar corporations such as Ceradyne or Corning.

We were also invited into the Future Leaders Program for members of ACerS’ Young Professionals Network, which meant waking up rather early in the morning to enjoy a pre-conference breakfast, served with a side of leadership training, with young graduates of our field. Friendships were quickly developed during those mornings as we got to know some of the people that would be our coworkers and fellow leaders after we graduated from university life and moved on to our careers.

All of the different aspects of the Leadership Summit came together into a fantastic experience. Over the course of just two days, we learned about some key trends in industry and education that will shape the future that we will step into after graduation. The variety of conversations we participated in also gave us a unique perspective on the ceramics community that cannot be easily gained at a technical conference. Our experience was one that we sincerely hope other undergraduate and graduate students will choose to share through participation in future Summits.

David Shahin is the council chair of ACerS’ President’s Council of Student Advisors at Missouri S&T. Chris Dosch is the recruitment chair of PCSA at the University of Florida.

(Editor’s note: We will be posting videos from the Summit over the next few weeks.)

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