[Image above] ACerS President’s Council of Student Advisors held their annual business meeting on the Friday and Saturday before ACerS Annual Meeting at MS&T24. This year’s delegates consist of 53 students from 28 universities, representing 10 countries. Credit: ACerS

 

When the COVID-19 pandemic swept across the world in 2020, the world of scientific conferences was turned upside down. Professional societies scrambled to adopt unfamiliar virtual formats, and almost as quickly, they needed to determine the safest way to hold in-person gatherings again.

ACerS staff and members have worked diligently to navigate this path back to live events. These efforts paid off last week during the Society’s 126th Annual Meeting at the 2024 Materials Science & Technology technical meeting and exhibition, which took place Oct. 6–9, 2024, in Pittsburgh, Pa.

MS&T is an annual event cohosted by The American Ceramic Society; The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society (TMS); and the Association for Iron & Steel Technology (AIST). This year, more than 2,900 attendees from 59 countries attended the conference and exhibit, including more than 740 students. This attendance outpaced MS&T 2023 attendance by more than 250 and even outpaced MS&T 2019 attendance (pre-pandemic) by nearly 100.

“I am proud to recognize the hard work of ACerS members and staff that allowed us to attract so many attendees at this year’s MS&T,” says Mark Mecklenborg, ACerS executive director. “We look forward to continuing this growth next year and finding meaningful ways to enhance the quality of this meeting for our global ceramics, glass, and materials communities.”

Below are highlights from ACerS 126th Annual Meeting at MS&T24.

Strategic plan nears finalization

After an intensive year-long effort, outgoing ACerS president Rajendra Bordia announced that the Society’s latest strategic plan is nearing completion during the Annual Business Meeting on Monday, Oct. 7.

Every few years, ACerS conducts a strategic planning process to set overarching goals for the Society. The new plan, which covers the period 2025–2028, will be posted online in December 2024.

One goal of the new strategic plan is to expand engagement with and support for international members. Several initiatives in this vein have already been implemented. For example, the first ACerS International Chapter in South America was established in Brazil, and the Society now offers reduced dues membership options for professionals and graduate students who currently reside in developing and underdeveloped countries according to the World Bank.

In addition to helping implement the recommendations from ACerS strategic plan, incoming ACerS president Monica Ferraris said her priorities in office will focus on three “Ms”: members, meetings, and marketing.

“I am more than honored” to help the Society improve its offerings in each of these areas, Ferraris said during the Annual Meeting.

Incoming ACerS president Monica Ferraris, left, accepts the ceremonial ceramic gavel from outgoing ACerS president Rajendra Bordia during the Annual Board Meeting. Credit: ACerS

Award lectures highlight advanced material functionality and design

Every year, humans push the limits on designing materials for ever-more extreme and complex environments, including in space, the body, and high-end electronics. The award talks at this year’s Annual Meeting demonstrated a few of these applications.

The award talks started on Monday morning with the Arthur L. Friedberg Ceramic Engineering Tutorial and Lecture, given by University of California San Diego professor Olivia Graeve. She leads the Xtreme Materials Laboratory at UC San Diego, and she explained the importance of controlling the shape (crystallography) of ceramics to achieve desired material functionality in extreme environments. She dedicated the lecture to the late Joanna McKittrick, who was her undergraduate advisor and then colleague at UC San Diego.

On Tuesday morning, Young-Wook Kim, senior vice president of Worldex Industry & Trading Co., Ltd. and professor emeritus of the University of Seoul, delivered the Edward Orton Jr. Memorial Lecture on “Silicon carbide: The versatile ceramic alloy.” He extended the point made in Graeve’s lecture about the effect of microstructure on a material’s behavior. Specifically, he showed how silicon carbide can be either thermally or electrically insulating or conductive depending on how it is processed.

Young-Wook Kim, left, accepts the Edward Orton Jr. Memorial Lecture certificate from outgoing ACerS president Rajendra Bordia. Credit: ACerS

Later Tuesday morning, two parallel award sessions serendipitously demonstrated the use of glass in different applications. In the first session, University of Adelaide professor Heike Ebendorff-Heidepriem delivered the Cooper Session Distinguished Lecture on the types of glass used in optical fibers. She was followed by this year’s Cooper Scholar recipient, student Patrick E. Lynch of Alfred University, who discussed ultrasound-assisted thermal processing of chalcogenide glasses, which are known for their applications in the infrared spectrum.

Meanwhile, a few rooms over, Corning glass development scientist Qiang Fu delivered the Tadashi Kokubo Award lecture on the industrialization of bioactive glass, pulling examples from his own research and discussing remaining challenges. He was followed by this year’s Bioceramics Young Scholar recipient, postdoctoral researcher Nicolas Somers of the University of Liège, who talked about using photonic rather than thermal methods to cure 3D-printed bioactive glass.

On Tuesday afternoon, Semiconductor Energy Laboratory president and CEO Shunpei Yamazaki delivered the Rustum Roy Lecture on the development of indium oxide semiconductors to replace silicon electronics. He brought a replica of the first 300-mm indium oxide large-scale integrated wafer, which is expected to enter commercial production within the next few years.

Shunpei Yamazaki shows off a replica of the first 300-mm indium oxide large-scale integrated wafer during the Rustum Roy Lecture. Credit: ACerS

On Wednesday, the last two award lectures took place in the morning and afternoon, respectively. First, University of Delaware professor Chandra Reedy delivered the Anna O. Shepard Award Lecture on the enduring legacy and innovation of Anna Shepard’s thin-section petrography approach to archaeological ceramics analysis. Later, University of Missouri professor Wai-Yim Ching delivered the Robert B. Sosman Lecture on computational modeling of complex materials.

Ching was unable to attend the conference in person, and so he submitted his lecture as a recorded presentation. University of Missouri postdoctoral research Puja Adhikari accepted the award on Ching’s behalf and paid tribute to his “unwavering work ethic” throughout the years.

Emerging professionals mix fun and education through targeted competitions and events

As usual, ACerS Annual Meeting featured several targeted events for students and young professionals, which provided them the chance for both fun and learning during the conference.

On Sunday, students competed in the annual Undergraduate Student Speaking Contest, which provides students the opportunity to practice communicating their research to a broader audience. This year, David Flores of The Pennsylvania State University took home first place, Ray Tsai of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and Julianne Chen of The Pennsylvania State University tied for second, and Anthony Conte of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey placed third.

Finalists of the Undergraduate Student Speaking Contest. From left: David Flores, Ray Tsai, Julianne Chen, and Anthony Conte. Credit: ACerS

Also on Sunday, the Mentor Mixer gave participants in ACerS’ four Mentor Programs the chance to mingle with each other. People who want to be involved in the programs next year can apply on the ACerS website.

On Monday, the Young Professionals Breakfast Club provided members of the Young Professionals Network a chance to mix with ACerS Corporate Partners, building connections and possible job opportunities.

Also on Monday, the Ceramic and Glass Industry Foundation hosted the IGNITE MSE symposium and career panel luncheon. This program, which debuted a year ago at MS&T23, runs in conjunction with selected conferences affiliated with The American Ceramic Society. It provides an opportunity for undergraduate and graduate students to explore professional development and career opportunities. It also includes the opportunity to submit a poster on the broader impacts of scientific research to the larger poster session on Tuesday.

The winners from this year’s poster session include

Undergraduate posters

  • First place: Dylan Burke, University of North Carolina at Charlotte
  • Second place: Sarah Cole, Boise State University
  • Third place: Hanyu Pan, Carnegie Mellon University

Graduate posters

  • First place: Casey Zhang, The Pennsylvania State University
  • Second place: Prapassorn Numkiatsakul, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
  • Third place: Fumiya Kimura, Yokohama National University

Besides the poster session, the famous mug drop and disc golf competitions took place on Tuesday. These annual events, hosted by Keramos, challenge students to fabricate ceramics that can withstand heavy impacts, and each year conference attendees flock to witness the students’ successes and failures.

This year, Laura Klusendorf from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign took home first place in the mug drop competition. Her mug survived a drop from 270 cm. Additionally, Kaylyn Courtney from the Colorado School of Mines was announced as having the most aesthetic mug.

In the disc golf competition, both Josiah Gifaldi and Cole Harsa from Virginia Tech successfully made it into the basket from a maximum distance of 9 meters. Meanwhile, Ray Tsai from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign was announced as having the most aesthetic disc.

Students from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (second row, hands raised) celebrate the survival of Laura Klusendorf’s mug after a drop during the competition. Credit: ACerS

Visit the ACerS Flickr page for more photos from ACerS Annual Meeting at MS&T24. Pictures from the Awards Banquet can be found there as well. Next year, ACerS 127th Annual Meeting at MS&T25 will take place in Columbus, Ohio, from September 28–October 1. We look forward to seeing you then!

Author

Lisa McDonald

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