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10 Years and Counting: Materials Science & Technology Conference Builds on Its Record of Success
01/11/2013 - More than 3,200 materials scientists and engineers gathered in Pittsburgh, Pa., from 7–11 October for the Materials Science & Technology Conference and Exhibition (MS&T).
A decade ago, it seemed like a really good idea. A group of leading materials professional societies pooled their resources and wisdom to organize a technical meeting that highlighted and encouraged synergies across disciplines, while enabling common members to participate in the activities of multiple organizations within one event. That idea has since evolved into a really good conference — the Materials Science & Technology Conference and Exhibition (MS&T).
“MS&T is a great example of collaboration,” said James Robinson, TMS executive director and member of the conference leadership team, along with the other organizing society executive directors. “It is rare that four organizations can set aside their unique cultures and agendas to create what is, in essence, an entirely new organization dedicated to the conduct of this event.”
Elizabeth Holm, TMS vice president, echoed this perspective when she kicked off MS&T’12 as the moderator and session chair of the opening plenary, calling the meeting “a unique materials conference organized by a diverse group of societies.”
More than 3,200 materials scientists and engineers gathered in Pittsburgh, Pa., from 7–11 October for MS&T’12. The spirit of collaboration that has marked this meeting from the beginning will be even stronger next year when the Metallurgy and Materials Society (MetSoc) of the Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy, and Petroleum (CIM) joins the MS&T organizing societies — The American Ceramic Society, the Association for Iron & Steel Technology, ASM International, and The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society — and their programming partner, NACE International, for MS&T’13.
Elements of Successful Innovation Highlighted at MS&T’12 Plenary
“Innovation means not just doing good science, but also bringing ideas to the marketplace.” With that comment, Terry P. Smith, technical director, 3M Corporate Research Materials Laboratory, began exploration of the MS&T’12 plenary topic, “Challenges for Materials-Intensive Industries: Consumer Products, Energy and Transportation.” As the first of three speakers, Smith shared how 3M has maintained its competitive advantage through the implementation of a successful innovation framework. Smith noted that a 3M solution generally “mixes and matches” technology platforms and markets. “Technology is shared across the company,” he said. “Something great being developed in one division often can be used by another.”
Other strategies for successful innovation that Smith discussed were the creation of a “strong, centralized research laboratory that serves as a broker of technology,” a coherent strategic vision communicated with all stakeholders, and delineating a clear path focused on 3M’s core technology platforms. “The quality and number of technology transfers are important metrics for us,” he said, although he also noted that investing in innovation often requires patience. Meeting the challenge of delivering technologically complex products to the marketplace “plays to the strength of materials scientists,” Smith said, since success requires a multi-disciplinary approach dependent on basic materials, processing and economic considerations.
While Smith examined the business decisions driving innovation at 3M, Luana Iorio, technology leader — manufacturing technologies, GE Global Research, discussed “innovation accelerators” that her company has adopted to speed delivery of new material systems to market. “The intersection of design, materials and manufacturing is innovation, with software and computational tools facilitating interaction among the groups,” she said. Iorio differentiated this from the conventional approach that dictates materials and manufacturing selection as “a mostly sequential process, with few interactions. This limits design options.”
Iorio continued that the emerging discipline of integrated computational materials engineering (ICME) provides “the framework for collaboration among materials, manufacturing and product design.” She noted that adopting this approach has opened “opportunities to drive new product capability, giving designers new degrees of freedom that will provide long-term competitive advantage.”
Also accelerating the design cycle at GE has been the utilization of additive manufacturing “to quickly produce and test new design concepts,” said Iorio. She discussed how additive manufacturing enables far greater geometric complexity of materials than conventional processing at a much lower cost, allowing for more customized solutions and holding “great promise to tailor material properties in unprecedented ways.”
The challenge of optimizing both ICME and additive manufacturing, Iorio said, is “too broad for a single company to do alone. Collaboration is essential with universities, companies and national laboratories.”
Matthew J. Zaluzec, senior technical leader and manager — global materials and manufacturing research, Ford Motor Co. Research and Innovation Center, echoed the themes of cross-disciplinary interaction and organizational collaboration emphasized by the previous two speakers. Zaluzec’s presentation covered how the automotive sector contends with industry-specific issues rising from high-volume applications, stringent safety regulations and aggressive fuel economy targets. “We are not necessarily inventing new materials, but rather driving improved quality, performance and safety at competitive costs. We tend to focus on teaching existing materials new tricks,” he said.
Zaluzec noted that Ford’s efforts have generally focused on advanced high-strength steels, but aluminum, magnesium and carbon fiber composites also offer new opportunities, enabled by ICME techniques and practices. Like Iorio, Zaluzec urged collaboration to ensure the fullest potential of ICME. To emphasize this point, Zaluzec closed his presentation with a quote from Henry Ford: “Coming together is a beginning, staying together is progress, and working together is success.”
— The above text is courtesy of TMS.
The AIST Adolf Martens Memorial Steel Lecture
In 2010, AIST’s Metallurgy — Processing, Products & Applications Technology Committee established the Adolf Martens Memorial Steel Lecture to honor the recipient’s significant contributions to the ferrous metallurgy community. Adolf Martens was a pioneer in establishing structure-property relationships in steel and one of the first researchers to utilize optical microscopy to observe that hard steels have different features than soft steels at the microscale. The award recognizes significant technical accomplishments or a lifetime of notable contributions in ferrous physical metallurgy processing and product applications. In 2012, the honorary lecture was presented by Anthony J. DeArdo from the University of Pittsburgh. His lecture was entitled, “The Microstructure of Steel: A Modern View of an Ancient Material.”
AIST Metallurgy Technology Division Awards
The AIST Metallurgy Technology Division presented several awards at MS&T’12, in addition to the Adolf Martens Memorial Steel Lecture. The awards, presented by AIST’s Metallurgy — Processing, Products & Applications Technology Committee, were as follows:
• The 2012 Jerry Silver Award was presented to Courtney A. Nowill, John G. Speer, Emmanuel De Moor and David K. Matlock for their paper entitled, “Effect of Austenitizing Conditions on Hardenability of Boron Added Microalloyed Steel.”
• The 2012 Richard J. Fruehan Award was presented to Pallava Kaushik, Hongbin Yin, Howard M. Pielet and Michael L. Lowry for their paper entitled, “How to Evaluate a Process for Clean Steelmaking and Quality Control.”
• The 2012 Gilbert R. Speich Award was presented to J. Arruabarrena, Pello Uranga, Beatriz López and José M. Rodriguez-Ibabe for their paper entitled, “Carbide Spheroidization Kinetics in a Low-Alloy Medium-Carbon Steel: Relevance of Deformation After Transformation.”
Material Advantage: Students at MS&T’12
More than 840 students attended the MS&T’12 conference in Pittsburgh, Pa. In addition to the technical sessions, students had the opportunity to participate in many Material Advantage activities.
Student programs kicked off with the Material Advantage Chapter Leadership Workshop on Sunday, 7 October. More than 65 chapter leaders learned about the four partnering societies and the major benefits each organization offers. They learned how to manage a Material Advantage chapter and shared ideas on how to increase membership and raise funds.
Students also competed in the Material Advantage Student Speaking Contest semi-finals, where contestants were narrowed down to four participants for the finals. All contestants received US$300 for travel expenses. The winners of the 2012 student speaking contest were:
· Winner: Spencer Wells, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
· 1st Runner-Up: Ruilong Ma Northwestern University
· 2nd Runners-Up: Jennifer DeHaven, Missouri University of Science & Technology, and Emily Fucinato, Pennsylvania State University
The contestants in the semi-final rounds were evaluated by a volunteer panel of judges: Marissa Reigel of Savannah River National Laboratory, Sarah Mansuetti of Rex Heat Treat, Sumin Zhu of Vesuvius Research, and Will Pinc of University of Arizona. Final round judges included: Brian Gilmore of Texas Instruments, RFAB, Kelly Dallas of ArcelorMittal USA, and Leigh Duren of Nichols Portland-Parker Hannifin.
Also on Sunday, entries for the undergraduate poster competition were displayed. Judging took place on Monday. On Tuesday, the poster entries for the graduate student poster contest were judged. The winners of the 2012 student poster contests were:
· Material Advantage Graduate Student Poster Competition:
o 1st Place: Solaiman Tarafder, Washington State University, “Effect of Local Alendronate Delivery on In Vivo Osteogenesis From PCL-Coated 3D-Printed β-TCP Scaffolds”
o 2nd Place: Owen James McGann, University of Sheffield
o 3rd Place: Jesse Angle, University of California–Irvine, “Thermal Measurements of 3- and 4-Phase Ceramic Composites using OOF2 Analyses”
The winners were selected by a volunteer panel of judges consisting of: Alex Cozzi of Savannah River National Laboratory, Pello Uranga of CEIT, Ed Sabolsky of West Virginia University, Will Pinc of University of Arizona, and Tony Rollet of Carnegie Mellon University.
· Material Advantage Undergraduate Student Poster Competition:
o 1st Place: Nathan Reeves, Walla Walla University
o 2nd Place: Samantha MacIntyre, Shippensburg University
o 3rd Place: Aeriel Murphy, University of Alabama
The winners were selected by a volunteer panel of judges consisting of: James Hemrick of Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Mike Alexander of Riverside Refractories Inc., Connie Herman of Savannah River National Laboratory, and Will Pinc of University of Arizona.
While the semi-final round of the speaking contest was under way, two additional programs were offered for the students. This year, a panel of students served on a committee to evaluate the session topics and select presenters. The students who served included:
· Zahra Ghanbari, Colorado School of Mines
· Anthony Ventura, Lehigh University
· Troy Ansell, Oregon State University
· Kevin Strong, University of Washington
· Scott Middlemas, University of Utah
First was the Material Advantage Career Forum, where representatives from different materials-related careers introduced themselves to the students. The representatives talked about their backgrounds and career decisions that led to their current positions. The students had the opportunity to ask questions of the panel to assist them in the difficult task of making their own career decisions.
The Career Forum Panel included Kelly Dallas of ArcelorMittal USA, Roger Narayan of North Carolina State University, Geoffrey Brennecka of Sandia National Laboratory and Ron O’Malley of Nucor Corp.
Next was the Material Advantage Graduate School Forum, where representatives from different universities and current graduate students introduced themselves to the students. The representatives talked about their backgrounds, the pros and cons of attending graduate school, as well as the process for selecting the right program. The graduate students talked about their backgrounds, why they chose to attend graduate school, and how they made their decision to attend graduate school. The presenters were Dr. Doreen Edwards, dean and professor of materials science and engineering at Alfred University, and Kevin Strong, a graduate student at the University of Washington.
The third session was the Art of Networking, presented by Troy Ansell from Oregon State University and Chris Dosch from GE Global Research.
The new session for 2012 was Communication Skills: Presenting Technical Information, presented by Dr. Robert Heard from Carnegie Mellon University. Dr. Heard’s session focused on oral and poster presentations, as well as best practices when using visual tools such as PowerPoint.
The final activity on Sunday was the Material Advantage Student Mixer, always a highlight for the students. More than 450 students, most wearing their school colors, networked with leaders from the four partnering organizations, representatives from companies participating in the Professional Career Pavilion, society members, and the Material Advantage staff liaisons.
On Monday afternoon, United States Steel Corporation hosted 26 students on a tour of the Mon Valley Works, Irvin Plant, near Pittsburgh. The students enjoyed seeing first-hand the processes involved in steelmaking.
Monday evening, the AIST Foundation presented the Steel to Students Recruiting Reception. About 115 students attended and met with recruiters from 10 steel companies that sponsored the event. [logos: AK Steel, ArcelorMittal, Carpenter, Ellwood Group Inc., Gerdau, Nucor, SSAB, Steel Dynamics Inc., TMK IPSCO and U. S. Steel.]
Tuesday, 9 October included the Material Advantage Ceramic Mug Drop Contest. In the contest, students entered their mugs, fabricated from ceramic raw materials, which were then judged on both aesthetics and breaking thresholds.
· Winners: Wen Yang and Rudi Bredemeier, both from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
· Most Aesthetic Mug: Rebecca Mullen, Missouri University of Science & Technology, and An Dang, University of Washington
The speaking contests and poster contests are organized by the Ceramic Educational Council, and the mug drop is organized by Keramos, all on behalf of Material Advantage.
The exhibit hall also included the Career Pavilion. Students were provided lunch and encouraged to visit the companies in the pavilion. Activities wrapped up with the Material Advantage Student Awards Ceremony, hosted by the Material Advantage Committee chair, Leigh Duren. The winners of Material Advantage contests were congratulated and presented with awards.
AIST Foundation trustee William King presented awards to five of the AIST scholarship winners during the ceremony. The AIST Foundation funds 10 one-year scholarships of US$3,000 annually, and the following four recipients received their awards:
· Haley Cherniuk, Virginia Tech
· Jason Hebert, University of Alabama
· Catherine Smith, Illinois Institute of Technology
· Bradley Potter, Case Western Reserve
In partnership with AISI, AIST awards a Premier Scholarship to the top-scoring applicant from all applications received. The recipient receives US$10,000 toward tuition in their junior year, a paid summer internship during the summer, and an additional US$10,000 in their senior year. This year’s winner was Lindsay Golem from Missouri University of Science & Technology.
In addition to the MS&T contest awards, the 2012 Material Advantage Chapter of Excellence Awards were announced. All active chapters were scored based on criteria for programming, career development, service, social activities and chapter management. The 2012 Chapters of Excellence winners, winning $400 each, were: Missouri University of Science & Technology, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Washington State University and Virginia Tech. The Most Outstanding Chapter Award went to Iowa State University.
The AIST Foundation is one of the sponsors of the Materials Camp, presented by the ASM Materials Education Foundation, on the exhibit show floor. During the two-day camp, 430 local high school students learned about various materials and their properties. Riverside Refractories has supported this program by sending their staff to work the AIST demonstration, and they worked over the summer to develop a new 3D video with Purdue University, featured in the AIST Foundation tent. MCC International also sponsors the camp and donated safety glasses (530 pairs) for all of the students.
Submit Your Abstract for MS&T’13
The MS&T organizers are pleased to welcome the MetSoc Conference of Metallurgists (COM) as their newest programming partner when MS&T’13 travels to the Palais des congrès de Montréal, Que., Canada, 27–31 October 2013. MetSoc’s strong focus on extractive and processing metallurgy will not only expand the conference’s technical programming, but also enrich the intersociety sessions and activities that have become an MS&T standard. MS&T’13 will once again be organized by The American Ceramic Society, the Association for Iron & Steel Technology, ASM International, and TMS, with NACE International returning as a sponsor.
Abstracts for MS&T’13 will be accepted until 15 March 2013. For additional information on the MS&T’13 technical program, as well as abstract submission instructions, visit the conference website at www.matscitech.org.
This article was featured in the January 2013 issue of Iron & Steel Technology.
