AMERICAN CERAMIC SOCIETY bulletinceramics.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/lo_res... · 4 American Ceramic Society Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 6 news & trends Reinforced Plastics (published

bulletinA M E R I C A N C E R A M I C S O C I E T Y

e m e r g i n g c e r a m i c s & g l a s s t e c h n o l o g y

JUNE/JULY 2009

ACerS launches new glass journal and website •

Nominations for Fellows •

MS&T: ACerS pre-meeting planner and new symposium •

Ceramic education:Educators, students and employers discuss changes forced by jobs, enrollment and research

Ceramic education:Educators, students and employers discuss changes forced by jobs, enrollment and research

1American Ceramic Society Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 6 1American Ceramic Society Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 6

contentsfeature articlesACerS Education Special Report

An end … or evolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12An overview of the state of ceramic and material sciences higher education in the United States

What employers want from schools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15The ‘consumer’ perspective

Positioning for a career . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19Students’ views on their careers and training

Capitolized . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19Impact of new research and federal stimulus funding will leave a big imprint on academia

MS&T Program Highlights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33• ACerS Calendar of Events . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34• ACerS Lectures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35• ACerS Short Courses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36• Exhibitors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37• MS&T’09 Student Activities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

departmentsNews & Trends . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3• Report: U.S. demand for reinforced plastics to reach 3.6

billion pounds in 2013 • Europium’s superconductivity discovered• Concrete’s role as CO2 absorber may be underestimated

People in the Spotlight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

ACerS Spotlight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7• MS&T’s new symposium to target emerging ceramic opportunities;

registration opens• ACerS launches new glass research journal• New Ceramic Transactions series available• Call for nominations for 2010 Fellows• Society leader elections

Ceramics in the Environment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10• Could LED light bulbs replace CFLs?

Research Briefs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19• A carbon nanotube device that detects rainbow colors• Graphene remains exciting research topic at MIT

J u n e - J u l y 2 0 0 9 • V o l . 8 8 N o . 6

Research BriefsA carbon nanotube device that detects rainbow colors - page 39

Ceramics in EnvironmentCould LED light bulbs replace CFLs? - page 10

cover storyCeramic Education:Educators, students and employers discuss changes forced by jobs, enrollment and research - page 11

2 American Ceramic Society Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 6American Ceramic Society Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 6

columnsRefractory Hot Line . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25Passing the gavel

Inside the Beltway . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32Obama science budget: “better than almost any other constituency”

Glass Facts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 GMIC launches career center to help match career opportunities with available skills

ámorphos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48Lessons from the road

resourcesNew Products . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Calendar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44Classified Advertising . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45Display Advertising Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

contentsJ u n e - J u l y 2 0 0 9 • V o l . 8 8 N o . 6bulletin

AMERICAN CERAMIC SOCIETY

Executive Staff Scott Steen, Executive Director, [email protected] G. Spahr, Publisher, [email protected]

Editorial and ProductionPeter Wray, Editor ph: 614-794-5853 fx: 614-794-4505 [email protected] Greenman, Contributing EditorBetsy Houston, Contributing EditorTess M. Speakman, Graphic Designer

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American Ceramic Society Bulletin covers news and activities of the Society and its members, includes items of interest to the ceramics community, and provides the most current information concerning all aspects of ceramic technology, including R&D, manufacturing, engineering and marketing.

American Ceramic Society Bulletin (ISSN No. 0002-7812). ©2009. Printed in the United States of America. ACerS Bulletin is published monthly, except for February, July and November, as a “dual-media” magazine in print and electronic format (www.ceramicbulletin.org).

Editorial and Subscription Offices: 600 North Cleveland Avenue, Suite 210, Westerville, OH 43082-6920. Subscription included with American Ceramic Society membership. Nonmember print subscription rates, including online access: United States and Canada, 1 year $75; international, 1 year $131.* Rates include shipping charges. International Remail Service is standard outside of the United States and Canada. *International nonmembers also may elect to receive an electronic-only, e-mail delivery subscription for $75.

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ACSBA7, Vol. 88, No. 6, pp 1–48. All feature articles are covered in Current Contents.

OfficersJohn Kaniuk, PresidentEdwin Fuller, President-electL. David Pye, Past PresidentArun Varshneya, TreasurerScott Steen, Executive Director

Board of Directors Rajendra Bordia, Director 2008-2011Donald Bray, Director 2006-2009Richard Brow, Director 2006-2009Carol Handwerker, Director 2007-2010Michael Hoffmann, Director 2008-2011William Kelly, Director 2008-2011John Mecholsky, Director 2006-2009David Payne, Director 2007-2010Kathleen Richardson, Director 2008-2011David W. Johnson Jr., Parliamentarian

Spectrometers

3American Ceramic Society Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 6

Report: U.S. demand for rein-forced plastics to reach 3.6 billion pounds in 2013

The research firm Freedonia Group claims that demand for reinforced plastics is forecast to grow 2.8 percent yearly to 3.6 billion pounds in 2013 which their researchers say is valued at $7.4 billion. Of interest to the ceramic and glass community is that Freedonia reports that this will create a market for 1.3 billion pounds of reinforcements.

It says the growth in demand will is being driven by advances in “reinforced plastics’ light weight and excellent performance and design capabilities,”

and reductions in raw materials and assembly time. The material is expected to continue to be key in construction, automobiles and commercial aircraft.

Freedonia says the demand for glass fibers in the production of reinforced plastics is forecast to expand 2.6 per-cent per annum to 1.3 billion pounds in 2013. Glass fibers, researchers say, pro-vide good mechanical properties, chem-ical resistance, processing versatility, and favorable price and performance criteria. The company’s report notes, “Generally speaking, reinforced plastics (composites) are more expensive than other materials such as steel and alu-minum in applications such as motor vehicles because production is more

complicated and line speeds are slower. Nonetheless, glass fiber reinforced plas-tics are price competitive with steel and aluminum in small volume applications, where complex shapes are prohibi-tively expensive to form from metal, and where light weight or high levels of corrosion resistance are mandated.”

news & trends

Year

Item 1998 2003 2008 2013 2018Reinforced Plastics Demand 3125 3235 3165 3640 4060 % glass fiber reinforced 98.7 98.5 97.3 96.0 94.5 Glass Fiber Reinforced Plastics 3085 3185 3080 3495 3835 % glass reinforcement loading 34.4 34.5 35.7 35.9 36.0 Source: The Freedonia Group, Inc.

Glass Fiber Reinforcement Demand (million pounds)

American Ceramic Society Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 64

news & trends

Reinforced Plastics (published 05/2009, 297 pages) is available for $4,600 from The Freedonia Group, Inc., 767 Beta Drive, Cleveland, OH 44143-2326. (Visit: www.freedoniagroup.com.) n

Concrete’s role as CO2 absorber may be underestimated

The June issue of the Journal of Environmental Engineering is all

about “Recent Developments in CO2 Emission Control Technology” includ-ing lots of ceramic-related information.

For example, there is an article that suggests that concrete (and its constitu-ent Portland cement) is not quite the villain some have thought when it comes to CO2 emissions. CO2 produc-tion in making cement and concrete is a concern and comes from three sources: the decarbonation of limestone, kiln fuel combustion and vehicles used to carry and distribute the cement and concrete.

Older studies have indicated that small amounts of CO2 can be slowly absorbed through the formation of cal-cite. Since concrete structures are often in place for years, the speed of this reac-tion isn’t really a problem (although it can cause integrity problems when rebar is present). But this new study asserts that significant amounts of CO2 are also being absorbed through non-calcite mechanisms, increasing the total CO2 removed from the atmosphere and lowering concrete’s overall carbon footprint.

From the abstract: “This research focuses on other carbon dioxide seques-tration species within concrete. It is hypothesized, and has been shown in some cases, that many other dissolved carbon dioxide complexes exist within the cement paste matrix, as they do in many aqueous-based systems and also that carbonate species other than calcite may exist. It is shown that carbon dioxide species, other than cal-cite, do exist in cement paste samples in amounts that are significant with respect to the stoichiometric potential for reversing the calcination process.” n

Europium’s superconductivity discoveredA duo from Washington

University in St. Louis reports they have for the first time found a way to tap the superconductivity properties of europium.

In work funded by the materials research division of NSF, WUSTL professor James Schilling and then-doctoral student Mathiewos Debessai found that europi-um becomes superconduct-ing at 1.8 K (-456°F) and 80 GPa (790,000 atmospheres) of pressure, making it the 53rd known elemental superconductor and the 23rd at high pressure. Schilling and Debessai used a diamond anvil and coil system to conduct their measurements.

“It has been seven years since some-one discovered a new elemental super-conductor,” Schilling said. “It gets hard-er and harder because there are fewer elements left in the periodic table.”

Europium isn’t an obvious super-conductor. As a rare earth element, its natural magnetic properties actu-ally run counter to superconductivity. “Superconductivity and magnetism hate each other. To get superconduc-tivity, you have to kill the magne-tism,” Schilling explained.

However, the researchers were armed with the insight that europium should be the easiest of the rare earths to lose magnetic properties under high compression. “When europium atoms condense to form a solid, only two electrons per atom are released and europium remains magnetic. Applying sufficient pressure squeezes a third electron out and europium metal becomes trivalent. Trivalent europium

is nonmagnetic, thus opening the possibility for it to become supercon-ducting under the right conditions,” Schilling said.

“Theoretically, the elemental sol-ids are relatively easy to understand because they only contain one kind of atom,” Schilling said. “By applying pressure, however, we can bring the elemental solids into new regimes, where theory has difficulty under-standing things. When we understand the element’s behavior in these new regimes, we might be able to duplicate it by combining the elements into dif-ferent compounds that superconduct at higher temperatures.”

Schilling and Debessai’s findings are published in a recent issue of Physical Review Letters in an article titled “Pressure-induced Superconducting State of Europium Metal at Low Temperatures.” Schilling is also presenting their research at the International Conference on High Pressure Science and Technology in July, 2009, in Tokyo, Japan. n

Inside of the diamond cell: In the middle is the coil system around the diamond anvil, which picks up the shielding signal from the superconducting sample.

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people in the spotlight

Wicks, Knight lauded by AΣMThe Alpha Sigma

Mu Honorary Society for Material Science and Engineering has named George Wicks a Distinguished Life Member. The award is the organization’s highest honor and is conferred

upon a select few whose technical attain-ment and contributions to the society through leadership in the field of materi-als science and engineering have resulted

in significant benefits to mankind. Wicks is a consulting scientist at the Savannah River National Lab.

In addition, Drexel University materials science professor Richard Knight has been named an Alpha Sigma Mu Fellow. Fellow status is a new award within the group and is granted to professionals from the materials com-munity who are in the middle of their careers and have

distinguished themselves in industry, gov-ernment, education or management. n

Carty earns double honors for excellence in teaching at Alfred University

William Carty, professor of ceramic engineering in the Kazuo Inamori School of Engineering at Alfred University, received not one, but two, Excellence in Teaching Awards dur-ing the University’s annual Honors Convocation. It’s the second time he’s won double honors.

This year, as he did in 2006, Carty received the John F. McMahon Award for Excellence in Teaching, an honor reserved for those who teach in the University’s statutory engineering pro-

grams, and a Joseph Kruson Trust Fund Award for Excellence in Teaching, a uni-versity-wide honor.

Carty joined the Alfred faculty in 1995 and was named a full profes-sor in 2002. n

Alfred University grad student receives Corning Foundation fellowship

John Rich, a student in the Ph.D. program in glass science in the Kazuo Inamori School of Engineering at Alfred University, has been named a Corning Incorporated Foundation Science Fellow.

Wicks

Knight

Carty

6 American Ceramic Society Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 6

Rich is a member of the Material Advantage student organization.

Rich was selected by a faculty com-mittee from among the Ph.D. students enrolled in the school of engineering, based on his academic performance and research proposal. His current project, “Metallic Colloid Formation in Glass,” will explore the formation of metallic nanoparticles in glasses through expo-sure to a hydrogen-rich atmosphere.

“The possibility of creating metallic alloys in glasses and understanding the mechanisms that govern this reduction process is exciting and appears to be very promising,” said Rich. n

Messing tackles new editing post Pennsylvania State University pro-

fessor Gary L. Messing has been tapped

to be the new editor-in-chief of the Journal of Materials Research. Messing, a past president of ACerS, has published more than 250 papers and co-edited 13 books on various aspects of ceramic processing.

Messing was co-editor of the Journal of the American Ceramic Society from 1993 to 1998, editor-in-chief of Ceramics International and principal editor of Materials Letters from 2003 to 2009.

Messing is the head of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Penn State. He is an ACerS Fellow and has received numer-ous awards for his research and leader-ship in the field of ceramics, including the Richard M. Fulrath Pacific Award and the ACerS Robert M. Sosman

Memorial Lecture. In 1999 he was elected to the World Academy of Ceramics. In 2003 Messing was rec-ognized as one of the most “Highly Cited Researchers” in materials and was honored with the International Award of the European Ceramic Society for his international collaborations. In 2005 he received the Outstanding Educator Award of the Ceramic Education Council of ACerS and in 2008 was elected president-elect of the International Ceramics Federation. n

Armed with a concept of con-verting greenhouse gases to syngas (see March 2009 Bulletin), a team of University of Toledo students and faculty earned an Honorable Mention award and a $1,000 prize during an annual competition sponsored by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in which science–engineering–business teams vied for the opportunity to con-nect with venture capitalists.

The UT team consisted of one engineering student, two business students and two coaches, including engineering professor Abdul-Majeed Azad. The UT team was among more than 30 teams who initially submit-ted proposals to ORNL’s 2009 Global Venture Challenge.

The merit of the UT team’s idea earned it and 14 other groups an invi-tation to ORNL to compete in late March for a $25,000 top prize. There, they faced two additional rounds of grueling screening. Ultimately, the judges placed UT in the final round with teams from Clark Atlanta University/Morehouse College, Duke University, Lund University, Purdue University and University of North Carolina, Charlotte.

“We did fight very well in the finals for the top prize of $25k, but couldn’t connect to the venture capitalist judges’ outlook for a great business model, despite present-ing a radically innovative idea to combat global warming due to greenhouse gases,” reported the UT team.

“But talking to ORNL people and other par-ticipants and based on the feedback from the judges in all the rounds, we realized that our concept struck a cord with a greater audience, as it offers a totally new and value-added concept of mitigating GHGs. We were placed among the ‘honorable mention’ team of the finalists, which in itself is a great honor. We received a citation and will also receive a $1,000 award,” the team spokesman also said.

In related news, UT presented Azad with the school’s Outstanding Faculty Researcher Award for the 2008–2009 academic year. Each year, UT recogniz-es the quality and contributions of fac-ulty research by presenting the OFRA. The award recognizes outstanding research, scholarship or creative activ-ity in any field, discipline or area at the university, and Azad was so nominated by fellow faculty members. (See www.globalventurechallenge.com) n

Toledo student team places high in ORNL’s Global Venture Challenge

A business proposal to tackle greenhouse gases gained the UT team members recognition at ORNL’s Global Venture Challenge. Team members, left to right, are team coaches Azad and busi-ness professor Sonny Ariss, along with MBA candidates Jona-than Johnson and Emily Sack, UT R&D staffer Samuel Giles and chemical engineering graduate student Desikan Sundararajan.

people in the spotlight

Messing


ACerS launches new glass research journalInternational Journal of Applied Glass Science to be published in partnership with Wiley-Blackwell

After nearly a year of behind-the-scenes planning, ACerS announced in late May that it is launching a new journal on advanced glass research. This new, peer-reviewed periodical will be called the International Journal of Applied Glass Science.

The journal’s debut is timely as new generations of glass and glass-related materials are increasingly being called upon to play a role in many of the world’s emerging technologies, includ-ing energy, medicine, transportation, construction, environment, optics and defense.

“IJAGS will be an important addi-tion to ACerS offerings,” said ACerS President John Kaniuk. “We see this as an indispensable source of information on the application of glass science and engineering across the entire materials spectrum, encompassing the descrip-tion, application, modeling, experimen-tal investigation and manufacture of glass materials.”

L. David Pye, dean and professor emeritus of glass science, at the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University has agreed to serve as the founding editor of the new journal. Pye will be aided by an international advisory board that includes luminaries in the field, including Mario Affatigato (Coe College), Richard Brow (Missouri University of Science and Technology), Manoj Choudhary (Owens Corning),

Alexis Clare (Alfred University), William Fahrenholtz (MS&T), Hua-Tay Lin (Oak Ridge National Laboratory), David Morse (Corning Inc.) Alexander Marker (Schott USA), Kathleen Richardson (Clemson University), Emilio Spinosa (Owens Illinois) and George Wicks (Savannah River National Laboratory).

Pye, who is the immediate past presi-dent of the Society, said he is honored to serve as the founding editor. “IJAGS will advance all of the branches of materials science and engineering, and it will support the growing role of glass applications throughout society,” said Pye. He said the journal would be published quarterly, with the first issue being released in March 2010.

The production of IJAGS will be done in partnership with Wiley-

acers spotlight

North America’s broadest materi-als conference is less than five months away, so it is time for attendees to start thinking about registration and crafting their meeting schedules. The conference runs Oct. 25–29, 2009, in Pittsburgh, Pa., at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center.

There is a timely new feature for MS&T’09: Organizers have added a new symposium that will delve into the new and improved ceramic mate-rials that are enabling scientists and engineers to develop important new energy-efficient and environmentally friendly applications and technolo-gies. The session, called “Emerging Opportunities for Ceramic Science and Engineering,” will be held Tuesday, Oct. 27, 2009.

The new symposium will start with reports from the winners of ACerS Corporate Environmental Achievement (SELEE Corp.) and Corporate Technical Awards (A123 Systems). These presentations will highlight their successful efforts to reduce emissions problems with ceramic filters, and a new and revolutionary battery tech-

nology that was made possible by the development of new ceramics.

Two other talks in the session focus on high-performance materials, includ-ing thermoelectric materials that con-tribute to environmentally friendly and energy-efficient devices and systems for vehicles. The final two presentations discuss opportunities for luminescent and optical ceramics to be used in various applications pushing the limits of efficiency and the prospect of trans-forming medicine by using ceramic scaffolds for tissue engineering.

Emerging Opportunities symposium events and presentations:

ACerS Corporate Environmental Achievement Award Presentation – SELEE CS-X: Development of a Phosphate-Free Reticulated Ceramic Foam Filter for Aluminum Cast Houses, Rudolph Olson, manager of R&D, SELEE Corporation

ACerS Corporate Technical Achievement Award Presentation – Nanophosphate Lithium Ion Battery Technology, Yet-Ming Chiang, founder, A123 Systems, professor of ceramics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Design of Ceramic Processing for Designed Microstructure and Functional Properties, Toshihiko Tani, Toyota Research Institute of North America

Opportunities and Challenges for Automotive Thermoelectric Applications, Jihui Yang, General Motors R&D Center

Luminescent and Optical Ceramics, Madis Raukas, Osram Sylvania

Ceramic Scaffolds for Tissue Engineering, Antoni P. Tomsia, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

Register nowMS&T’09 organizers are now

accepting registrations for the confer-ence. Registration options include online registration and mailed or faxed registration forms. Online registration and print registration forms are avail-able at www.matscitech.com.

Online registration is available.Nonmember students must mail or fax in their registration using a spe-cial form that also is available on the MS&T website. n

MS&T’s new symposium to target emerging ceramic opportunities; registration opens


acers spotlight

Blackwell. ACerS and Wiley-Blackwell already have a strong publishing track record and jointly produce the Society’s Journal of the American Ceramic Society and the International Journal of Applied Ceramic Technology, among the most cited ceramic publications in the world.

“I am delighted that ACerS has given Wiley-Blackwell the opportunity to extend our partnership by publish-ing this new journal together,” said Jon Walsmley, vice president and managing director, professional publications, of Wiley-Blackwell. “This is a hot subject-area with significant potential. It is typical of ACerS to be looking to build for the future and it is a privilege to be a part of ACerS’s exciting vision.” n

New Ceramic Transactions series available

ACerS Bookstore now features the just-published volumes of the Ceramic Transaction series featuring:

Materials Innovations in an Emerging Hydrogen Economy (Ceramic Transactions Vol. 202); G. Wicks, J. Simon, editors; 256 pages, published March 2009; $125.

Processing and Properties of Advanced Ceramics and Composites (Ceramic Transactions Vol. 203); Narottam P. Bansal, J.P. Singh, editors; 266 pages, published May 2009; $125.

Advances in Electroceramic Materials (Ceramic Transactions Vol. 204); K.M. Nair, D. Suvorov, R.W. Schwartz, R. Guo, editors; 210 pages, published June 2009; $125.

Advances in Energy Materials (Ceramic Transactions Vol. 205); Fatih Dogan, Navin Manjooran, editors; 168 pages, June 2009; $99.95.

ACerS members receive at least 20 percent off the retail price when ordering online. To order, visit the ACerS–Wiley website (www.ceramics.org/bookstore), enter code CERAM in the Promotion Code field during the checkout process. Make sure to click the Apply Discount button so the dis-count is calculated in the final price.

Shoppers should note that the discount does not apply to shipping and han-dling and applicable taxes.

The same discount can be used for the other great ceramic science and engineering books available at the ACerS Bookstore although sale items, subscriptions, supplements, electronic products and sets (unless otherwise noted), and Pfeiffer annuals are excluded. Free shipping, when offered, is available only within the 50 United

States and only via UPS Ground. Free shipping to Hawaii, Alaska and Puerto Rico is via two-day air. Offers cannot be combined for additional discounts. All orders must be paid in U.S. dollars. Prices subject to change. FOB shipping points: Somerset, NJ and Harrisonburg, VA. Shipping and offers may not be available online outside the U.S. Discounts do not apply to online orders from Asia because these orders are ful-filled through Amazon. n

Call for nominations for 2010 Fellows It’s time to submit nominations for

the ACerS 2010 Class of Fellows. The deadline for nominations is Sept. 4, 2009 (for elevation to Fellow in Oct. 2010).

If you wish to submit a nomination, go to the awards page at www.ceram-ics.org to download a nomination form. Please note that this form has been revised and is different from that used in previous years.

The nominee, as well as all spon-sors, must be active members of ACerS. A one-page cover letter from the first sponsor, setting forth the qualifications of the nominee, must accompany the nomination. Single-page endorsement letters from additional members may accompany the nomination. Nominations are active for four consecutive reviews by the Panel of Fellows. Contact Marcia Stout (see below) if you are not sure if a nomination is active.

A note to sponsors: There is a length restriction of three pages on Fellows nominations. This limit is strictly enforced. Nominations that exceed the length restriction will be returned.

Also note that there is a new sig-nature policy. In the past, all sponsors had to submit original signatures. ACerS Board of Directors recently approved a change so that faxed and scanned signatures are now accept-able.

Signatures may be sent to head-quarters on separate forms, but make

sure that the nominee’s name is on the form.

If someone already has been nomi-nated and his or her nomination is still active, and if that nominee has had additional accomplishments since the time the nomination was submitted, sponsors may send an update for consid-eration. However, the three-page length restriction also applies to updates.

General criteria for nomination Fellows should:

• Be persons of good reputation;• Have reached their 35th birthday; • Have been members of the Society at least five years continuously at the time of nomination; and• Have made outstanding contribu-tions to the ceramic arts or sciences through broad and productive scholar-ship in ceramic science and technol-ogy, by conspicuous achievement in ceramic industry or by outstanding service to the Society.

All nominations submitted by Sept. 4, 2009, will be considered for eleva-tion to Fellow at the October 2010 ACerS Annual Meeting in Houston, Texas.

Nominations should be sent to Marcia Stout via mail (ACerS, 600 N. Cleveland Ave., Ste. 210, Westerville, OH 43082), faxed (614-794-5881) or email [email protected]. Any ques-tions concerning the nominations pro-cess should be directed to her by email or by phone at 614-794-5821. n


Society leader electionsThe election of ACerS board of directors and president-

elect, along with the election of division and class officers, is taking place from June 25 to July 25, 2009. The nine directors of the board are elected to staggered three-year terms. This year, six candidates are running for the three open board seats.

Biographical information and a statement from each candi-date are in the May issue of the Bulletin. Statements from the three Basic Science Division secretary candidates are on the division web page. Voting and ballot information will be sent to ACerS members by email and regular mail later in June. Members will be able to vote one of three ways: cast a vote online, return a ballot by mail or return a ballot by fax. Voting information will soon appear online.

Questions regarding the elections should be directed to Marcia Stout, [email protected]. The members’ vote and voice are important to the future of ACerS. All are encouraged to take this opportunity to elect the next leaders of ACerS. n

Be a Mentor or Mentee through ACerS Mentoring Program

ACerS mentoring program matches experienced engi-neers, scientists, educators, and business professionals with young professionals and graduate students in the ceramic materials field.

ACerS will match participants based on area of focus (e.g. electronics, energy, glass, etc.), career path (e.g. academia, business, research, etc.), or geographic proximity. When a match is made, the Society will notify the mentor and men-tee, and provide contact information and additional resource materials. Together, the participating individuals determine their expectations and how to best structure their relation-ship. ACerS encourages participants to stay involved for at least one year and participants can extend this relationship as desired. The mentor-mentee relationship may be largely based on phone and email contact, or may extend to face-to-face meetings if convenient and desirable.

The role of the mentor may include providing career advice and guidance, introducing your mentee to other pro-fessional colleagues, and hosting a mentee at a conference or in your laboratory or plant. Mentees may request career guidance, ask for professional advice, or exchange ideas with their mentor about current research, trends, and develop-ments in the field of ceramic materials and technologies.

To learn more or to sign up, go to www.ceramics.org/?page_id=224. n

RemindersSign up for summertime web seminars and short courses

The Society is offering several new and convenient edu-cational and training opportunities, including one online

offering and three intensive two-day short courses. See the ACerS website for details on these courses.

Web Seminar: Test Standards and Specifications for the Global Advanced Ceramics Market – Status, Needs and Challenges. Date: Aug. 12, 2009, 1:00 p.m.–2:30 p.m. EDT. $95 for ACerS members ($145 nonmembers). Site access participation, allow-ing unlimited viewers at one location is $225 for members ($325 nonmembers).

Short Course: Introduction to Ceramic Phase Diagrams. June 29–30, 2009. ACerS headquarters, Columbus, Ohio. ACerS members - $675, nonmembers - $765, students - $225.

Short Course: Fundamentals of Glass Science and Technology, July 13-14, 2009. ACerS headquarters, Columbus, Ohio. ACerS members - $675, nonmembers - $765, students - $225.

Short Course: Ceramic Injection Molding. Sept. 16-17, 2009. Double Tree, San Diego, Calif. ACerS members - $675, nonmem-bers - $765, students - $225.

Call for award nominationsThe Electronics Division and the Glass & Optical

Materials Division are soliciting nominations for awards


continued from 9, ACerS Spotlight to be presented at the ACerS 111th Annual Meeting, combined with MS&T, in Pittsburgh, Pa., Oct. 25–29, 2009.

Detailed nomination criteria can be found on the ACerS website. Any questions about the nominations should be sent to Marcia Stout, [email protected]. The deadline for making nominations in these categories is July 10, 2009:

• Edward C. Henry Best Paper Award

• Lewis C. Hoffman Scholarship• Alfred R. Cooper Scholars Award

Calls for Papers The deadline submitting abstracts

for two important meetings is com-ing up quickly. The deadline is July 12, 2009, for submissions for the 34th International Conference and Exposition on Advanced Ceramics and Composites, to be held Jan. 24–29, 2010, in Daytona Beach, Fla. Information on the meeting can be found at www.ceramics.org/?page_id=2668.

The deadline is Sept. 21, 2009, for the new Materials Challenges in Alternative & Renewable Energy Sources meeting, to be held Feb. 21-25, 2010, Cocoa Beach, Fla. Information about the meeting can be found at www.ceramics.org/?page_id=2706. n

In Memoriam Randall (Randy) Ragan – 2009 David W. Kellerman – 2009

Obituaries can be found on the ACerS website, www.ceramics.org/?page_id=7082

ceramics in the environment

The Netherlands-based Lemnis Lighting Co. has introduced a new 6-watt LED light bulb during the 20th Lightfair International in New York, May 3–7, 2009. Lightfair International describes itself as the world’s largest architectural and commercial lighting trade show and conference.

Lemnis claims that the new 6-watt LED bulb is equivalent to a 60-watt incandescent bulb and that it can be used with dimmer switches. The new bulbs contain no mercury, a concern with compact fluorescent light bulbs. The company also suggests that the LED bulb will last about 35,000 hours – eight times longer than CFLs.

Company founder Warner Philips suggests that the new 6-watt LED bulb, the “Pharox LED Light,” could replace current incandescent and CFL light bulbs. Philips says, “CFLs are officially an outdated technology. You can’t recycle CFLs. You can’t get a fully dim-mable product. That should make them obsolete.”

“When we as individuals take even one small step toward reducing our carbon footprints, the collective positive impact on the environment

is extremely significant,” says Frans Otten, chairman of Lemnis Lighting. “Lighting accounts for up to 20 percent of our global energy consumption. This Earth Day, if every American house-hold switched four 40-watt light bulbs to Pharox LED bulbs, the United States would save $113 billion in energy costs over the lifetime of the Pharox bulbs.”

Lemnis currently sells a 5-watt LED bulb for about $35.00, down from $40.00 six months ago. It currently is sponsored by Clinton Climate Initiative in Europe, where 2.5 million bulbs are expected to be distributed. The compa-ny expects to sell the 6-watt version for about $50.00 via the Amazon online marketplace. Lemnis believes that the higher price will be recovered in the long lifespan of the bulb.

Some concerns have been expressed about the LED bulbs. One is that the LED bulbs used in enclosed fixtures appear to have their life span reduced by 25 percent. Another is that the LED bulbs have an advertised output of about 300 lumens, while 60-watt incandescent bulbs have an output of 900 lumens.

More about Lemnis Lighting Co. can be found at www.lemnislighting.com. n

Could LED light bulbs replace CFLs?

The Pharox III is reported to be a dim-mable, high-efficient warm white LED light bulb. With a 6-watt power consumption, it is said to deliver a thermally stabilized output of approx 300 lumens, replacing up to a 60-watt incandescent lamp, or up to an 11-watt CFL. The “bulb” contains no mercury, emits no UV light, is RoHS com-pliant and boasts of a 35,000-hour life-time. It comes in E26, E27 and B22 bases.


Jennifer Sowash

c o v e r s t o r ybulletin

An end … or evolution?

Decades ago, it would have

been hard to imagine ceramic science engi-neering in the state it is today, nearly extinct as a stand-alone field of study. Indeed, for more than 100 years, colleges and universities granted bachelor of science degrees in ceramic engi-neering, but through the years – and particularly in the past couple of decades – the demand for discipline-specific

degrees has dropped precipitously. According to ABET (formerly the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology), as of October 2008, only three schools – Alfred University, Clemson University and Missouri University of Science and Technology – held or were seeking CerE accredi-tation. By contrast, more than 55 institutions have or are seeking accreditation under “Materials Science and Engineering. “ (The New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University recently added – and received accreditation for – an MSE program in addition to its CerE pro-gram.)

In their manuscript, “Status and Evolution of Accreditation for Materials Programs in the U.S.,” written for the Journal of Materials Education, G. Slade Cargill III, a pro-fessor emeritus in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Lehigh University, and Chester Van

Ceramics education continues to be altered by job, industry, student concerns and governmet funding

(Photo courtesy of Boise State University)



Tyne, a professor in the Department of Metallurgical and Materials Engineering at the Colorado School of Mines, found that the number of stu-dents graduating with B.S.-level materi-als degrees grew from 817 in 2004 to 963 in 2007, an 18 percent increase. Nearly all were accredited by ABET, and the programs offered “an increas-ingly wider variety of program titles,” wrote Cargill and Van Tyne.

Rudolph Bruchheit, a professor and chairman of Ohio State University’s Department of Materials Science and Engineering, puts it into context: The ascendancy of materials science repre-sents “just one phase across the histori-cal continuum,” he says. “If you go way back to the inception of universities in North America, you find they were, of course, modeled after the English and French Universities,” which had schooling in the arts and letters as their focus.

That continued to be the model that educational institutions continued to follow until the time of the Civil War, when land-grant institutions were com-missioned with the recognition of the need for workers formally trained in disciplines such as as agriculture and manufacturing, Buchheit says. Out of that ethos came studies in mining, the precursor to ceramics and metallurgy courses. “There are still a few mining programs around, but not too many,” says Buchheit.

The ascendancy of metals and ceramics happened in the late 1920s and early 1930s, but by the late 1950s, there was a recognition that metals, ceramics and other materials shared some commonalities, “and it began to make sense to think of those com-monalities as organizing principles,” Buchheit says.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology was the first educational institution to form a Department of Science and Engineering, Buchheit says. “MIT is, of course, absolutely a trendsetter in the physical sciences and engineering, and several other schools followed suit,” he says. (This was due, in no small part, to the Manhattan Project, which MIT participated in and

which brought together scientists in many disciplines.)

According to a history on MIT’s own website, the school’s Department of Materials Science and Engineering traces its origins to the study of metal-lurgy and mining. Indeed, in one of its earliest incarnations, the depart-ment was known as the Department of Mining and Metallurgy. Then, as is now, research was driven by society’s technological needs, and the procure-ment and production of metals served as the department’s focus, according to a history on its website. Through the decades, though, the department changed its name several times, and its disciplines – geology, mining and metallurgy –were repeatedly joined and separated. In 1974, the depart-ment received the name it holds today. According to the department history, “these name changes reflect the grow-ing awareness, both at MIT and in the field, that materials should be studied in terms of their behavior and charac-teristics, rather than by specific class.”

And that awareness, as well as changes in industry and universities’ interest in trimming their administra-tive budgets, have impacted where ceramic-related education is today.

Employment opportunitiesThe new approach to materials

research and engineering is due in no small part to changes in understanding of how seemingly different materi-als can behave in similar ways. That change in perception, which occurred in the 1950s, came thanks to “things like advances in materials characteriza-tions, like electron microscopy, where you look at atomic models for materials behavior,” Buchheit says. “There are commonalities across classes of materi-als and you can teach principles that apply equally well across broad classes of materials.”

Make no mistake, ultimately, mate-rials science programs are affected by the kind of employment opportunities available to graduates. By studying materials – chief among them, ceram-ics, metals, polymers and composites – students can prepare themselves for

jobs in multidisci-plinary engineer-ing sectors, “such as automotive and aerospace manu-facturing, where optimization of material selection is critical,” accord-ing to information from Boise State University, which opened a materials science depart-ment in 2004.

In other words, educa-tion has changed as industry has changed. (The global materials industry is worth an estimated $550 billion, according to information from Boise State.) In the early half of the 20th century, the United States had a labor-intensive manufacturing economy, but now much of that work has migrated aborad, says Buchheit. “What we’re left with are much more technologically sophisticated fields” such as aerospace or computer manufacturing, he says. “Things like that are where we excel now, and so we have to be training our workforce for that.”

The evolution is reflective of the demands of research, says Darryl Butt, a professor and chairman of the Department of Materials Science & Engineering at Boise State. “You need to be a metallurgist sometimes, you need to be a ceramicist sometimes ... but at the same time, I think there has been something lost in this.” Butt says, “If you want to be an expert in ceramic processing, it’s difficult to get a B.S. or a master’s [degree], because there are fewer courses ... really, you’ve lost that ability to go into greater depth in certain areas.” Still, he says, the benefit to research is the ability for those with various backgrounds to “cross-fertilize” their efforts in a way that they wouldn’t be able to without materials science.


Alfred has four courses of study within its engineering offerings: materi-als science and engineering, glass engi-neering science, ceramic engineering and biomedical materials engineering science.

“We’ve seen so much off-shoring of traditional ceramics production that we need to consider where the cur-rent market is,” says Doreen Edwards, a professor of ceramic engineering and materials science at Alfred, where she serves as associate dean of engineering. “... We are poising ourselves to provide what the employers want, but having said that, we have a lot of traditional ceramics companies who ... are still looking for that special set of engineer-ing skills that we’ve been traditionally known for. So, that’s a strong part of our engineering portfolio – and the same goes for glass.”

“You can imagine that there are met-allurgists rotating in their graves right now because we’re no longer teaching extractive metallurgy,” a fundamental component of metallurgy from the 1900s to the mid-1970s or mid-1980s,

says Robert Snyder, a professor at Georgia Institute of Technology and chairman of its materials science engineering school. Courses such as this, and, for another example, cement refractory, are gone, “but they’re not things that need to have remained.” There’s simply not enough space in curriculums to include outdated areas of study, he says. “Whiteware is a mature industry – they don’t hire engineers, they hire technicians. ... The same thing hap-pened in steel and lots of other indus-tries. What we have

to do is follow the trends to the new areas of technology,” says Snyder.

“The engineering and science chal-lenges that are in front of us today, they’re just not going to be answered by using a ceramic, or a material or a composite – it’s about maximizing the strengths of these materials,” says Allen Kimel, assistant professor and associate head for undergraduate stud-ies, Materials Science and Engineering, Pennsylvania State University.

Career-minded students see materi-als as a flexible course of study offer-ing a wide range of well-paying jobs. According the U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics May 2008 National Occupational Employment and Wage Estimates, the mean annual income for materials engi-neers is $84,200.

“Most employers have an under-standing about what materials science is. It’s a broad-based area of people who know a lot of different things,” says Kevin Fox, a senior engineer at the Savannah River National Laboratory, who holds an undergraduate degree

in ceramic engineering from Alfred, and a master’s and Ph.D. in materials science from Kent State University. For his part, Fox says his materials sci-ence background helps him at SNRL. Certainly, there’s always a focus on interdisciplinary work and partner-ships both within our lab and at other national labs and universities ... it’s very useful to have an understanding of other people’s disciplines and background when putting a proposal together.”

“If you go out in the world and have a degree in materials science, I think people understand what that is ... if you go out with a degree in ceramics engi-neering, it might have a different con-text, especially at the graduate level,” says Edwards.

Snyder says, at first he didn’t quite understand why a student would opt for materials science. He says that changed when he spoke to a student who was studying materials science engineering. “I asked, ‘why are you majoring in mate-rials science,’ and he said, ‘why would I want to limit my career possibilities by eliminating the rest of materials,’” says Snyder. At the undergraduate level, students are given “fundamental tools,” says Snyder. “We turn them loose, they are not pointed toward any particular industry.” Generally speaking, more than half of Georgia Tech’s undergraduate students in materials science will go to graduate school, but those who enter the workforce have “a fairly broad offering to pick from,” says Snyder. This year might have been an exception, but generally grads “have a number of offers,” he says.

Many of those with advanced degrees in materials science will go into electronics industries; others will head to government labs and academia. At the graduate level, students work where funding is found, and sources often include NASA, the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health and the military, Snyder says. “Wherever the government puts up funding, that’s where we go – we are market-driven here.”

“I think the skills that we teach, at the end of the day, are applicable to many, many different problems and many, many different materials sys-

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From engineers and researchers on the

lab bench to leaders of international corpora-tions, opinions about what changes in ceramic engineering education means to the profes-sion are as varied as the applications of the materials themselves.

Here are some perspectives from those in the field about the shifting academic landscape.

John Marra, associate lab director, Savannah River National Laboratory

With his bachelor’s in ceramic sci-ence and doctorate in ceramic engi-neering from Ohio State University, Marra’s credentials might give you an opposite impression when it comes to the dwindling number of CerE aca-demic programs and what it means in a professional setting.

“On the job, the distinctions (between MatSE and CerE grads) are quite small,” Marra says. “The general core of the education curriculum is the same for CerE or MatSE.”

Marra says he’s seen the evolution of the academic programs play out during the past decade or so.

“[Of] the graduates we’re seeing and hiring, fewer and fewer even have ceramics in their degree title,” Marra says. “By and large what we’re seeing is that we hire all different types of mate-rials science engineering graduates, but we’re seeing some of the people still have specialties in ceramics, even though their degree says differently.”

SRNL is in the nuclear business, Marra says, which means most of what the researchers and scientists learn, they learn on the job.

“From our standpoint, we do most of the educa-tion once they get here,” Marra says. He offered an analogy likening the hiring process to being a football coach – but with a twist. “Football coaches have specific needs to fill, but what we look for is a good athlete. It’s more impor-tant to hire a good athlete than to hire a specialist.

“In some areas, we do have specific needs and go after someone with a spe-cific background. But most of the time, we’re looking for people with a general background who can become good team members,” he says.

Given his own background, Marra does look on the current state of affairs of ceramic engineering programs with a heavy heart. “From a nostalgia stand-point, it’s sad,” he says. “But from an employer standpoint, I have yet to see the downside.

“It’s not something we have a lot of control over,” he added. “To be honest with you, if I was graduating now, I’d probably want a MSE, because it car-ries with it a broader marketability.”

David Italiano, senior ceramic engineer, Kyocera Industrial

IItaliano sees the decline of ceramic engineering options at the graduate level as a ding to the profession as a whole.

“We do need people with ceramic backgrounds,” Italiano says. “Ceramics is a field where you do need that very focused background to break ground in the field and keep pace. If the degrees

start to be more general, that knowl-edge and expertise is going to be lost.”

The possibility exists, Italiano says, for materials science engineers who specialize in ceramics to keep pace with changes to the field. But he still has misgivings.

“I think there will be a watering down of the knowledge base, especially when it comes to traditional ceramics,” he says.

Ted Wegert, applications engineer, Schott HomeTech N.A.

In his business location, Wegert is one of very few ceramic engineers. He graduated with a Ph.D. in ceramic engineering in the last year Ohio State University offered the option. Wegert says his focus over the past several years has morphed into more mechani-cal engineering and applications for glass and ceramics.

His take on the program change car-ries Italiano’s point to another level. Wegert is also worried about ceramics engineering education merging with materials science engineering – but in his opinion, the switch will dilute an already comparatively weak academic program when perceived on a more global scale.

“For the lower-level degrees, the U.S. engineers have a more generic

The ‘consumer’ perspectiveWendy Hankle

What employers want from schools


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and theoretical overview, whereas the European educated are better able to grasp the practical and apply their training,” Wegert says. “I would expect that numbing down the ceramic engi-neering program to materials science is a step furthering this divide.

“In essence, we are taught to think there, and others are taught how,” he says. Wegert is sure to place his observa-tions within the context of his organiza-tion’s specific applications and products.

Frank Anderson, director of tech-nology, CoorsTek

Though he was not trained as a ceram-ic engineer, Anderson has been working with ceramic materials since 1986. Now 23 years into it, Anderson feels like he still only understands the basics.

“I have found ceramic engineering to be a complex and fascinating field of study,” Anderson says, citing the com-plexity of the materials themselves, the forming methods and diversity found in physical properties and markets.

When it comes to assessing the current trend toward pulling a materials science engineering mantle over ceramic engi-neering programs, Anderson sees hurdles.

“Current CerE graduates already need a lot of on the job training to be productive in a real-world ceramic pro-duction environment,” he says. “While exposure to material systems beyond ceramics in MatSE degree programs is good, it represents a dilution of focus on an area that is inherently very broad and difficult to get one’s arms around.”

Anderson already scratches his head at the disconnect between academic CerE programs and the reality of work-ing in industry. He sees that chasm widening with the current movement.

“Technology trends are going the other way, i.e., toward becom-ing increasingly more specialized and focused,” Anderson says. “There is a cost associated with this dilution.”

Given the breadth of the field of ceramic engineering, Anderson says he sees some places where current programs of study – both CerE and MatSE – could do some work filling in the gaps.

“CerE graduates typically have little to no process experience, and have

worked with very few (if any) different material systems,” Anderson says. “I’d like to see CerE and MatSE programs give students more exposure to what industrial manufacturing processes actu-ally look like. Is there an academic pro-gram that teaches even the basic ideas of statistical process control?”

Joseph Miller, senior vice president and chief technology officer, Corning Inc.

Miller frames the dialogue in a more expansive context. He points to President Obama’s call to further develop research and innovation networks in the United States – and the administration’s inten-tion to back up this renewed plea to the tune of about $400 billion. Miller thinks this support will unleash another wave of innovation across the country.

“[Renewing this spirit of innova-tion] will require strong expertise in advanced materials, advanced ceramics and advanced plastics,” he says. “It will be a challenge to continue to produce engineers and scientists that deal with the very pressing problems facing our society.”

In this context, Miller sees the absorption of ceramic engineering aca-demic programs into a material science department as having distinct benefits.

“I think we need to continue to look for ways of stimulating the interest of the broader scientific and engineering communities, and the only way we can do that is to begin to integrate those programs in ways that the grad students have diversified ways to utilize the capabilities they develop,” he added.

The team concept, Miller says, is key for tackling future problems. “Reaching out and understanding other disciplines is so important because, in a team-based environment, there’s an appreciation for other disciplines,” he says. “This greater appreciation comes from understanding what those disciplines can do.”

Miller does see a dark cloud on the horizon for all materials science aca-demic programs: numbers. “I do think material science programs need to continue to look for ways of integrat-ing their activities with other science and engineering programs on our campuses,” he says. “I’m concerned by

the declining number of graduates in our material science programs,” citing Rutgers and Penn State as examples of this decline.

Steve Dorris, engineer, Argonne National Laboratory

Dorris received his bachelor’s degree in chemistry, Dorris earned a doctorate in materials science from Northwestern University in 1986. He specialized in ceramics at Northwestern and now his work centers on hydrogen separation membranes.

As a graduate of a MatSE program who works in ceramics, Dorris doesn’t observe the current academic trends in a negative light.

“I think it’s a good thing, it gives a broader view of materials and how they function, and what kind of properties we’re looking for in terms of applica-tions,” he says, then points to his own experience. “I’d been exposed to chemis-try with my undergraduate program, and seeing how that related to materials was interesting to me. It also broadened my view of materials science engineering.”

How Dorris’ academic experiences relate to his eventual professional pursuits can shed light on a potential avenue for continuing the training of ceramists for the workforce – ceramic engineering program or not.

“When I was at Northwestern, I chose a field of study that had to do with the professor who appealed to me at the time, and ceramics was his field,” Dorris says. “Coming from chemistry again, there were a lot of different materials problems I could’ve gotten involved with but didn’t know any-thing about any of them, so I based it on that.”

Although the materials science degree has served him well, Dorris does see a shortcoming in the education of students in the field.

“I think there could be more emphasis on fabrication and how to achieve cer-tain ends, for example, how to fabricate films, how to make defect-free films, that sort of thing,” he says. “Perhaps that kind of experience is tied to a specific

continued on page 24




tems. ... Companies are hiring for a skill set, not necessarily a knowledge base,” says Kimel. And over his last six years as a Penn State faculty member, students have “essentially 100 percent placement,” with a near-even number of grads hitting graduate school or heading out into the workforce, Kimel says. “This year, it went decidedly grad school, and it would be very easy to say it’s because of the economy,” he says. Still, he says, the jobs are there, “They were just a bit more competitive, stu-dents had to do some more digging.”

“As usual, the students are leading in this in many ways,” says Pamela Vandiver, a professor of materials sci-ence at the University of Arizona. They’re “aware that they’re going to have several jobs in their lifetimes as their fields change.” With a background in materials science, “they’ll change with it,” she says.

A state of mindIn many respects, it’s hard to paint all

material science programs with the same brush. Some may have originated from ceramics programs, others from metals. Furthermore, what they require of stu-dents may be different, even with pro-grams sharing the same accreditation in, say, materials science and engineering.

For instance, while some may require coursework in a some of the materials themselves, others may not, instead offer-ing such studies as electives. On the grad-uate level, some may have a significant number of students who studied materials science as undergrads, while other pro-grams could see students with degrees in fields as different as ceramics, physics, chemistry, mechanical engineering and chemical engineering. In his experience at Kent State, fellow classmates “came from a variety of backgrounds. Materials science is kind of unique in that it cap-tures a lot of sciences and sort of rolls it all together ... and that’s one of the things that was attractive to me,” says Fox. While he remained focused on ceram-ics while pursuing his advanced degrees, many of his classmates chose other areas of study. It was “helpful to learn from them,” he says.

In truth, the field is “all about teach-

ing students to bring an interdisciplin-ary approach to their studies, “ says Snyder. “And so we still bring the tra-ditional tools that we’ve been teaching for the last 50 years, but we’ve added other tools to the tool box,” he says. Says Kimel, “Companies out there are hiring students for the subset of skills they have in terms of problem-solving or trouble-shooting. In that case, the specialization ... is not as critical as the goal of being able to critically think through a problem, because of the skills they were taught in the materials sci-ence program.” The critical thinking skills taught in materials science are applicable in a variety of fields, he says. “Therefore, U.S. Steel can hire a stu-dent that studied polymers in a materi-als science program because they can use their critical thinking skills in the production of steel.”

“The core thing, at the undergrad level, and truly in the long run, it doesn’t matter if it’s mechanical engi-neering or materials science, what you really have to come away with is the ability to think like an engineer and then turn around and be able to com-municate with other people. If you learn the basics, then, I think, you’re useful in an industrial environment,” says Buchheit.

Truly, says Vandiver, making advances in alternative energy, comput-ers and elsewhere is going to require people in different disciplines working together. “You really do need interdisci-plinary teams,” says Vandiver.

All of that said, “I worry very much about imparting utilitarian engineering skills as we’re drifting away from topical specialties,” Buchheit says. At least one employer says he hopes graduates come out of school with both depth and breadth to their knowledge. “I think we want to have T-shaped people,” says Joseph Miller, senior vice president and chief technology officer, Corning Inc. “We want them to be deep in one area, but they have the capability to move in different directions.”

It’s all about cashOf course, the consolidations are

driven not just by scientific principles

and philosophy, but by pragmatic prin-ciples as well. “Over the last decade or so, many of the traditional ceramics and glass have melded into material sci-ence and engineering, and at Clemson University, where I’m director of mate-rial science, we’re in the process of going through a similar transition,” says Kathleen Richardson. “The hard part of that transition is that the thing you’re most known for – in our case, both in ceramics and in polymer-fiber materi-als – are now being forced, strictly often for fiscal reasons, to consolidate into a single program primarily due to the issues of numbers at the undergraduate level. Because at the end of the day, our undergrad programs are our bread and butter, and as I’m at a state institution, we need to have critical class sizes and critical enrollment to be able to justify maintaining our program.”

“The big trend – or one of the big trends – is what I call the ‘corporatization of academia.’ It’s about returns on invest-ment, revenues and expense. And one of the big revenues is how much tuition you earn,” Buchheit says. But, he says, materi-als science is not an enrollment-driven program. Rather, it’s research-driven. Materials science programs, he says, “tend to be small. The faculty are more research scientists than they are pure educators. ...


and an an eco-nomic model where revenues are driven by enrollments, they are not big earners.”

It’s fair to say that build-ing and sustain-ing undergradu-ate enrollment represents perhaps the biggest chal-lenge for mate-rials science programs, say those involved in such pro-grams. For the most part, students rarely

know much about materials science and engineering when they begin college. By contrast, many are familiar with, say mechanical, civil, chemical or electrical engineering, which struggle less with stu-dent enrollment.

According to the nonprofit Dedicated Engineers, while there do exist college degrees in “General Engineering,” about 98 percent of all engineering bach-elor’s degrees are awarded in a specific discipline of engineering. Dedicated Engineers ranks materials science among the “smaller 10” disciplines (others include Agricultural, Architectural, Engineering Management, Engineering Physics/Engineering Science, Environmental, General Engineering Studies, Mining, Nuclear and Petroleum engineering), which collectively account for less than 10 percent of all engineer-ing bachelor’s degrees awarded annually.

When it comes to undergraduate programs, “There are no schools that are over-enrolled compared to their engineering collegues in something like mechanical engineering. We need more young people coming in,” says Gary Messing, head of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Penn State. “Materials science, as a discipline, is a little bit under attack, because we do not populate the under-

grad classes with enough students so that deans that are looking at budgets and things like that feel justified to maintain those departments,” says Messing.

Penn State has 140–150 undergradu-ate students in material science, and because there are four options within the department, a senior class may only have eight to 10 students. “So, at any time, our senior classes could, by defini-tion, be underenrolled. You sit very pre-cariously on this precipice (within the university). Are you making the best use of their resources? Penn State is not going to require a department to drop a course because it’s underenrolled, but still, it puts you under this more intense spotlight. And with state appropriations decreasing, it becomes a much more feverish pitch,” says Kimel.

Graduate programs are doing better, “because there are very large gradu-ate populations and they bring a lot of research funding,” Kimel says.

Low enrollmentIt’s tough to recruit students from

high school to the material sciences – and ceramics in particular – because students have simply never heard of the subject, say the educators. “There is a terrible disconnect between high schools and universities,” says Vandiver.

“You wonder if that’s too elementary of an explanation,” but the data shows that, when students learn about the field and how it’s applied to everything from space shuttles to innovations in cancer treatment to the latest and greatest cell phone technologies, stu-dents say, ‘that’s what I want to do’,” says Kimel. “I really do think that’s the major key. The fact of the matter is the funding and research is there, so it’s not like no one’s giving us the money to do these things – we do it and we do a lot of it,” he says.

As a matter of fact, Kimel says, he “had no idea” about materials science when he enrolled as an undergraduate at North Carolina State University. He started as an electrical engineering major and was required to take a mate-rials science course – “ That’s where the epiphany hit me,” he says. “Sometimes I describe it to students as the concept

of ‘how’ versus ‘why,’ and this idea that the engineer is more interested in the ‘how’ side, ‘how am I going to achieve a certain goal,’ make ‘X’ do ‘Y’ – I was interested in the ‘why’.”

One way to grab students’ interest, of course, is to offer then money. The Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Boise State was founded in August 2004 thanks to funding from the Micron Technology Foundation. The department offers a B.S., M.S., M.Engr. and a minor for undergrads. Unlike most material science programs, it does not yet offer Ph.D. programs. (It hopes to do so in three to five years, says Butt, but in order to do so, it needs to raise community support in the form of about $15 million in funding.) All of the students enrolled in material science (and there are roughly 100 of them) have full financial aid, he says. Furthermore, thanks to research grants, they can earn research stipends of more than $20,000 a year. Boise is one of the few new departments of material science to open in the last decade, and doing so requires “some incredible sup-port from your state,” says Butt.

Beyond such efforts, educators are working on familiarizing students with the field long before they are set to come to college. “One of the key areas is the growth and renewal of our exper-tise in science and mathmatics at our middle school and high school levels. Those are the future, and we need to make a committment to educating our young people and getting them on track and engaged in science and engi-neering. They’ll be our next genera-tion of grad students, and that’s where innovation is going to come from,” says Richardson.

Materials camps for students and teachers appear to have some – albeit minor – positive impact, Kimel says. That said, doing outreach and offering summertime opportunities to students “are very time-consuming tasks, and they’re not magic bullets,” Kimel says. He’s conducted such camps for five years now, and if one or two students will leave the camp and enroll in mate-rials science, “I consider that to be a success, and that’s a drop in the bucket

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compared to, say, mechanical engineer-ing, which is getting 2,000 to 3,000 applicants a year,” he says.

Ultimately, “I think materials sci-ence and engineering is a pretty signifi-cant discovery subject. Any incoming freshman class will probably increase in numbers by upwards of 20 percent by the time they graduate,” says Kimel. Even so, “Until we get a TV show on NBC, we’re always going to be chal-lenged,” he says.

More mergersBeyond mergers into materials sci-

ence, some institutions have gone even further, folding their materials programs into chemical engineering and mechanical engineering programs. “Those of us in the field are worried about that, because we feel if you lose the distinct identity of materials, you lose the ability to train people properly in the field,” Buchheit says. There’s not a natural fit there, but institutions will try, and “you get students with hybrid training. The question is, ‘Is that still ultimately meeting the needs of the industry to produce a qualified work-force? Are really doing that with hybrid

students?’ I think that’s an open ques-tion,” Buchheit says.

“When it gets combined, it gets combined almost randomly, first with chemical engineering, then with mechanical engineering,” Snyder says. “The move into chemical and mechanical engineering] is unfortunate. I think that’s completely the opposite way to go ... it’s not helping the cause in educating the general public in what we do,” Kimel says. And in such cases, while the number of students in a par-ticular department would grow, those in materials science would likely represent a small proportion. Given the politics of universities, department leadership may not likely be aligned with their priorities, says Kimel.

With all these mergers, can ceramics science and engineering continue as a discipline? “It won’t go back to the days when ceramics and metals owned the field. This field belongs to everybody, but what we have to do is be good stew-ards,” says Messing.

Ceramic materials have been with us for thousands of years, and I guess the optimist in me thinks they’re going to be around for a long long time,” says

Delbert Day, now retired but formerly the director of the Graduate Center for Materials Research at Missouri University of Science and Technology.

The most likely candidate to retain pure ceramics science and engineer-ing instruction is Alfred, which was founded in 1900 as the New York State School of Clay-Working and Ceramics. Indeed, says Edwards, “At Alfred, I sus-pect we will maintain a ceramic degree, rather than just a materials science degree, because our history is so embed-ded in ceramic and glass materials, and I don’t see us giving that up.”

Other institutions may not be able to do the same, but they may do well to take comfort in Buchheit’s thought about the changing nature of educa-tion. “The thing that I’ve come to appreciate about it is that it’s a change in a very broad continium of change that goes back to the very beginning. It’s always dynamic – it has to be,” Buchheit says.

Ultimately, a long look at the ways in which education continues to grow and evolve “is soothing in a way,” he says. “It’s always changing – you’re just in the continuium.” n

Student perspectivesWendy Hankle

Positioning for a career

Not too long ago, an aspiring ceramist could take her or his pick of several graduate programs in ceramic engi-neering. But today, Alfred University and Missouri University of Science & Technology are among the lone survi-vors in an emerging academic environ-ment that ushers ceramics graduate pro-grams under the broad umbrella of mate-rial science engineering departments.

But that’s not to say students aren’t still studying ceramics – or that they’re not enthusiastic about their pursuits in the field. The Bulletin talked to five current students and recent graduates to get their perspectives on this slow

shift – how it affects their careers, their studies and their lives.

Should I stay or should I go?The dwindling number of ceramic

engineering graduate programs neces-sarily narrows the field for students who want to pursue a Ph.D. But indepen-dent of this limitation is another factor driving a student’s choice of where to pursue an advanced education: Should you stick with the familiarity of your CerE alma mater, or look elsewhere?

Jessica Riesterer is a recent gradu-ate of the Materials Science and Engineering Department at the

University of Minnesota. She earned her bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate. from the same department at the same school.

“I was originally a chemical engi-neering student until I took my Introduction to Materials Science course as an undergrad,” she says. “I found the subject much more interest-ing than my ChemE courses. Soon after, I began working in professor C. Barry Carter’s lab as an undergraduate researcher. I was hooked.”

Riesterer earned her doctorate in 2009. Her emphasis of study was on investigating ceramic surfaces using microscopy techniques.


“Barry is one of the best, so to me, it seemed silly to go elsewhere to work with someone who wasn’t as good.”

And it paid off. Riesterer landed a

post-doc position at EMPA in Thun, Switzerland. EMPA is the Swiss equiva-lent to NIST. She begins her post in August.

“I had hoped to get a position similar to this in the [United States], so I’m quite happy,” she says. “Unfortunately, the current economic climate made it difficult to find a similar position in the U.S. right now, but I’m looking forward to living abroad and gaining some new experiences.”

The pursuit for new experiences had the opposite effect on Harlan Brown-Shaklee. A CerE Ph.D. student at MS&T, Brown-Shaklee has strong opinions on the impact of his decision to depart Alfred University, where he got his bachelor’s and master’s degrees.

In Brown-Shaklee’s ideal world, something of an organized “school swap” would occur, where students are required to learn at different institu-tions, work under different advisors and in different labs.

“We should encourage students to take advantage of the rich and diverse academic environment in the United States and abroad,” he says. “We need to expose students to multiple learning environments.”

Brown-Shaklee was drawn to MS&T specifically because of the opportu-

nity to work with high-temperature non-oxides under Bill Fahrenholtz and Greg Hilmas. So he parted ways with AU after two degrees.

“I chose to leave Alfred after finishing my master’s degree because

many industry folks spoke highly of those with multiple degrees obtained from multiple universities,” he says. “At a conference in State College, Pa., I met researchers from Corning Inc., who strongly suggested that I work on my

About three weeks ago, the president of Washington State University sent out a university-wide email concerning the current economic climate. Recent news-paper headlines had screamed 14 percent budget cuts and probable phasing out of a number of majors. Little has been said on the subject since then, but ten-sions are still high. Several students I know have posted worried Facebook updates on whether they should start looking for another university to attend because they won’t have a major in the future. These are hon-ors students, the brightest of them at WSU, stressing over their future. It was with spite that I thought how it might be more financially secure to go work at a fast-food restaurant. No accumulation of school debts and a secure minimum wage. And, we thought we were making the smart decision.

Because the MSE department is relatively small at WSU, I was worried our funding would be cut as well, which would most likely mean dissolving at least two important materials processing and character-ization labs, both of which I took over the past year. As much as I may complain about the long hours of tedious lab work, these classes are vital to our curriculum. These also happen to be two of the costliest classes offered for the MSE degree. Will these classes get cut because of how costly they are, no matter how beneficial to students they may be? I don’t know.

What I do know is that I’m lucky to have had the opportunity to learn such techniques and machin-ery. I also know that in about one year I’ll be walking down the aisle dressed in all black with a crimson tassel. What comes next?

I had the opportunity to partici-pate in a Research Experience for

Undergraduates program at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa., last summer, and it solidified my desire to continue my education after graduating. The wisdom of this plan has been severely questioned recently. On one hand, if I stay out of industry for another four to

seven years, the economy may bounce back and employment opportunities will abound. On the other hand, if I’m offered a job in a year, I may have to take it, even if I want to go to grad school, especially considering the level of

budget cuts in motion. Will I be able to get any graduate

school funding? Maybe. Probably. Hopefully. Will it be enough? I don’t know. Will I get to work on something I love or will I have to take whatever I can get? I don’t know.

This summer I have to take an internship in a steel mill to get the other half of a large scholarship. (I am a metallurgist, although I’ve participated in ACerS PCSA for about one-and-a half years). Despite being an honors college student, and very academically successful, I only had one company offer me a job for the summer. At this com-pany, I am one of two interns. They had more than 20 interns in the previous year! So, despite the fact that I’ll be working in long pants and a long-sleeved t-shirt in the middle of an inland California sum-mer, feeling fairly miserable from all the sweat and heat, and that steel isn’t exactly my material of choice, I’m pretty thankful. But with gradu-ate studies, we’re talking about the rest of my life, not just a summer.

It is my hope, however, that the future of higher education will become bright once again, and I won’t end up selling burgers, French fries, and an extra-large chocolate shake. Only time will tell. n

Sarah Miller

Materials … or fast food?

Jessica Riesterer

Harlan Brown-Shaklee



Ph.D. at a different uni-versity.”

Diversity also drove Andrea Muller to leave Missouri for Pennsylvania. She is in her third year of a doctoral program in

materials science and engineering at Pennsylvania State University, having attended MS&T for her bachelor’s in ceramic engineering. She chose to leave MS&T for Penn State for many of the same reasons Brown-Shaklee cited.

“I wanted something different,” she says. “I looked at several schools, most of them larger, because I wanted a little more diversity, and going to a different school would give me that.”

MatSE vs. CerESumin Zhu is a senior research

engineer with Vesuvius. He received his bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees in ceramic engineering. His decision to not veer from that course was deliberate, and now that he’s in the profession, he has no regrets.

“By focusing on ceramics, I have been able to build the depth of my knowledge specializing in ceramic engi-

neering,” he says. “This gave me a competitive edge when I was looking for a job before the end of my Ph.D. studies.

“With a focus on ceramics, I benefitted

from getting multiple job opportunities before I even finished with my doctor-ate,” Zhu added.

Claire Weiss stands in contrast to Zhu on this point. She is a doctoral stu-dent in the University of Connecticut’s materials science and engineering program. Her bachelor’s degree is in physics – and this factor contributed her choice to study materials science instead of ceramic engineering.

“Some people want their graduate program to be less broad and more focused on each student’s area of inter-est,” Weiss says. “However, since I came from a physics background, I really liked taking classes that broadly covered all areas of materials science.”

I once read that “a teacher’s work is never done.” That must be doubly true for a professor who is expected to balance pursuing his or her own research career while educating a host of college students. However, like many students, I have been for-tunate enough to experience professors who find a way to excel at both jobs. These are the professors that have impacted us in the classroom and whose teachings we will remember as we enter the professional world.

A unifying quality of the best professors I’ve learned from is how passionate they are about their subject matter and the act of teach-ing. Passion about their work is easy to detect because these professors always bring a certain inspiring energy to the classroom. It is as if their passion is contagious. Their big-gest talent is their ability to inspire students to learn. Even if it involves shimmying across the classroom while waving one’s hands frantically to mimic the movement of an elec-tron, these professors go the extra mile to get students excited. This also helps make concepts more acces-sible and classes less mundane or repetitive.

Good professors also understand how to be effective teachers. At the end of every semester, when students are asked to complete an evaluation of the class and the professor’s teach-ing performance, the one question that I always pause to give full con-sideration is, “To what extent did the professor create a positive learning environment that you felt comfort-able in?”

In my opinion, this is the most critical aspect of a successful class. The classes I enjoyed the most (and, consequently, learned the most from) were the ones in which I was relaxed and unafraid to ask a ques-tion. Though this was often accom-plished by the professor incorporating

humor and a general informal nature into lectures, the most important thing that he or she did was always to encourage and never discourage. The bottom line is that every student makes mistakes. The best professors understand that it’s more important

to teach students to learn from a mistake rather than berate them for making an error. After all, this is the crux of all research – trial and error!

Learning is often not a quick process. It certainly takes a great deal of patience to teach others, and something the best profes-

sors have in common is an abundance of this virtuous quality. Most likely, every student can remember an inci-dent in which a fellow student raised his or her hand (or simply interrupted class) with an inane or seemingly obvious question that made others around become frustrated with the disruption. Yet the professor, unaf-fected, calmly answered the question as many times and in as many differ-ent ways as necessary to fully explain the concept without talking down to the student. A good professor is there to share his or her knowledge and not criticize a question because it is “stupid.”

Patience goes beyond answering questions, however. I have always tried to maintain close relationships with my favorite professors. This was easy due to their genuine interest not only in my performance in their class, but also in my success in general. This is the qual-ity I cherished most in my professors. It helped transcend the professor-student relationship into more of a mentor-mentee relationship.

We should consider ourselves lucky to have been in a classroom with a professor who goes above and beyond in their job. I would encourage all students to not only praise their pro-fessors on an anonymous evaluation form, but to also personally thank them and let them know how much their hard work is appreciated. n

Josh Frederick

Teaching requirement: Contagious passion

Sumin Zhu

Andrea Muller


Weiss’ experience in graduate school is not only allowing her to explore many pos-sible directions for her studies, but it’s helping her fill in the gaps she

missed while studying physics as an undergrad.

“As an undergraduate, I did a sum-mer of research that was very materials science-related and I loved it,” she says. “I really enjoy studying how the pro-cessing conditions affect the final mate-rial and its performance at all levels.”

For Brown-Shaklee, choosing a CerE program or a MatSE course of study is less about “what” and more about “who.”

“My choice to choose ceramic engi-neering over materials science really doesn’t make a difference. The course-work was the same, and the require-ments for graduation were identical,” Brown-Shaklee says. “I chose a research topic and an advisor rather than a pro-gram and a degree title when I came to MS&T.”

Like Brown-Shaklee, the chance to work with a particular professor or on a particular project held sway for Muller when contemplating a destination for her doctorate.

“When you come into a program it’s not all about taking classes. You’re going to be given a project, and this means you look at all the professors at the university and what their research interests are,” Muller says. “I came into this program and knew I was going to do spherical indentation. That was one of the main reasons I chose this particu-lar program.”

The lack of options for Muller to contemplate also drove her decision to enter a materials science program. “In a MatSE program, I can still take classes that are geared more toward ceramics,” she says. “Materials science is a more broad term, something I guess more people know about, but I’m not sure if [a materials science engineering degree] opens more doors or not.”

Brown-Shaklee credits one of his professors at Alfred with summing up perhaps one contributing factor to the

decline of ceramics engineering pro-grams: a lack of good PR.

“Scott Misture said it best: If the Pentium advertisements in the electron-ics section of Sunday’s paper used the word ‘ceramic’ instead of some obscure acronym, ceramic engineering programs wouldn’t have any trouble with enroll-ment,” he says. “Ceramics are sexy, but there aren’t enough people out there selling it to the masses as such.”

Beyond the tassel and gownZhu received his doctorate in

ceramic engineering from MS&T in 2008. Although he honed his ceramics knowledge through every degree pro-gram, he credits his job satisfaction at Vesuvius in part to the broad spectrum of skills and knowledge he received as a student. Prior to attending MS&T, he earned his master’s at Shanghai Institute of Ceramics and his bachelor’s at Nanjing University of Technology.

“The main reason that has been motivating me to study ceramic engi-neering is my dream to become a ceramic materials scientist who can develop innovative ceramic products to improve the quality of people’s lives,” Zhu says. “The field I am working in is exactly where ceramic engineering is applied to make innovative products. The job I have now is truly what I was expecting.”

Neither Penn State’s Muller nor UConn’s Weiss have the benefit of

Zhu’s hindsight. But both believe that they are being prepared well for their professional future.

“While it’s impossible to be an expert in all techniques involved in your field, graduate school lets you learn the basic techniques and then focus on one area in a lot of detail,” Weiss says. “It is this attention to detail in one specific area that teaches gradu-ate students to be good future problem solvers and experimentalists in the workforce.”

“I think this program is preparing me well for the workforce,” Muller concurs. “The school and the professors have a good reputation, and there’s enough flexibility here that I can choose the classes I feel will be applicable to my degree and to what I want to do when I hit the job market.”

Muller also prefers time in the lab over time in a desk – something gradu-ate study provides. She envisions her future working in an industrial research setting, perhaps at a national labora-tory.

For now, she’s enjoying her program – and its sometimes-calamitous conse-quences.

“I get to go into work and break stuff. It’s fun to be in the lab,” she says. “It’s the hands-on aspect of this degree that keeps me going.”

Riesterer echoes that sentiment.“I really enjoyed being hands-on in

the lab, and I was given the freedom to

Claire Weiss

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find out what I was good at by trying dif-ferent things,” Riesterer says. “Of course, funding is another issue. DOE decided to cut ceramics funding during my work, so I had some major bumps in the road. If I knew the trouble I would have gone through because of funding, I’m not sure I would do my Ph.D again.”

But the bumpy road paved Riesterer’s current path, regardless of the difficulty. “I think my program prepared me very well. I’ve learned the ups and downs of funding and proposal writing. I was for-tunate to travel to a lot of conferences and use equipment,” she says. “This helped me build very strong contacts

that ultimately helped me get my post-docdoc position.”

This ability to present at conferences and make contacts is one of the com-mon points agreed upon by students. Networking, getting your name out there and knowing the field before you enter it as a professional is key to future success – regardless of whether you study CerE or MatSE.

In the end, Brown-Shaklee believes the blurring lines separating material science engineering from ceramic engi-neering aren’t necessarily a bad thing.

“I believe ceramic engineering pro-grams that train students in fundamen-tal material science and processing and application … will produce the scien-tists and engineers necessary to meet the challenges of tomorrow,” Brown-Shaklee says. “Ceramic engineering will continue to produce material scientists who know how to process powders and think analytically.

“But here’s the cool part: Ceramic engineers are materials scientists, but it isn’t necessarily the other way around.” n

Impact of new research and stimulus funding will leave big imprint on academiaJennifer Sowash

Capitolized:

April may be known as the cruelest month by some, but it’s fair to say that many in the science community felt great joy following President Barack Obama’s April 26 announcement dur-ing the annual meeting of the National Academy of Sciences of his goal to ensure that 3 percent of the country’s gross domestic product would be spent on scientific research and development. That amount would mark the country’s greatest-ever financial commitment to scientific R&D – currently, the U.S. spends roughly 2.6 percent of its GDP on R&D, according to figures from the National Science Board.

The president said that the goal would be achieved through a com-

bination of government funds and private-sector initiatives, and clean, “green” energy development will be a significant priority. Obama’s $787 bil-lion stimulus bill included funding for the Advanced Research Projects for Energy, a new agency modeled after the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Like its military counterpart, ARPA-E, as the new agency will be know, is intended to take on high-risk, high-yield projects. The president has proposed spending $150 billion over the next decade on renewable energy and energy-efficiency initiatives, a matter of particular interest to cera-mists and those in material sciences, who have seen much of their work of

late focused providing solutions to the national and global demand for envi-ronmentally friendly energy sources.

Still, the good news at the federal level is tempered by continued budget woes at the state level, where many state governments are looking to cut funding for research and higher edu-cation in order to stay afloat. The students are there – even if sometimes their numbers are low – but what role is the economic downturn playing in their education?

As with most things, there are as many opinions as there are respondents. Here’s what some of them had to stay about how the economy has impacted student life today, and how it could

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affect materials education in the near future:

How is the economy affecting stu-dent enrollment, financial aid and post-doc opportunities?

Rudolph G. Buchheit, professor and chairman, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Ohio State University: When it comes to gradu-ate students, “We haven’t seen a huge impact or change in enrollment. That, I think, is still in front of us.” Ohio State only admits graduate students who can hold research assistantships, which pay a stipend and cover the cost of classes and fees, says Buchheit. Generally speaking, admissions to OSU’s College of Engineering are up 33 percent. This time last year, there were 1,100 fresh-men enrolled, and now that number is at more than 1,500. Buchheit says he believes OSU is perceived as a “great educational value.” Moreover engineer-ing is a pragmatic choice for students seeking reliable, well-paying employ-ment.

“The jobs that students are taking [represent] a much larger fraction of temporary appointments,” from his observations, says Buchheit. So, many of them are finding post-doc positions, but they come at the expense of more per-manent employment, he says. “There’s been a huge upset in the employment situation, and it’s all been in the past year. It’s hit harder at the undergraduate level than at the graduate level.”

Doreen Edwards, associate dean of engineering and professor of ceramic engineering and materials science, Alfred University: “In general, when we see recessions and hard economic times, engineering enrollment goes up. People become interested in a degree that will lead to a good-paying job.” That said, “I think families are having a tough time making tuition. People are get-ting furloughed, getting their hours cut back – I think everybody’s feel-ing the pinch in that regard,” says Edwards.

“In terms of grad school, we’re see-ing a lot more last-minute grad school applications,” she says. Recent gradu-ates “look for a job, then if they don’t get one, they look at grad school as a backup. ... Unfortunately, we’re not able to accept some of the later applica-tions,” as all available positions already have been filled, she says. And as to post-doc opportunities, “I’ve definitely seen a decrease,” Edwards says.

How will the funding from various Obama administration programs affect materials education?

Allen Kimel, assistant professor and associate head for undergraduate stud-ies, Materials Science and Engineering, Pennsylvania State University: A number of solicitations have come out under the new administration, he says. “It’s really overwhelming, and it’s com-ing quickly. But the decisions are not being made at that pace.”

Robert Snyder, professor and chair-man, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology: “Frankly, we had eight years of a president with little idea of what our economy is about. His dam-age to the research community was a sustained one,” says Snyder. Money “is just beginning to flow out of the NSF and NIH, but it’s too early to tell you the quantity. We’ve got tons of propos-als out there.”

Darryl Butt, chairman, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Boise State University: “I’m sure that it’s going to impact materials pro-grams, but it’s going to vary, state by state. I know that we’ve seen an increase in our success in getting

grants.” In addition to receiving money from the President’s stimulus package, Boise State has received a $1 million grant spread over two years for energy-related research, he says.

Kathleen Richardson, director, Department of Material Science, Clemson University: “The federal fund-ing situation is extremely important. We’ve gotten a minor breath of fresh air with the stimulus funds being inject-ed in both into the NSF, the NIH and the DOE right now, and it’s great for our industry, and many of our ceramic colleagues are taking advantage of those initiatives. ... President Obama seems to be very committed to science and engi-neering, both at the research stage and also, very importantly, at the education stage. If we maintain some of these initiatives that have been put in place and started, it will be a good time to kind of use the strength and growth of our educa-tional base and our


knowledge base to help drive the future of economic growth in our country,” says Richardson.

Richardson continues, “It’s my per-sonal opinion that we slipped over the course of the last decade, and while [the stimulus package] is encouraging ... we’ll see. We’ve got a lot of ground we need to make up before we can, in my opinion, really assert our level of predominance in many of the areas we need to.”

Edwards: In terms of federal funding for energy projects, “ceramics people who are doing ceramics research are so well-poised to compete for those grants,” Edwards says. With so much of technol-ogy, particularly that around alternative energy, using ceramic and glass materi-als, “we’re very hopeful that funding will come through, and we’ll see a spike in research funding,” she says. “Proposals are due now, and funding will probably be available in the fall, for grad school and getting people onto assistantships. It’s all about timing.”

Buchheit: “No question, we’ve already seen that there are funds,” dispersed by various federal agencies. However, “most of that money is really aimed at short-term economic stimulus, such as equipment purchases that have to be used within a year or two. So, we can renovate labs or buy equipment,

but research needs to unfold, we need to be paying stipends and salaries ... .” Discovery-driven research often takes three to five years, “and we haven’t seen so much money injected into that side of that,” Buchheit says. All of that said, initial information shows that the NSF, DOE, DARPA and other entities all project their budgets will be up 5 to 10 percent in the next two or three years.

“That’s huge compared to the increase we saw in the [President George W.] Bush administration, dur-ing which funding levels were flattened. So, this represents some slower but meaningful growth. That’s all good news.

The bad news is the state budget, right, and Ohio’s looking at a big, huge cliff,” Buchheit says. And given that Ohio State faculty salaries are paid out of state funds, even with capital for research coming from Washington, “the manpower issue” is of concern, he says.

Pamela Vandiver, professor of mate-rials science, University of Arizona: “This next year is going to be a disas-ter, because a lot of state universities are having big budget cutbacks. And, because of that, research funding is being cut back, and funding for gradu-ate research is going to take a massive plunge,” she says. n

Capitolizedcontinued from page 15project, but there didn’t seem too much of an emphasis where I was.”

Joel Moskowitz, CEO and chair, Ceradyne

Moskowitz is a graduate of Alfred University, and has been on the school’s board since 1983. He sees the current situation through the eyes of the leader of an advanced ceramics manufacturing company who under-stands the benefits of collaboration.

“At Ceradyne, we often have a very clear path for new products that involve ceramics and that is the discipline we really want,” he says. “I want scientists and engineers who are ceramic scientists and engineers.”

But Moskowitz is quick to acknowledge that this truth is not absolute. Using the example of his company’s lightweight ceramic armor, comprised of ceramic and polymer components, Moskowitz points to the collaborative environ-ment that was necessary to bring the project to fruition.

“In that instance, we actually have some polymer engineers who work hand-in-glove with the ceramic staff,” he says.

And there are other aspects where collaboration between ceramists and material science engineers benefit the whole, specifically when the path to solve a puzzle not so cut and dried.

“In aerospace, there are often prob-lems where it’s not clear at all what should be used,” he explained. “Maybe the solution is ceramic, maybe not. There, to have a materials scientist who can say ‘We have to look at everything,’ it becomes a big asset.”

And, as for the nuts and bolts of the academic programs, Moskowitz makes a point to say that he doesn’t have all the answers – but he doesn’t hesitate to put his finger on what he views as a critical component of the educational process: internships.

“I think real life experience is very important from two aspects: if the young man or woman really likes it, then that’s terrific. He or she is headed in the right direction. If the opposite occurs, that, too, is instruc-tive,” he says. “Everybody comes out ahead with internship programs. The companies come out ahead, and the students have a real chance to see what the profession is like.” n

refractory hot line Paul Ormond

When I came home from the St. Louis Section Meeting this spring my children were disappointed that I could not show them the gavel. I had told them that I was going to a meeting and that my colleague, Mike Alexander, would “hand over the gavel” and pass the title of chair of the Refractory Ceramic Division to me. Gavel or no, we have an exciting year ahead. It will be as challenging and changing as the past 35 that I have spent in this industry.

There was a time during my career when the RCD was one of the largest in the Society. We are much smaller now, but I believe, still vitally impor-tant. Ours is a discipline that is unique among our peers. Refractory ceramists know more about more raw materials and material systems than any other group. This is a large volume of knowl-edge, but we are still working with the minerals that Mother Earth gives us. That means that we must be ready to take whatever is economically avail-able and deliver the best value to our customers. To take a line from Bill McCracken’s column last month, we all have to be concerned with where our next bauxite meal is coming from.

There is plenty of bauxite available for the rather small needs of our indus-try (compared with that mined for alu-minum production). The trick is to get a mining concern interested in mining and separating the special high-purity grades suitable for refractories. This will come at a cost. Perhaps, it will be too high of a cost and our industry will have to find new ways to make refrac-

tories from other, more cost-effective minerals, such as andalusite.

Whatever the case, it calls for an intimate understanding of refractory customer processes and the mined materials that the world has to offer at any given time. It is a brutally efficient economic model that demands tech-nological solutions with an eye toward value (not just cost). This is a different slant than is evident for the rest of the ACerS divisions, as there is no other group where the expense of raw materi-als plays such a big part of the cost of finished goods.

I dare say that our group is as impor-tant to the general success of ACerS as ACerS is to us. The dwindling size of our division is a function, not of our failure, but of the realities of the downsizing of heavy industry in North America and the rapid growth of the industries that we serve in develop-ing nations. This industry will survive in our region as sure as iron and steel, non-ferrous metals, hydrocarbon pro-cessing, power generation and cement production will survive.

The Society still provides the best platform for refractory technologists to keep up and stay ahead of the rest of the world. ACerS has become an organization of and for technologists. Because RCD’s needs are different, the ideas generated by other divisions and the ideas that we have to offer can cre-ate a good balance.

The Society has become a group of loosely held specialized divisions. In our St. Louis meeting, President John Kaniuk encouraged us to seek the pro-grams and venues that best suit division needs, while using the Society structure to accomplish that.

To that end, the St. Louis Section Meeting has and will remain the pre-

mier meeting for RCD. While the size of the section has shrunk in tandem with our division, the tradition, effec-tiveness and cost of the meeting have made this a continually well-attended and supported meeting. As the article on this meeting in the May Bulletin notes, the recent meeting was attended as well as ever despite the dismal economy.

RCD has and will continue to take an active role in maintaining the high quality of this meeting. In addition, I believe that much of the rest of our programming will continue to take on an international flavor, as it must. Raw materials availability and cost are truly part of the global economy. We are all competing for the same resources. The industries that we serve are growing globally, so there is much to learn from a cooperative effort with our foreign counterparts.

Programs to best serve our member-ship – along with education to ensure new talented individuals come into the industry – are our most important func-tions. I welcome any suggestions that you may have in this regard.

And, perhaps, next year there will be a gavel to pass onto the incoming chair, James Hemrick.

Ormond has worked in sales and mar-keting of refractory materials for over three decades and is currently on the staff of AluChem Inc. He graduated with a bach-elor’s degree in ceramic engineering from Alfred University and worked for Babcock and Wilcox before joining AluChem.

Paul [email protected]

Passing the gavel



In a three-week period from late April to mid-May, the Obama admin-istration unveiled its proposed Fiscal Year 2010 budget in which science, engineering and technology received significant increases. In fact, “we have done better than almost any other con-stituency,” according to White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director John Holdren.

President Obama himself began the traditional budget roll-out with a major speech at the National Academy of Sciences entitled, “A Historic Commitment to Research.” In this speech, Obama emphasized:

• A commitment to finish the 10-year doubling of the R&D budgets of the National Science Foundation, the Office of Science in the Department of Energy and the National Institute of Standards and Technology. That level of funding was authorized by the America COMPETES Act but previously had fallen far short of full funding.

• The launch of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (also authorized by the COMPETES Act). DOE already has issued its first solicita-tion for ARPA-E using funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act – see the description and instruc-tions at www.energy.gov/news2009/documents2009/ARPA-E_FOA.pdf.

• A joint initiative by DOE and NSF called RE-ENERGYSE (Regaining our ENERGY Science and Engineering Edge), “that will inspire tens of thou-sands of American students to pursue careers in science, engineering and entrepreneurship related to clean ener-gy – with programs and scholarships from grade school to graduate school.”

• A $5 billion “race to the top”

fund to encourage states to improve the quality and supply of math and science teachers, including alternative routes into teaching for math and sci-ence teachers and proposals to upgrade teacher training and promote and reward effective teachers.

In testimony before the House Science and Technology Committee on May 14, Holdren presented the proposed FY 2010 budget allocation of $174.6 billion for research and development across all agencies. He emphasized that the real magnitude of the budget can be judged only with the inclusion of ARRA funds. He said that, “While no year-by-year allocation of these funds is currently available, it is clear that their addition to the approved regular budget for FY 2009 and the proposed one for FY 2010 would give these two years the two largest federal investments in R&D in U.S. history.” Holdren also discussed the president’s pledge to increase R&D to three percent of the national GDP (it currently is 2.6 percent).

Energy bills limping along in Congress

Comprehensive energy legislation is moving in fits and starts in both houses. At our press time, it appears that final action will come in June or July rather than the earlier goal of Memorial Day. Senate Energy Committee Chair Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) and House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) are deter-mined to move their respective bills that address renewable energy produc-tion and overhauling of the national electricity grid.

In mid-May, one of the major hang-ups in the House was resolved with Rep. Waxman reaching agreement with Rep. Rick Boucher (D-Va.) to accom-modate concerns about “cap-and-trade” provisions affecting coal producers and users.

In addition to the cap-and-trade system, major controversies include

whether to define nuclear power as a “renewable energy” source.

Meanwhile, a bipartisan group in the House led by Rep. Neil Abercrombie (D-Hawaii) has introduced a plan to drill for oil and gas offshore, promote cleaner use of coal and nuclear power, fund renewable energy resources and provide low-income home energy assis-tance. Separately, members of the House Republican leadership have vowed to stop the cap-and-trade system and described it as a “national energy tax.”

Clean coal technologies get big boost

As if to underscore the importance of clean coal technology to the overall cap-and-trade initiative supported by President Obama, Secretary of Energy Steven Chu on May 15 announced that $2.4 billion from the stimulus bill will be used to expand and accelerate the com-mercial deployment of carbon capture and storage technology. The funding will support the following initiatives:

• Clean Coal Power: $800 million “will allow researchers broader carbon capture and storage technology commer-cial-scale experience by expanding the range of technologies, applications, fuels and geologic formations that are tested.”

• Industrial Carbon Capture and Storage: $1.52 billion for a two-part competitive solicitation for large-scale carbon capture and storage from indus-trial sources.

• Geologic Sequestration: $70 mil-lion for site characterization and for sequestration training and research.

Betsy Houston, Executive Director Federation of Materials Societies 910 17th Street, NW, Suite 800 Washington, DC 20006 202-296-9282 [email protected]

Betsy Houston

inside the beltway

Obama science budget: “better than almost any

other constituency”



The leading forum

addressing structure, properties,

processing and performance

across the materials community.

Register at www.matscitech.org

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Includes ACerS 111th Annual Meeting


ACerS CAlendAr of eventSAt MS&t

(Accurate as of 6/11/09; subject to change)

Legend: CC = David L. Lawrence Convention Center WP = Westin Pittsburgh Hotel red = ACerS Lectures

Saturday, October 24, 2009 ACerS Board of Directors Meeting 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP

Sunday, October 25, 2009 Keramos National Board Breakfast and Business Meeting 7:00 a.m.–9:00 a.m. WP Keramos Student Chapter Business Meeting 8:00 a.m.–9:00 a.m. WP ACerS Meetings Committee 8:00 a.m.–10:00 a.m. WP Keramos Biennial Convocation and Business Meeting 9:00 a.m.–11:00 a.m. WP ACerS PCSA Officers Meeting 9:00 a.m.–11:00 a.m. WP ACerS NICE Executive Committee Meeting 10:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m. WP ACerS Volunteer Leaders Training 10:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m. WP Keramos Career Speaker 11:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m. WP Keramos Board, Student Representative, and Chapter Advisors Meeting 12:00 p.m.–1:00 p.m. WP ACerS Publications Committee Meeting 12:30 p.m.– 3:00 p.m. WP ACerS Electronics Division Executive Committee Meeting 1:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m. WP ACerS Division Break 1:00 p.m.–3:30 p.m. WP ACerS Glass & Optical Materials Division Programming and Executive Committee Meeting 2:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m. WP ACerS Basic Science Division Executive Committee Meeting 2:30 p.m.–4:30 p.m. WP ACerS Engineering Ceramics Division Executive Committee Meeting 2:30 p.m.–4:30 p.m. WP ACerS Nuclear & Environmental Technology Division Executive Committee Meeting 3:00 p.m.–4:30 p.m. WP ACerS Ceramic Educational Council Meeting 5:00 p.m.–6:00 p.m. WP Ceramographic Display 6:00 p.m.–8:00 p.m. CC ACerS Frontiers of Science & Society - Rustum Roy Lecture 5:00 p.m.–6:00 p.m. CC MS&T Welcome Reception 6:00 p.m.–7:30 p.m. CC

Monday, October 26, 2009 Ceramographic Display 7:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. CC ACerS Education Integration Committee Meeting 7:00 a.m.–9:00 a.m. WP ACerS Member Services Committee 7:30 a.m.–8:30 a.m. WP ACerS Companion Breakfast 8:00 a.m.–10:00 a.m. WP MS&T Opening Session/Plenary 8:30 a.m.–10:30 a.m. CC MS&T Concurrent Technical Sessions 10:40 a.m.–5:20 p.m. CC ACerS PCSA Student Tour 10:00 a.m.–2:00 p.m. to Anter Corp. ACerS Annual Membership Meeting 1:00 p.m.–2:00 p.m. CC ACerS NICE Business Meeting and Order of the Engineer Ceremony 2:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m. CC ACerS Richard M. Fulrath Award Session 2:00 p.m.–5:10 p.m. CC ACerS Book Committee Meeting 4:00 p.m.–5:00 p.m. WP ACerS Nuclear & Environmental Technology Division General Business Meeting 5:45 p.m.–6:45 p.m. CC ACerS Annual Honors and Awards Banquet 7:30 p.m.–9:30 p.m. WP ACerS Afterglow 9:30 p.m.–11:00 p.m. WP

Tuesday, October 27, 2009 Ceramographic Display 7:00 a.m.–6:00 p.m. CC ACerS Companion Breakfast 7:00 a.m.–9:00 a.m. WP ACerS Strategic Planning and Emerging Opportunities Committee Meeting 7:00 a.m.–8:30 a.m. WP

MS&T Concurrent Technical Sessions 8:00 a.m.–4:20 p.m. CC ACerS Emerging Opportunities for Ceramic Science and Engineering 8:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m. CC ACerS Past President’s Council Meeting 9:00 a.m.–11:00 a.m. WP ACerS Bulletin Editorial Committee Meeting 10:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m. WP ACerS Arthur L. Friedberg Lecture 10:00 a.m.–11:00 a.m. CC MS&T Exhibit 11:00 a.m.–6:00 p.m. CC MS&T Poster Session 11:00 a.m.–6:00 p.m. CC ACerS Basic Science Division General Business Meeting 12:00 p.m.–1:15 p.m. CC ACerS Engineering Ceramics Division General Business Meeting 12:00 p.m.–1:00 p.m. CC ACerS WISE (Women In Science & Engineering) Session 12:30 p.m.–2:00 p.m. WP ACerS Edward Orton, Jr. Memorial Lecture 1:00 p.m.–2:00 p.m. CC ACerS Panel of Fellows Meeting 3:00 p.m.–5:00 p.m. WP MS&T Exhibit Reception 4:00 p.m.–6:00 p.m. CC ACerS Electronics Division General Business Meeting 5:30 p.m.–7:00 p.m. CC ACerS Glass & Optical Materials Division General Business Meeting 5:30 p.m.-6:30 p.m. CC

Wednesday, October 28, 2009 Ceramographic Display 7:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. CC ACerS Companion Breakfast 8:00 a.m.–10:00 a.m. WP ACerS Robert B. Sosman Session 8:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m. CC MS&T Concurrent Technical Sessions 8:00 a.m.–5:20 p.m. CC ACerS Nominating Committee Meeting 9:00 a.m.–11:00 a.m. WP MS&T Exhibit 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. CC MS&T Poster Session 11:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. CC ACerS Robert B. Sosman Lecture 1:00 p.m.–2:00 p.m. CC ACerS Alfred R. Cooper Session and Award 2:00 p.m.–5:20 p.m. CC

Thursday, October 29, 2009 MS&T Concurrent Technical Sessions 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. CC Thermal Analysis & Thermophysical Property Measurements of Ceramic Materials Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP Microwave and RF Processing Fundamentals for Ceramics and Metals Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP Fundamentals of Glass Science and Technology Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP Sintering of Ceramics Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP Mechanical Properties of Ceramics and Glasses Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP Solids Flow in Storage and Process Systems Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP Dynamic Behavior of Structural and Armor Ceramics Short Course 8:00 a.m.– 5:00 p.m. WP Introduction to Ceramic Phase Diagrams Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP

Friday, October 30, 2009 Fundamentals of Glass Science and Technology Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP Sintering of Ceramics Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP Mechanical Properties of Ceramics and Glasses Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP Solids Flow in Storage and Process Systems Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP Dynamic Behavior of Structural and Armor Ceramics Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP Introduction to Ceramic Phase Diagrams Short Course 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. WP


ACerS frontiers of Science and Society - rustum roy lecture - Charles M. Vest, president, National Academy of Engineering; president emeritus, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

ACerS Aurthur l. friedberg Memorial lecture - “Ceramics in a 21st Century Materials World” Gary Fischman, The National Academies

ACerS edward orton, Jr. Memorial lecture - “Innovations through Ceramic Processing by Tailoring Solid-Liquid and Solid-Gas Interfaces,” Ludwig J. Gauckler, ETH Zurich

ACerS robert B. Sosman Award, lecture and Session - “Measuring and Interpreting the Three- Dimensional Structure of Grain Boundary Networks” Gregory S. Rohrer, Carnegie Mellon University

Sunday, october 25

tuesday, october 27

Wednesday, october 29

richard M. fulrath Award Session - Japanese Academic: Naoki Ohashi, Optronic Materials Center, National Institute for Materials Science

- Japanese Industrial: Ryosuke Ueyama, Daiken Chemical Company Ltd. and Takayuki Nagano, Japan Fine Ceramics Center

- American Academic: Venkatraman Gopalan, Pennsylvania State University

- American Industrial: Andrew L. Gyekenyesi, Ohio Aerospace Institute, NASA Glenn Research Center

111th Annual Meeting Newly elected officers take their positions and the Annual Membership Meeting is held. All ACerS members are welcome.

Awards Banquet & Afterglow Enjoy dinner, conversation and the presentation of Society awards, followed by dessert and coffee. Purchase tickets for $75 via the conference registration form.

Monday, october 26

tuesday, october 27

Wednesday, october 28

emerging opportunities for Ceramic Science and engineering This all-invited session explores new and improved ceramic materials that enable scientists and engineers to develop energy- efficient and environmentally-friendly applications and technologies.

Poster Session Now located in the Exhibit Hall to give attendees more time to view the posters. Posters are available during Exhibit Hall hours, with the formal session being held 4-6 p.m. Tuesday.

Alfred r. Cooper Session and Award Invited Speakers: A Physical Approach to Industrial Glass Research,” John Mauro, Corning Inc.

“Glass Microspheres in Medicine –An Overview,” Delbert Day, Missouri University of Science and Technology

“Mixed Glass-Former Effects on the Properties and Structures of Glass,” Steve W. Martin, Iowa State University

ACerS leCtureS PreSented At MS&t’09

ACerS SPeCiAl eventS

lounge Stop by the member lounge to take a spin on the prize wheel and network with peers. You’ll find us by registration!

Fischman Gauckler

Rohrer

Vest


ACerS Short CourSeSPreSented At MS&t’09

Microwave and rf Processing fundamentals for Ceramics and Metals location: Westin Convention Center

instructor: Bob Schiffman, r.f. Schiffman & Associates; Bernie Krieger, Cober electronics, inc.; dinesh Agrawal, Pennsylvania State university; John f. Gerling, Gerling Applied engineering inc.; Ben Wilson, PSC inc.; and edward ripley, oak ridge national labdescription: This short course will fundamentally focus on the utility of MW and RF technologies to improve properties and processing of advanced materials, encompassing not only materials processing but also emerging areas of metals, powdered metals, and organic/inorganic composites systems. Topics include an historical perspective of dielectric heating, fundamentals of electromagnetic wave/material interactions, electroheat theory, MW & RF technology basics, dielectric properties and associated materials measurements, etc. State-of-the-art MW & RF equipment will be reviewed, and select demonstrations (e.g. power measurement and Q-factor) will give the student an in-depth understanding of engineering considerations that are important to the successful deployment of MW and RF technologies.

thermal Analysis and thermophysical Properties Measurements of Ceramic and refractory Materials Sponsored by Netzschlocation: Westin Convention Centerinstructors: ekkehard Post, J.B. henderson, and robert Campbell; netzschdescription: The course will cover introduction to STA/TG/EGA, thermal expan-sion/bulk density, mass change/energetics, thermal conductivity/thermal diffusiv-ity, fundamentals of high-temperature DSC and technical solutionss and ceramic applications. Additionally, a laboratory session with working dilatometer, STA/DSC and LFA will be demonstrated.

thursday october 29, 2009 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

thursday - friday october 29-30, 2009 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

dynamic Behavior of Structural and Armor Ceramicslocation: Westin Convention Center instructor: Ghatu Subhash, univ. of florida

description: The course will cover projectile impact on armor; threat character-istics & ceramic responses; dynamic fracture, fragmentation and comminution; constitutive models for ceramic fracture under dynamic loads; experimental methods for dynamic response; constitutive response of comminuted ceramics; and design issues in impact-resistant ceramics.

fundamentals of Glass Science and technologylocation: Westin Convention Center instructor: Arun K. varshneya, Alfred univ.description: Course covers basic glass science and technology in order to broaden or improve one’s foundation in the understanding of glass as a mate-rial of choice. Topics include glass science (commercial glass families, glassy state, nucleation and crystallization, phase separation, glass structure), glass technology, batch calculations, glass melting and forming, glass properties and engineering principles, and elementary fracture analysis.

introduction to Ceramic Phase diagrams location: Westin Convention Center instructor: Matthew hall, Alfred univ.description: The course will cover basic features of binary and ternary phase diagrams, application of the Lever Rule in binary phase, construction of Alke-made lines and application of the Alkemade Theorem, identification of compatibil-ity triangles in ternary phase diagrams, construction and application of isothermal sections in ternary phase diagrams, and much more.

Mechanical Properties of Ceramics and Glasses location: Westin Convention Center instructors: George d. Quinn, niSt and richard C. Bradt, univ. of Alabamadescription: The course will cover mechanical properties of ceramics & glasses for elastic properties, strength measurements, fracture parameters & indentation hardness, fundamentals of properties for topics, related properties to structure & crystal chemistry, and standard test methods.

Sintering of Ceramicslocation: Westin Convention Center instructor: Mohamed n. rahaman, Missouri univ. of Science and technologydescription: The course will follow the key topics the text book, Sintering of Ceramics, by M. N. Rahaman, CRC Press and will be supplemented by detailed case studies of the sintering of specific ceramics and systems. Topics include review of sintering basics, solid-state and viscous sintering, microstructure devel-opment and control, liquid-phase sintering, effect in homogeneities on sintering, solid solutions additives (dopants), viscous sintering with crystallization, and ‘how to do’ sintering.

Solids flow in Storage and Process Systemslocation: Westin Convention Center instructors: roger Barnum and James Prescott, Jenike & Johanson inc.description: In this two-day course, attendees gain a strong, fundamental under-standing of bulk solids and their behavior, along with the general principles and practical applications of solids flow. Discover how and why typical flow problems occur, and what simple, practical steps can be taken to solve them. Learn how to design bulk material-handling systems that work from the start, and also, how to retrofit existing troublesome systems to ensure reliable solids flow. The lectures will not produce instant experts in the theory of solids flow, but will provide advice as well as sources for further study and references.


MS&t’09 exhiBitorS (as of 4/27/09)

Booth# Company

525 Ad Value Technology LLC421 Alfa Aesar514 Allied High Tech Products Inc.420 American Stress Technologies505 Anter Corporation532 Applied Test Systems Inc.428 ArcelorMittal601 ATI (Allegheny Technologies Inc.)601 ATI Allegheny Ludlum601 ATI Allvac601 ATI Engineered Products601 ATI Wah Chang303 Avure Technologies209 Brannon & Associates714 Brook Anco Corporation417 Bruker AXS208 Buehler Ltd.425 Carbolite501 Carl Zeiss MicroImaging500 Carl Zeiss SMT608 Center for Tribology Inc.524 Centorr Vacuum Industries Inc.437 Cilas Particle Size405 Clemex Technologies Inc.310 CM Furnaces Inc225 CMC Americas418 CompuTherm LLC410 Crystex Composites LLC204 CSM Instruments427 Dunhua Zhengxing Abrasive Co. Ltd..309 EDAX Inc.340 Eirich Machines632 ELSEVIER311 Engineered Pressure Systems Inc.(EPSI)530 Ernest F. Fullam Inc.610 Evans Analytical614 FEI Company700 Gasbarre Products Inc. (PTX-Pentronix)320 Goodfellow Corporation605 Granta Design424 H.C. Starck Inc.620 Haiku Tech Inc.536 Harrop Industries Inc.415 High Temperature Materials Laboratory330 Horiba Instruments Inc.328 Horiba Jobin Yvon504 Hysitron Inc.200 IMR Test Labs324 Innovative Test Solutions332 Innov-X Systems Inc.600 JEOL USA Inc.231 JUMR400 LECO Corp.408 Leica Microsystems333 Maney Publishing619 McDanel Advanced Ceramic Technologies215 Mercury Computer Systems305 Metal Samples Company308 Metcut Research, Inc325 Micromeritics Instruments Corporation341 Micropyretics Heaters Int’l336 MTI Corporation

Booth# Company

300 MTS Systems Corporation528 NanoFocus Inc.609 Nanovea (Micro Photonics)401 Netzsch Instruments Inc.314 NIST414 NSL Analytical Services Inc.235 Nucor Steel604 Olympus Industrial205 Oxford Instruments317 Panalytical539 Premier Lab Supply615 Proto Manufacturing Inc.436 Rigaku Americas Corporation533 Sente Software Ltd.611 Spectro Analytical Instruments

Booth# Company

337 Springer409 Struers Inc.304 TEC201 Tescan USA538 Thermex-Thermatron LLC509 Thermo Scientific - NITON511 Thermo Scientific - Scientfic315 Thermo-Cal Software301 UES Inc.433 Union Process Inc.515 United States Steel Corporation526 W.E.L. Instrument Co. LLC100 Westmoreland Mechanical Testing & Research Inc.426 Wiley-Blackwell


MS&t’09 Student ACtivitieSAttention Students:Material Advantage students have an opportunity to learn and network by attending special sessions and activities especially for them. The following information highlights this year’s activities that students won’t want to miss.

neW eventS for 2009!

Material Advantage outreach demonstration expo

The Material Advantage Student Program will be showcasing outreach activities on Saturday, Oct. 24, 3:30 p.m.–5:30 p.m., that have been devel-oped by our very own Material Advantage Student Chapters. The Material Advantage Outreach Demonstration Expo will provide a venue for chapters to share their activities with, not only other chapters, but with select student groups. This is also an excellent opportunity for chapters who may not have a lot of experience in this area to see what other chapters are doing to help them generate new ideas. Tables are still available. If your student chapter is interested in participating with a demonstration, contact Can-dace Cunningham at [email protected].

Student Service Project

Students have the opportunity to make a difference in the community by participating in this student service project, sponsored by the Material Advantage Student Program. The students will be divided into groups and working on landscaping, painting, and a walking trail. Busing, lunch, snacks and beverages, T-shirts, tools, equipment and all materials will be provided. The projects will be first come, first served so sign-up early. Lend a hand and give back to the community by participating in this worthwhile event! To participate, sign-up with Lori Wharrey at [email protected] by Oct. 2. Please provide T-shirt size when you contact Lori.

don’t MiSS theSe eventS

networking Mixer

Sunday, Oct. 25 concludes with a Student Networking Mixer from 8 p.m.–10:30 p.m. This casual and fun atmosphere is designed for students, Material Advantage faculty advisors, and Society volunteer leaders to make connections.

ACerS PCSA Student tour of Anter Corporation

Tour this Pittsburgh manufacturer of dilatometers for thermal expansion (CTE) and sintering studies, thermal conductivity meters, thermal diffusivity systems (laser flash) and specific heat capacity measuring instruments to test solids, powders, and liquids. The tour will be held on Monday, Oct. 26, 10 a.m.–2 p.m. Students will see Anter’s products in a laboratory setting and will get an overview of their use in material characterization. Students will also see the manufacturing process from beginning to end. Bus trans-portation will be provided. To sign up for the tour, contact Claire Weiss at [email protected] by Oct. 1.

JuMr Symposium - focus on undergraduate Materials research

Undergraduate students will be presenting their work performed as an in-dividual or from a collaborative research for a class-project or an internship at the JUMR Symposium on Monday, Oct. 26, 2 p.m.–5 p.m., and Tuesday, Oct. 27, 8 a.m.–11 a.m.

Daniele Finotello, the program director for the NSF-DMR Office of Special Programs, will be the featured speaker during Monday’s symposium. She will be speaking about the opportunities for undergraduate students regarding the educational activities at NSF.

Student Career Connection

On Tuesday, Oct. 27, from 11 a.m.–2 p.m., human resource departments from companies representing various industries along with university grad-uate school programs will participate in the Student Career Connection. The companies will be speaking with students about potential employment and internship opportunities. The universities will provide information on their graduate programs. Students are encouraged to bring copies of their résumés.

MAteriAl AdvAntAGe ConteStS And CoMPetitionS

undergraduate Student Poster Competition

This poster competition is to encourage undergraduate students to present their undergraduate research experiences and to improve their commu-nication skills. The poster entered must be the work of an undergraduate and completed during the undergraduate education of the student. The competition is open to any materials-related technical topic. For more in-formation about this poster contest for undergraduates or to enter a poster abstract, contact Kevin Fox at [email protected]. Deadline for entries is Sept. 30.

Graduate Student Poster Competition

The graduate student poster competition is to recognize superior research performed during graduate study. All graduate student posters were submitted during the Call for Papers and must be accepted for the general poster session to be entered into the contest. Posters for the contest will be displayed during the general poster session, and winners will be announced at the student awards ceremony on Tuesday, Oct. 27, from 2 p.m.–3 p.m.

Student Speaking Contest

This is the national semifinal and final rounds of the undergraduate student speaking contest and will be held in the Westin Hotel, attached to the Con-vention Center. Each Material Advantage Student Chapter is encouraged to hold local undergraduate student speaking contests on campus prior to MS&T. Winners of the local contests will advance to the semifinal/finals at MS&T on Sunday, Oct. 25, from 1 p.m.–5 p.m. The subject of the presenta-tion must be technical in nature but can relate to any aspect of materials science and engineering. National contestants must be reported to Elliott Slamovich at [email protected] by Sept. 30.

Mug drop and Putting Contests

These two contests are both interesting and fun. They are scheduled for Tuesday, Oct. 27, from 11:15 a.m.–1:15 p.m. in the Convention Center Exhibit Hall. Students wanting to compete must register no later than Oct. 16 by e-mailing William Hammetter at [email protected].

Visit www.materialadvantage.org/financial/contest.aspx for complete information about Material Advantage contests and competitions.

Material Advantage Student Awards Ceremony

Student activities end with this awards ceremony on Tuesday, Oct. 27 from 2 p.m.–3 p.m. Various awards will be presented to the winners of the Mate-rial Advantage contests.

ACerS ConteStS And CoMPetitionS

the Graduate excellence in Materials Science (GeMS) Awards

The GEMS Awards recognize the outstanding achievements of up to 10 graduate students in materials science and engineering. The award is open to all graduate students who are making an oral presentation in any symposium or session at MS&T. The awards are sponsored by the Basic Science Division of ACerS. For complete details, visit the GEMS Award page at www.ceramics.org/?page_id=6507

Ceramographic Competition: undergraduate Studies

The Ceramographic Competition is an annual exhibit to promote the use of microscopy and microanalysis as tools in the scientific investigation of ceramic materials. The competition entries will be displayed in the Conven-tion Center. Undergraduates are encouraged to submit entries to the “Un-dergraduate Studies” category. For more information, visit www.ceramics.org/?page_id=6513. The deadline for entry submittal is Sept. 20.

For registration, housing, and travel grant information, see www.matscitech.org, or by contacting Tricia Nicol, Membership Services Manager and The American Ceramic Society liaison to the Material Advantage Student Program, at [email protected] or 614-794-5827.


Researchers at Sandia National Laboratory are working on a device that could eventually lead to an opti-cal detector with nanometer-scale resolution, ultra-tiny digital cameras, solar cells with greater light absorp-tion capability or perhaps suitable for applications such as genome sequenc-ing. However, they emphasize that the near-term purpose of the project is basic science research.

Xinjian Zhou, François Léonard, Andy Vance, Karen Krafcik, Tom Zifer and Bryan Wong have created the first carbon nanotube device that can detect the entire range of visible light. The device could allow scientists to study single molecule transformations, includ-ing how a molecule responds to light and changes shape, and how molecules and nanotubes interact.

As with many other recent studies, the Sandia researchers went back to nature, in this case the human eye, and they improved on the model. When light strikes the eye’s retina, a cascade of chemical and electrical events occur. Photons strikes chromophores, the light-sensitive part of the molecules found in the retina. The photon inter-raction causes the molecule to change shape, and that ultimately trigger nerve impulses.

Likewise, when light strikes a chro-mophore in the nanoscale color detec-tor, it causes a conformational change in the molecule. This, in turn, causes a threshold shift on a transistor made from a single-walled carbon nanotube.

“In our eyes the neuron is in front of the retinal molecule, so the light has to transmit through the neuron to hit the molecule,” says Zhou. “We placed the nanotube transistor behind the mol-ecule – a more efficient design.”

Early efforts using an individual nanotube detected light in a narrow wavelength range at laser intensities. However, the Sandia detector is more sensitive, that is, 40 W/m2 – about

three percent of the den-sity of sunshine reaching the surface of he earth. “Because the dye is so close to the nanotube, a little change turns into a big signal on the device,” says Zhou.

Zhou and Krafcik created a tiny transis-tor made from a single carbon nanotube. They depos-ited carbon nanotubes on a silicon wafer and used photolithography to define electrical patterns to make contacts. Meanwhile, Vance and Zifer synthesized molecules to create three types of add-on chro-mophores that respond to either red, green or orange bands of the visible spectrum. Zhou immersed the wafer in the dye solution until the chromo-sphores attached themselves to the nanotubes.

“Detection is now limited to about three percent of sunlight, which isn’t bad compared with a commercially available digital camera,” says Zhou. “I hope to add some antennas to increase light absorption.”

The team is now working on detect-ing infrared light. “We think this prin-ciple can be applied to infrared light, and there is a lot of interest in infrared detection,” says Vance. “So we’re in the process of looking for dyes that work in infrared.”

“A large part of why we are doing this is not to invent a photo detec-tor, but to understand the processes involved in controlling carbon nano-

tube devices,” says Léonard, author of The Physics of Carbon Nanotubes, pub-lished September 2008.

The next step is to create a nano-meter-scale photovoltaic device. Such a device on a larger scale could be used as an unpowered photo detector or for solar energy. “Instead of monitoring current changes, we’d actually generate current,” says Vance. “We have an idea of how to do it, but it will be a more challenging fabrication process.” n

research briefs

A carbon nanotube device that detects rainbow colors

Sandia researcher Xinjian Zhou measures the electronic and optical properties of carbon nanotube devices in a probe station. The moni-tor shows the electrode layout on the device wafer. The nanotubes are positioned in the small horizontal gaps.

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Representation of chromophores attach-ing to a transistor made from a single carbon nanotube.


research briefs

MIT became associated with gra-phene 50 years ago when professor Mildred Dresselhaus and her physicist husband Gene worked with multi-layered graphene in the 1960s. At that time, many thought that a single-layer form could never be found or made. “It was very controversial; there were many people who were skeptical [about the research],” Dresselhaus says.

Now MIT researchers are focusing on how to harness graphene’s proper-ties and produce it in larger quantities. Back at MIT, several research groups have intensified their investigations of the physical, chemical, electronic and engineering properties of graphene.

The mobility of electrons in gra-phene is by far the highest of any known material. Its strength is, pound for pound, 200 times that of steel. Gra-phene is a remarkably simple material, composed of nothing but carbon atoms arranged in a simple, regular pattern, like diamond. Carbon atoms have a propensity to bind strongly to each other and to other atoms. The molecu-lar bonds they form are easy to make and hard to break. That’s what gives carbon molecules and crystals their unrivaled strength.

“It’s the most extreme material you can think of,” says Tomas Palacios, assistant professor of electrical engi-neering and computer science and a leader of one of MIT’s research groups exploring graphene’s possible electronic applications. He continues, “For many years, people thought it was an impos-sible material that couldn’t exist in nature, but people have been studying it from a theoretical point of view for more than 60 years.”

Graphene research projects at MITOne hope is that graphene will sur-

mount the physical constraints that limit the further development of small-er, faster silicon chips.

Graphene also might be used as substitute for copper to make electrical connections between computer chips

and other electronic devices. Its advan-tages are lower resistance and, thus, less heat generation.

Another MIT group is focusing on graphene’s transparency, a property that results from its single-atom thick-ness. Therefore, it can be used to make transparent electrodes for light-based applications, such as light-emitting diodes or improved solar cells. The potential solar cell applications are now being studied by associate professor of electrical engineering Vladimir Bulovic and associate dean of engineering for research Karen Gleason.

In still another MIT project, Pablo Jarillo-Herrero, assistant professor of physics, is studying graphene’s basic physical properties and using its unique behavior as a way to study fundamental quantum-mechanical effects. For exam-ple, in graphene, electrons behave as if they were massless particles propagat-

ing according to the laws of relativistic quantum mechanics. This is a behavior that is normally reserved to particles traveling near the speed of light in accelerators or in the cosmos. Such behavior is at the heart of the ultrahigh mobilities exhibited by graphene devic-es. Jarillo-Herrero says that because the material is so new and its fundamental properties still are being discovered.

Graphene productionHowever, when it comes to possible

commercial applications, it’s essential to find ways of producing graphene in large quantities.

Jing Kong, ITT Career Development Associate Professor of Electrical Engi-neering, leads a team that is working on developing methods of producing gra-phene at a commercial level. The team has created sheets of graphene using chemical vapor deposition, a technique that it hopes can be developed to make larger quantities of the material. Kong’s method uses equipment that is “very compatible to conventional semicon-ductor processing.”

The method “is quite straightfor-ward, and not too expensive,” she says, which could help to enable commercial applications. Further research will be needed to improve the quality and uniformity of the graphene sheets for specialized functions, such as computer chips, she says. However, for other applications, such as solar-cell elec-trodes, the existing process allows the researchers to start the investigation.

Still, Dresselhaus is a bit less san-quine about making graphene sheets suitable for commercial applications. “[T]o provide the next generation of semiconductor electronics, that’s really a decade away,” she says. Dresselhaus adds that, although it remains to be seen what applications will prove to be practical or affordable, she still likes the material for its properties and strength.

A version of this article appeared in the May 6, 2009, issue MIT Tech Talk. n

Graphene remains exciting research topic at MIT

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Crystallographic structure of a sheet of graphene is revealed in this atomic force microscope picture.

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AFM picture of a graphene supercon-ducting field effect transistor. The two gold-colored electrodes are made of superconducting titanium-aluminum alloy.

American Ceramic Society Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 6 41

Our industry is going through chal-lenging times: Some markets are down; others are up. Employment in the United States can be affected by the economics of “home base” companies that are half a world away. The Glass Manufacturing Industry Council fre-quently gets calls from individual glass professionals who are, through no fault of their own, in search of new jobs. In parallel with this, a number of compa-nies are adding new facilities or grow-ing specific departments (research, for example!).

How do we handle that? When we have a position we’re aware of, we can’t just announce it to the industry. Some might see this as “poaching” – provid-ing excellent employees with oppor-tunities that will take them away from their current companies.

Similarly, when an individual is seeking a job that will best utilize his or her skills, how do we put the seeker together with an interesting job oppor-tunity?

We now have a solution. We are pleased to announce the launch of our interactive job board, the “GMIC Career Center.” With its focus on glass industry companies, the Career Center offers our members – and the glass industry at-large – an easy-to-use and highly targeted resource for online employment connections.

We’re very excited about the Career Center, because we know how critical it is for employers in the glass industry to attract first-rate talent with a mini-mum expenditure of time and resources. And, it’s important for us to help

enable smooth career transitions for those seeking industry jobs.

Both members and nonmembers can use the Career Center to reach quali-fied candidates. Employers can post jobs online, search for qualified candidates based on specific job criteria and cre-ate an online résumé agent to email qualified candidates instantly. They also benefit from online reporting that provides job activity statistics.

For job seekers, the Career Center is a free service that provides access to employers and jobs in the glass indus-try. In addition to posting their résu-més, job seekers can browse and view available jobs based on their criteria, and save those jobs for later review if they choose. Job seekers can also cre-ate a search agent to provide email notifications of jobs that match their criteria.

There is more. In recent weeks I’ve received calls from headhunters in vari-ous industries looking for individuals who might be glass professionals, but whose skills are relevant to other heat/melting-based industries. Likewise, I have been contacted by glass compa-nies seeking individuals in one of those other industries who have relevant engineering experience.

In these situations, another feature of the Career Center that will ben-efit employers and job seekers is the center’s link to the Engineering & Science Career Network, a growing network of leading engineering and science associations. The GMIC’s alli-ance with the ESCN increases employ-ers’ reach to over 15,000 résumés, as well as job seekers’ reach to hundreds of job postings.

The ESCN includes leading engi-neering and science societies, such as the American Society of Civil Engineers, the Biomedical Engineering Society and the American Council of Engineering Companies.

Association job boards link together with the online career center solution provided by the Network’s managing partner, Boxwood Technology. The sys-tem allows recruiters looking for systems engineers, for example, to reach engi-neering candidates with, for example, the American Institute of Physics mem-berships as well as engineers from any of the other societies in the network.

Boxwood Technology Inc. is the leading provider of career center ser-vices for the association industry, and the only such provider endorsed by the American Society of Association Executives. Boxwood chair and CEO, John Bell, says the goal of the ESCN is to make it easy for associations to work together to expand the reach of their individual job boards. Boxwood has also created several other career networks, such as the National Healthcare Career Network, the Diversity Talent Network and the Marketing Career Network.

GMIC is pleased to provide these new programs, and we hope that com-panies and individuals will make good use of its features. We also welcome your comments and suggestions for enhancements or additional features that we could add to our overall support of our industry.

You can reach the Career Center through our web site, www.gmic.org. Click on the second tab down the left column and you’ll go directly to the center. Good luck to all!

For more information about Boxwood Technology, see www.boxwoodtech.com.

Michael Greenman, Executive DirectorGlass Manufacturing Industry Counciltel 614-818-9423fax [email protected] www.gmic.org

glass facts

GMIC launches career center to help match career opportunities with available skills

Michael Greenman

American Ceramic Society Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 6 41


new products

Spectronics Corp. has unveiled the Spectroline OPTIMAX 365C, a

cordless, rechargeable UV-A LED flashlight to use for curing of adhesives, sealants, epoxies, resins, coatings and other materials. Powered by a recharge-able NiMH battery, it provides 90 min-utes of continuous use between charges; the LED lifetime is 30,000 hours. The OPTIMAX 365C has a corrosion-resis-tant anodized lamp body, weighs 11.8 ounces and is ergonomically designed. It comes with UV-absorbing spectacles, a belt holster and smart AC and DC battery chargers, all packed in a padded carrying case.Spectronics Corp. Westbury, N.Y. [email protected] tel 800-641-1133 www.spectroline.com t

A TS Rheosystems introduces the MERLIN Viscometer, a rotational

viscometer capable of steady shear and yield stress testing in a rugged, compact size footprint. Designed for perform-ing routine rheological tests, such as single-point viscosity checks for quality control, to complex rheological evalu-ation for R&D, the viscometer is ideal for investigating the mixing, stirring and process flow characteristics of fluid systems, the company states. The unit

comes standard with built-in Peltier temperature control for all measuring systems. Cone and plate, parallel plate and concentric cylinder measuring sys-tems are included.ATS RheoSystems Bordentown, N.J. [email protected] tel 609-298-2522 www.atsrheosystems.com t

InfoSight Corp. provides sequential bar-coded ceramic tile that can be

used to track products through extreme temperatures or aggressive chemical pro-cesses. The sequentially numbered, reus-able bar codes are designed to provide “license plate” identification. The codes can be either linear (picket fence) or 2D symbologies and are available in a variety of sizes and thicknesses that can be adhe-sively attached to other ceramic surfaces. InfoSight also provides bar coding trace-ability solutions for direct application to a variety of substrates, such as ceramics (e.g., catalytic converter cores) and glass (e.g., solar cells). InfoSight Corp. Chillicothe, Ohio [email protected] tel 740-642-3600 www.infosight.com t

QComp Technologies,

Inc. has introduced five new conveyors designed specifically to meet any glass-handling applica-tion. The complete line of conveyors includes straight, pop-up transfer, canti-levered-finger, tilt-top and skewed-roller conveyors. “Glass manufacturers, due to the delicate nature of their product, require extremely precise, secure and careful transport of the glass throughout the production line,” said Tom Doyle, president. “Our complete line of glass handling conveyors includes integrated

controls for precise handling and mini-mizing gaps between lites to maximize square footage through coating, laminat-ing and tempering machines.” QComp Technologies Inc. Greenville, Wisc. 54942 [email protected] tel 920-757-0775 www.qcomptech.com


CRAIC Technologies announces the QDI 2010 film microspectropho-

tometer, which is designed to measure the thickness of thin films of submicron sampling areas rapidly and nonde-structively. The QDI 2010 enables the user to determine thin-film thickness on everything from semiconductors, MEMS devices, disk drives to flat panel displays. “Many of our customers want to measure the thickness of thin films of smaller and smaller sampling areas for rapid quality control of their products. The QDI 2010 film microspectropho-tometer was built in response to cus-tomer requests for a powerful, flexible film thickness tool that can measure submicron areas on both transparent and opaque substrates. The QDI 2010 film meets those needs,” says Paul Martin, president. CRAIC Technologies Inc. San Dimas, Calif. [email protected] tel 310-573-8180 www.microspectra.com t

T he Pro-Cast Series lab-scale tape-casting/coating machines from

HED International offer a simplified and inexpensive forming method for product development, research and

quality control. The lab-scale machines are designed with an enclosed drying chamber and removable tempered glass viewports for ease of product access and visual inspection. Precision casting and coating applications are accomplished with a calibrated doctor blade set on a solid granite plate. Independently controlled heaters and an exhaust fan are provided for counter flow circula-tion and dynamic management of the drying process and vapor removal. A variable speed drive with carrier payout and removable take-up spools is also included. Many custom options are also available.HED International Inc Ringoes, N.J. [email protected] tel 609-466-1900 www.hed.com t

inXitu Inc. introduces a new benchtop combination XRD/XRF instrument.

Its BTX performs mineral/phase identi-fication and quantification for routine quality control applications. According to the company, the powder handling meth-ods can dramatically improve the quality of XRD data while reducing the require-ments for sample preparation. inXitu’s patented technique makes possible qual-ity XRD data to be collected regardless of the grain size of the sample. Grain sizes

up to 400 µm have been tested, produc-ing data normally obtained with micron-sized particles.inXitu Inc. Mountain View, Calif. [email protected] tel 650-567-0081 www.inxitu.com t

Ocean Optics’ USB4000-series spec-trometers and the new Jaz modular

sensing suite monitor the absolute and relative spectral irradiance of sun and artificial sunlight sources, such as solar simulators. With the former, measure-ment of solar characteristics can help solar system installers position photovol-taic panels most effectively. With solar simulators, the value is in monitoring how reliably the simulators mimic the sun’s light in various environments. Ocean Optics Dunedin, Fla. [email protected] tel 727-733-2447 www.oceanoptics.com t


Calendar of events

June 20091–2 Avionics USA and Military & Aerospace Electronics Forum – San Diego, Calif.; www.avionics-usa.com

1–4 Ceramics China – Guangdong, China; www.ceramicschina.net

1–4 Society for Experimental Mechanics Conference & Exposition on Experimental & Applied Mechanics – Albuquerque, N.M.; www.sem.org

6–12 Society of Manufacturing Engineers Annual Conference – Philadelphia, Pa.; www.sme.org/confer-ence

11–15 Glass Performance Days (Finland) – Tampere, Finland; www.gpd.fi

17–18 Size Matters 2009: Ethical Challenges Facing Nanotechnology Conference – Saarbrücken, Germany; www.sizematters2009.de

17–19 The Fred Glasser Cement Science Symposium – Aberdeen, Scotland; www.nanocem.org/ glassersymposium

18–19 ACerS Southwest Section Annual Meeting – Houston, Texas; [email protected]

28–30 ACerS Short Course: Introduction to Ceramic Phase Diagrams – Westerville, Ohio; www.ceramics.org/shortcourses

28–7/1 Int’l Conference on Powder Metallurgy & Particulate Materials – Las Vegas, Nev.; www.mpif.org

28–7/3 17th Conference on Solid State Ionics – Toronto, Canada; www.ceramics.org/meetings/endorsed.aspx

July 200913–14 ACerS Short Course: Fundamentals of Glass Science and Technology – Westerville, Ohio; www.ceramics.org/shortcourses

August 200911 CerMA Golf Classic – The Quarry Golf Club, Canton, Ohio; Registration deadline - Aug. 1. Contact Myra Warne,

740-588-0828, [email protected]

12 ACerS Ceramic Materials Web Seminar: Test Standards and Specifications for the Global Advanced Ceramics Market – Status, Needs and Challenges; www.ceramics.org/mee-ings/webseminars.aspx

25–29 Thermec 2009: 6th Int’l Conference on Advanced Materials and Processes – Berlin, Germany; www.thermec.uow.edu.au

29–9/2 30th Int’l Thermal Conductivity Conference and 18th Int’l Thermal Expansion Conference – Pittsburgh, Pa.; www.thermalconductivity.org

September 20096–9 The 3rd Int’l Conference on the Characterization and Control of Interfaces for High Quality Advanced Materials and Joining Technology for New Metallic Glasses and Inorganic Materials – Kurashiki, Japan; www.ceramics.org/meetings/endorsed.aspx

13–16 High Temperature Electronics Network – Oxford, United Kingdom; www.imaps.org

17–18 ACerS Short Course: Ceramic Injection Molding – San Diego, Calif.; www.ceramics.org/shortcourses

28–30 Nanotech Northern Europe – Berlin, Germany; www.nanotech.net

29–10/3 Cersaie, Int’l Exhibition of Ceramic Tile and Bathroom Furnishings – Bologna, Italy; www.cersaie.com

30–10/2 GlassBuildAmerica 2009 – Atlanta, Ga.; www.glassbuildamerica.com

October 200913–16 UNITECR 2009 11th Biennial Worldwide Conference on Refractories – Salvador, Brazil; www.unitecr2009.org

20–23 Ceramitec 2009 – Munich, Germany; www.ceramitec.de

25–29 Materials Science & Technology Conference & Exhibition – MS&T’09 combined with ACerS 111th Annual Meeting – Pittsburgh, Pa.; www.matscitech.org

29 One-day ACerS Short Courses: • Microwave and rf Processing Fundamentals; • Thermal Analysis and Thermophysical Properties Measurements of Ceramic and Refractory Materials; Both held in conjunction with MS&T’09 – Pittsburgh, Pa.; www.ceramics.org/shortcourses

29–30 Two-day ACerS Short Courses: • Introduction to Ceramic Phase Diagrams; • Fundamentals of Glass Science and Technology; • Sintering of Ceramics; • Mechanical Properties of Ceramics and Glasses; • Dynamic Behavior of Structural and Armor Ceramics; • Solids Flow in Storage and Process Systems; All held in conjunction with MS&T’09 – Pittsburgh, Pa.; www.ceramics.org/shortcourses

November 20091–4 2nd Int’l Symposium on Advanced Ceramics and Technology for Sustainable Energy Applications – Taipei, Taiwan; www.conf.ncku.edu.tw/actsea2009

8–9 Glassman Middle East – Dubai; www.glassmediaonline.com

December 20092–4 Glasspex Index 2009 – New Delhi, India; www.mdna.com

January 201020–22 Electronics Materials and Applications 2010 – Royal Plaza Hotel, Walt Disney World Plaza Resort, Orlando, Fla.; www.ceramics.org/ema2010

resources

Dates in RED denote new entry in this issue.

Entries in BLUE denote ACerS events.

denotes meetings that ACerS cosponsors, endorses or otherwise cooperates in organizing.


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patents/legal services

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From New England to California, the Rust Belt to the Sun Belt, I’ve been privileged to get to know many of you this year and hear your stories. I wanted to share a little about what I’ve learned.

Our members continue to be upbeat about the future. The industry leaders, academics and students I’ve talked to firmly believe that the ceramics com-munity has essential technical expertise that is needed to rebuild the economy. Most companies are weathering the storm while planning for the future. Our students recognize that while this recession is a serious challenge, it is a relatively short-term one for them.

Two of ACerS strategic goals are to develop the next generation of ceramic talent, and to engage and support those in ceramic-related industries. While the needs of students and industry may not be identical, there are surprising over-laps. From my conversations, I believe there are four big lessons for ACerS.

Innovation and communitySome students recently asked me

why they should belong to ACerS. My answer was that one of the keys to career success is the ability to innovate, to develop new ideas that lead to improve-ments – whether in research, plant oper-ations, sales or even administration.

In my experience, innovation is gen-erally a collaborative process. New ideas are shaped and tested when you get outside of your everyday situation and have the opportunity to interact with other smart and creative people. For me, ACerS has been an incredible resource for these types of people and a catalyst for these types of discussions. ACerS has given me an invaluable network of friends with whom I can discuss prob-lems, opportunities and ideas. I believe that the more ACerS can foster a strong

community of peers – whether through technical meetings, online or volun-teer experiences – the more we all benefit.

Attract a new generation

With many ceramics professionals are over the age of 55, there is a grow-ing need to find new talent. With very few university ceramics programs left and declining enrollments in materials engineering pro-grams, there will not be sufficient supply to meet this demand. All of the major companies that I visited recognized that this presents a huge challenge for the future. To address this challenge, ACerS needs to do more to attract new stu-dents to the discipline, increase student involvement in ACerS activities and deeply engage young professionals in the life of the organization.

Fill the knowledge gapConsidering retirements and declines

in ceramic-specific education, we face a talent gap, and a knowledge gap. Ceramic science and engineering experts are leaving the workforce. At the same time, knowledge requirements for those entering the workforce are likely to increase, as advanced technol-ogies require greater knowledge about broader materials systems.

Many industry leaders I spoke with felt ACerS needs to be part of the solu-tion in filling this knowledge gap. To do this, we must help develop a culture within our community that encourages knowledge sharing and new tools – par-ticularly web-based tools – to dissemi-nate knowledge. This presents a trickier challenge because of competitive issues, but most of those I spoke with felt these issues could be overcome.

Enhance service to industryACerS leaders often talk about our

membership being a three-legged stool, consisting of members from academia, government laboratories and agencies, and industry. What many members don’t realize is that our industry mem-bership is larger than the other two groups combined, yet what we offer does not typically reflect this reality. Fortunately, there is wide consensus that this needs to change.

One way we are addressing this need is by launching an industry-focused Ceramic Materials Summit in 2010. The Summit will give industry leaders the opportunity to talk with their peers in academia and national labs about the opportunities and challenges confront-ing the ceramic materials community today. We are also creating online forums and other web resources that will allow us to communicate on busi-ness issues and help provide knowledge to our customers, plant personnel and others. Obviously, these ideas are just a start, and we will continue to engage industry in a discussion about how ACerS can better serve the industry community.

If you have thoughts you would like to share about any of these ideas, please send me an email at [email protected].

ámorphos

Lessons from the road


John Kaniuk ACerS President

Students, like those I met at Penn State, (from left) Helen Larson, Katie O’Brien, Brad Hasek and Jessica Serra, will help us fill the approaching “talent gap.”

AMERICAN CERAMIC SOCIETY bulletinceramics.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/lo_res... · 4 American Ceramic Society Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 6 news & trends Reinforced Plastics (published

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