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Report from IUPAC-Sponsored
Symposium
Polymer Characterization
Polychar World Forum on Polymer Application and Theory,
7-11 January 2002, Denton, Texas, USA
> Back to Calendar
by Michael Hess
This year's Polychar World Forum on Polymer Application and Theory
was held 7-11 January 2002 in Denton, Texas, USA. This was the 10th
conference in the series on relationships between characterization,
synthesis, processing, manufacturing, and properties of polymer
systems. The Chancellor of the University of North Texas, Warren
Burggren, opened the conference, which featured 48 participants
from 19 countries and comprised 8 special speakers, 6 invited speakers,
23 normal speakers, and 28 posters.
The number of participants and speakers at the conference was lower
than in previous years because of the particular difficulties in
travelling these days. The number of registrations was initially
much higher, but because of the aftermath of September 11 and unexpected
weather problems, many registered participants could not attend.
Therefore, the conference suffered from many unexpected gaps in
its time schedule. Despite these problemswhich were professionally
handled by the experienced local crew of the Department of Materials
Science and other supporting departments of the University of North
Texasthe conference provided an impressive overview of current
developments in polymer science.
The conference presenters included a number of wellknown scientists,
but consisted mainly of those who are at the front line of science-diploma-and
doctoral students who presented their results as oral presentations
or as posters. For many of the young scientists, this conference
is the first occasion to present their work in front of a larger
international audience.
The day before the official conference starts, there is a tutorial
on analytical methods in polymer characterization, which is presented
by notable specialists. This event is very useful for advanced and
doctoral students to get an overview of the most important techniques
available to characterize polymers in theory and application. The
areas covered by the conference were:
- Predictive Methods l Polymerization
- Polymer Liquid Crystals
- Mechanical Properties and Performance
- Dielectrical and Electrical Properties
- Surface, Interfaces, and Tribology
- Rheology, Solutions and Processing
- Characterization and Structure-Property Relations
- Recycling
Presentations covered a range of subjects, such as Combinatorial
Methods for Polymer Science, Alleviation of Environmental Pollution
by Converting Polystyrene Waste into Nonionic Surfactants, Processing
and Performance of Polymer-Based Shape Memory Alloy Adaptive Composite,
and Biobased Polymeric Flocculants for Industrial Effluent Treatment.
In addition, a number of awards and prices were announced at the
conference:
- The Paul Flory Polymer Research Prize was shared by Ronald
Koningsveld, Sittard, The Netherlands, and Moshe Narkis, The Technion
Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel.
- The Prize for the Best Lecture of the Tutorial was awarded
to Dirk Schubert, Freudenberg Forschungsdienste, Weinheim, Gemany.
- The Bruce Hartmann Award (for a young polymer researcher) was
given to Sirina Putthanarat, University of Akron.
- The Carl Klason Award (for the best student paper) went to
Ricardo Simoes, University of North Texas, Denton, U. S. A.
- Diplomas of Distinction (for a student's presentation) went
to Frederic Dreux, University of Rouen, France; Kwan Yee Lau,
Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, China; Joanne
Yip, Polytechnic University of Hong, China; and Rice University,
Houston, U. S. A.
The next World Forum on Polymer Application and Theory (POLYCHAR
11) will be held in Denton, Texas, 7-10 January 2003 with the Short
Course on Polymer Characterization on 6 January 2003.
Michael
Hess is a professor at the Gerhard-Mercator Universität,
in Duisburg, Germany and is chairman of the Subcommittee on Macromolecular
Terminology.
Page last modified 27 June 2002.
Copyright ©2002 International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry.
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