MRS-Mexico/MRS meeting held in Cancun
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MRS-Mexico/MRS meeting held in Cancun
TiO2 alone and was able to maintain high amounts of CO2 production over a much longer period of time. Ron Turco (Purdue University, USA), with expertise in soil microbiology, is interested in what happens to the soil– food web when different types of nanomaterials are introduced. In soil, a rich community of bacteria and fungi help support plant life and other important environmental processes such as nitrification. In his presentation in the symposium on Nanostructure Applications in Crossover Scientific and Technology Fields, Turco said that assessing the effects of nanomaterials on this system is a key part of understanding overall environmental impact. His group has studied materials composed of carbon, fullerenes, and single-walled carbon nanotubes, as well as metals including nano-silver, -indium, and -gallium. Methods of assessment included soil sorption tests, microbial community diversity, the respiratory response of fungi, and plant growth assays. Results demonstrate that carbon-based materials have little effect on soil communities, and fullerenes may even be degraded by certain types of fungi when first photo-oxidized to form hydroxyfullerenes. Overall, the impacts of nano-metals are “more negative, immediate, and warrant further study,” Turco said, although indium and gallium showed milder effects than silver. Turco emphasized the importance of develop
www.mrs-mexico.org.mx/imrc2010 www.mrs.org/imrc_2010
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he XIX International Materials Research Congress (IMRC) was held in Cancun, Mexico, on August 15–19, 2010, with half of the symposia organized jointly by the Materials Research Society and the Sociedad Mexicana de Materiales (MRS-Mexico) to complement the 12 IMRC symposia organized by MRS-Mexico. The NACE International Section Mexico Sociedad Mexicana de Materiales A.C was also a co-sponsor. In addition to the technical symposia, the Meeting chairs Luis Enrique Sansores Cuevas (Instituto de Investigaciones en Materiales), Miguel Contreras (National Renewable Energy Laboratory), Darrell Schlom (Cornell University), and Miguel Jose Yacaman (University of Texas—San Antonio) provided plenary sessions, tutorials, an exhibit, government funding seminars, and a luncheon talk on Mayan mathematics.
Environmental conservation
The theme of environmental conservation ran throughout the meeting. Much research was reported on making “green” materials, energyconserving materials, alternative fuel source materials, and materials for rectifying environmental damage, for example. One of the presentations in the New Catalytic Materials symposium addressed the problem of environmental damage caused by waste water that is generated by coffee production. With over 122 million 60-kg bags of coffee expected to be produced in 2010–2011, coffee producers such as Mexico, Colombia, and Brazil will battle pollution in their rivers due to organic contaminants. Moreover, the chemical and biological treatments necessary to mitigate the damage being done by the production is cost-prohibiti
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