Field of Dreams
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CALL FOR PAPERS
ABSTRACT DEADLINE: August 22, 2003
8th Wide-Bandgap III-Nitride Workshop September 29 – October 1, 2003 • Omni Richmond Hotel • Richmond, Virginia USA Workshop Chair: Dr. Cole W. Litton, Air Force Research Laboratory The Nitride Workshop is the 8th in a series that began in St. Louis in 1992. Participation of the entire GaN materials and device communities is encouraged, with subject areas including: substrate development • epitaxial growth • properties and applications of narrow-gap III nitrides • structural characterization • optical and electrical characterization • defects, doping and compensation • polarity • alloys and heterostructures • nanostructures • etching • UV optical sources and detectors • optoelectronic devices • III-nitride electronic devices. Abstract submissions for any of these topical areas are welcome. The program will include short (15 minute) oral presentations; poster sessions are also expected. Generous time for questions will be scheduled and no parallel sessions are planned.
www.mrs.org/meetings/workshops/GaN
POSTERMINARIES
Field of Dreams Truth or dare: How many of you have described the job of a materials scientist as inventing (or developing, designing, or creating) new materials to enable new technologies? Materials scientists very often respond to the need for a material with a particular set of properties—usually by adapting the processing or composition of an existing material to meet the new need—but it is very rare to invent entirely new materials for which there is no established application. Even when new materials are developed, it is as likely to happen by divine providence as it is by the design process. Stainless steel, Teflon, nylon—all were discovered by accident.
If you do invent something new, there is only a small chance that it will ever be commercialized and even less that it will make you rich. The first plain fact of the matter is that it is really difficult to invent new materials. Those of you with access to large numbers of fertile young minds might want to try this classroom exercise: Ask your students what novel set of properties they would like to design into a new material. The answers will probably disappoint you. You will certainly get a few “superstrong, ultralight” answers, although they never specify how strong or how light. You may get a handful of “transparent alu-
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minum” responses from the Star Trek fans. If you have done a good job of educating your students, some of them might respond with “ductile ceramics,” and that is about the limit of the imagination that you can really expect. The more hopeful educators out there will already have considered the follow-up questions: “What application would your materials have?” and “How would you achieve the specified properties?” But you are not very likely to get that far based on the typical response patterns to the first question. There are some interesting examples of invented materials. Polyethylene was developed by ICI just before the second world war and was used to provid
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