TABLE OF CONTENTS

TMS SEES ITS NAME IN NANO
As Official Society Sponsor of Pennsylvania Nanotechnology Conference

TMS PLANS NEXT-GENERATION WEB SITE STRATEGY
Looks for Your Input in Benchmarking the Best of the Web in Materials

FROM OUR SPONSOR: ZEISS INTRODUCES AXIOVERT 200 MAT
Free T-Shirt with Every Request!

TMS DUES REMAIN LEVEL IN 2006
Board of Directors Votes to Maintain Membership Dues through 2006

BOARD OF DIRECTORS APPROVES "TRACK PUBLISHING" INITIATIVE
All 2006 TMS Annual Meeting Attendees Will Receive a Proceedings CD with Registration

HAVE THE KNOWLEDGE AT YOUR FINGERTIPS
Proceedings from 2005 TMS Annual Meeting & Exhibition

HOW TO . . .
. . . Exhibit at TMS Conferences

TOP TEN . . .
. . . Ways One Engineer Can Make a Difference

WASHINGTON NEWS FROM THE FEDERATION OF MATERIALS SOCIETIES
Manufacturing Bill on the Move

As Official Society Sponsor of Pennsylvania Nanotechnology Conference

TMS is making a name for itself in nanomaterials. Just look at the TMS logo (pictured--for a more detailed view of the logo, constructed from carbon nanotubes by KBK Teo and IYY Bu of Cambridge University, click on the image). That's why TMS will serve as the official society sponsor of The Business of Nanotechnology, the 2005 Pennsylvania Nanotechnology Conference, to be held April 18–20, 2005, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This conference melds industry and academia around the research and business of nanotechnology. Last year's conference attracted more than 500 industry leaders, business development specialists, venture capitalists, academicians, journalists, and students.

The conference will include the TMS-moderated panel session entitled Nanomaterials: Transforming Traditional Products. Led by Robert Shull of the National Institute of Standards and Technology and chair of the TMS Nanomaterials Committee, the panel will include participation from Alcoa, U.S. Steel, Kennametal, PPG Industries, and Bayer MaterialScience. Panel members will discuss the growing importance of nanomaterials in their respective industries and future trends for the technology. Other highlights will include a keynote presentation on government nanotechnology initiatives and sessions on developments from emerging nanotechnology companies here and abroad, as well as intellectual property issues.

Looks for Your Input in Benchmarking the Best of the Web in Materials

During the 2005 TMS Annual Meeting, the society's Board of Directors appointed TMS Vice President Brajendra Mishra to lead the ad hoc TMS Web Strategy Committee. The charge of this group is to develop a strategic plan that will provide a guiding framework for the next-generation TMS web presence. This plan will be reviewed by the society's Strategic Planning and Advisory Committee and presented to the board during its August 2005 meeting in Warrendale, Pennsylvania. The ad hoc committee will focus on four activity areas:

• Providing electronic benefits to TMS members
• Providing revenue through commercial sales
• Providing public information for the benefit of the public and the profession
• Promoting TMS and its members, activities, and objectives

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Board of Directors Votes to Maintain Membership Dues through 2006

In 2005, TMS instituted the first membership dues increase in five years. The increase has been used to support an expanding TMS student member program, as well as to create new and build on existing member-benefit programs, such as the Technical Questions@TMS on-line resource, TMS Letters, increased industrial coverage in JOM, and member access to the on-line Metal-Matrix Composites in Industry database.

In 2006, TMS members will not see any additional dues increase, the TMS Board of Directors decided during the 2005 TMS Annual Meeting. Professional dues for 2006 will remain $105 per year, while student member dues will hold steady at $25 per year.

All 2006 TMS Annual Meeting Attendees Will Receive a Proceedings CD with Registration

The TMS Board of Directors approved a publishing initiative designed to provide future TMS Annual Meeting attendees with robust—and complimentary—conference proceedings in CD-ROM format as part of basic meeting registration. Here's how it works: For the 2006 TMS Annual Meeting, all planned symposia will be divided among distinct programming tracks. All proceedings volumes for the symposia within a given track will be collected on a single CD, along with featured presentations and links to sites that will publish post-conference papers. When a person registers for the meeting, he/she will be provided one track CD of his/her choosing. (The remaining track CDs will be available for separate purchase.)

As an example of how the track publication concept would have worked at the 2005 TMS Annual Meeting, upon registering, an attendee selecting the "light metals" track would have received a gratis CD containing Light Metals 2005, Shape Casting: John Campbell Symposium, and Magnesium Technology 2005.

For individuals that require print volumes, individual symposium proceedings will be available for separate purchase in soft-cover format. Track publication CDs will only be available for distribution during the conference; subsequent to the meeting, only the individual symposium proceedings volumes will be available for purchase. More detail on this value-enhancement plan for meeting attendees will follow in coming months.

Proceedings from 2005 TMS Annual Meeting & Exhibition

10 Titles to Choose From

Learn About:

Technological Developments in Extraction & Processing

Improved Quality in Light Metals

Application Developments in Materials Processing & Manufacturing

Theory and Experiments in Electronic, Magnetic & Photonic Materials

30% Discount Off Cover Price for TMS Members!

Add these valuable resources to your collection today! For a complete listing of titles and ordering information, visit the 2005 TMS Annual Meeting web site.

. . . Exhibit at TMS Conferences

Throughout the year, TMS offers companies in the materials science and engineering industries the opportunity to meet with potential clients during TMS technical conferences. Exhibits offer companies a venue to present their products and services to a well-educated, highly motivated, and influential group of materials professionals.

To become an exhibitor, first select the TMS exhibition that best suits your company's technological focus. The TMS Annual Meeting is the society's largest and best-attended meeting and covers the broadest range of technology. The society also offers more focused specialty meetings throughout the year that allow companies to meet with a more concentrated group of interested individuals. TMS is currently accepting exhibit space reservations for:

• 2005 Electronic Materials Conference
• Silicon Carbide and Related Materials 2005
• MS&T '05
• 2006 TMS Annual Meeting

. . . Ways One Engineer Can Make a Difference

For one week in February, engineers pool their resources to promote the profession of engineering through the Engineers Week program, seeking to raise public awareness of engineers' positive contributions to society. But engineers can promote the profession any time. The Engineers Week web site offers fifty ways to do it. Here are ten:

10. Invite the Public to You: Open facilities such as college engineering laboratories for public tours

9. Visit Local Schools: Contact a teacher or principal to arrange to speak to students of all ages and provide hands-on engineering experiments

8. Bring Students to Work: Contact a middle or high school and offer to have a student shadow you on the job

7. Write a Letter to Your Local Newspaper: Inform readers of the importance of engineering to the local community

6. Involve Students in an Engineering Competition: Involve students in an Engineers Week activitiy such as the Future City Competition or create your own competition, such as constructing a bridge or building working machines

5. Develop a Directory of Speakers: Provide schools with a listing of available speakers from engineering societies and industry

4. Create an Engineering Tour: Organize a walking or bus tour of interesting engineering achievements in the community

3. Participate in a Science Fair: Volunteer to serve as a judge for a school science or technology fair

2. Create an Engineering Section in a Local Library: Donate mystery books, children's books, posters, and bookmarks with an engineering background

1. Request Engineers Week Materials: Engineers can access tools for presenting science demonstrations, organizing contests, and participating in other programs through the Engineers Week web site

Manufacturing Bill on the Move

On March 15, by voice vote, the House Science Subcommittee on Environment, Technology, and Standards sent a message to the administration by approving HR 250, the Manufacturing Technology Competitiveness Act of 2005. The bill reauthorizes the laboratory programs at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) at a level consistent with the president's budget request, but also strengthens NIST's Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP). The administration had proposed cutting the MEP program funding essentially in half.

The new bill, which will be considered by the full Science Committee after the Easter recess, authorizes $110 million for the MEP centers in fiscal year 2006, rising to $120 million by 2008. It also allows MEP centers to receive funding from other government agencies and private sector groups without following cost-sharing regulations, and creates a pilot program within NIST at a cost of $10 million annually through 2008 to fund research partnerships between firms, community colleges, universities, research institutions, state agencies, and nonprofits to develop innovative manufacturing technologies.

ABOUT e-NEWS

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News Editor:
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EDITORS' CHOICE

The editors of TMS publications select the must-read papers from the latest editions:

MARCH JOM: "Collaboration Is an Essential Part of Materials Development" by Robert Schafrik, Leo Christodoulou, and James C. Williams
Under the right circumstances, collaboration can be the most efficient means for developing a new material. A leading motivation for collaboration is the expectation that development time can be dramatically shortened while the technical risk that the new material will meet or exceed the requirements of its intended application is reduced. This strategy increases the probability that investments in the new materials technology will pay off across the supply chain. The 10th International Symposium on Superalloys, held in September 2004, featured a panel session on developing materials as part of a team. This article provides a summary of that session.[READ]

MARCH JOM: "The Design and Application of Multifunctional Structure-Battery Materials Systems" by James P. Thomas and Muhammad A. Qidwai
Combining structure and battery (power) functions in a single material entity permits improvements in system performance not possible through independent subsystem optimizations. The design of composite multifunctional materials for optimal system performance involves selection of constituents, material architecture, and interface connections. This overview focuses primarily on plastic lithium-ion structure-battery materials. Three main topic areas are considered: rules and tools for analysis and design of multifunctional materials; multifunctional structure-battery material systems; and structure-battery in the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency Wasp micro-air vehicle.[READ]

MARCH JOM: "Embedding Simple Machines to Add Novel Dynamic Functions to Composites" by C.-Y. Tang, M.J. OBrien, and G.F. Hawkins
One unique property of a machine augmented composite (MAC) is its ability to convert a compressive force into a shear force, and vice versa, simply by the geometry of its angled sidewalls. The authors have discovered that a non-spinning ball dropped at a normal angle onto the MAC's surface rebounds from that surface at an oblique angle and develops a significant rotational velocity. Through finite-element analyses, analytical study, and experiments, the magnitude and direction of the spin can be precisely controlled by tailoring the stiffness of the MAC through the properties and dimensions of its constituent materials.[READ]

MARCH JOURNAL OF ELECTRONIC MATERIALS: "Electro-Thermal Resistance of GaAs Interconnects" by Scott A. Wartenberg, Gang Zhao, and Qing H. Liu
This paper describes the effect of steady-state heating on the electrical and thermal resistance of interconnects on GaAs. Examined is a typical dual-layer metal interconnect system, common to GaAs processing. The interconnect system is considered in three parts, the interconnect metals, the Si₃N₄ dielectric surrounding the metal, and the Al_xGa_1-xAs epitaxial substrate. Using a meandering line as a test structure, measurements show how the direct current resistance increases with both temperature and dissipated power. Thermal resistors are proposed to account for self-heating and thermal coupling.[READ]

MARCH JOURNAL OF ELECTRONIC MATERIALS: "Solderability Testing of Sn-Ag-XCu Pb-Free Solders on Copper and Au-Ni-Plated Kovar Substrates" by Edwin P. Lopez, Paul T. Vianco, and Jerome A. Rejent
Solderability was evaluated for four Pb-free alloys: 95.5Sn-4.3Ag-0.2Cu (wt.%), 95.5Sn-4.0Ag-0.5Cu, 95.5Sn-3.9Ag-0.6Cu, and 95.5Sn-3.8Ag-0.7Cu on oxygen-free electronic grade Cu and Au-Ni-plated Kovar substrates. The solderability metric was the contact angle as determined by the meniscometer/wetting balance technique. Tests were performed at 230°C, 245°C, and 260°C using rosin-based, mildly activated (RMA) flux, a rosin-based (R) flux, and a low-solids (LS) flux. The Pb-free solders exhibited acceptable to poor solderability on Cu with the RMA flux. Nonwetting occurred in most tests using the R flux. Wetting was observed with the LS flux, but only at 245°C and 260°C and with high contact angles. The solderability of the Pb-free solders improved at all test temperatures on the Au-Ni-plated Kovar substrate when using the RMA flux. Wetting was observed with the R flux and LS flux for all temperatures. The Pb-free solders had generally lower wetting rates and longer wetting times on Cu than the 63Sn-37Pb solder. The wetting rate and wetting time data were superior on the Au-Ni-plated Kovar substrates. In general, solderability did not exhibit a consistent dependence on the composition of the Sn-Ag-XCu (X=0.2, 0.5, 0.6, and 0.7) alloys. The better performers were 95.5Sn-3.9Ag-0.6Cu alloy with the RMA flux (both Cu and Au-Ni-plated Kovar) and 95.5Sn-3.8Ag-0.7Cu with the R and LS fluxes (Aut-Ni-Kovar, only). [READ]

MARCH MMTA: "Beyond Nickel-Base Superalloys Symposia Proceedings" by Various
The March issue of Metallurgical and Materials Transactions A showcases articles from a symposium held at the 2004 TMS Annual Meeting: Beyond Nickel-Base Superalloys. The organizers state in their Foreword that the eighteen papers in the issue are representative of the state-of-the-art research in niobium silicides, molybdenum borosilicides, and iridium-based alloys. Nearly all the articles have ternary phase diagrams, so reading the papers of this symposium should improve one's ability to read and utilize these higher order phase diagrams.[READ]

MID-MARCH MMTA: "Precipitate Effects on the Mechanical Behavior of Aluminum Copper Alloys: Part I. Experiments and Part II. Modeling" by H. Sehitoglu, T. Foglesong, and H.J. Maier
Ten of the seventeen articles in the Mid-March issue of Metallurgical and Materials Transactions A focus on light-metal alloys of aluminum or titanium. Articles on solidification and mechanical properties of these light alloys are included. The two-part article "Precipitate Effects on the Mechanical Behavior of Aluminum Copper Alloys" provides a thorough investigation that demonstrates how, in some cases, precipitate-induced anisotropy can dominate over the crystal anisotropy effects.[READ]

MEETINGS CALENDAR

Programs, on-line registration, and more:

SOLID-SOLID PHASE TRANSFORMATION IN INORGANIC MATERIALS
Phoenix, AZ
May 29-June 3, 2005

2005 ELECTRONIC MATERIALS CONFERENCE
Santa Barbara, CA
June 22-24, 2005

ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION OF MATERIALS IN NUCLEAR SYSTEMS-WATER REACTORS
Salt Lake City, UT
Aug. 14-18, 2005

INTL CONFERENCE ON SILICON CARBIDE AND RELATED MATERIALS
Abstracts Due: April 15, 2005
Pittsburgh, PA
Sept. 18-23, 2005

MS&T '05
Pittsburgh, PA
Sept. 25-28, 2005

INTL SYMPOSIUM ON SUPERALLOYS 718, 625, 706 AND DERIVATIVES
Pittsburgh, PA
October 2-5, 2005

2006 TMS ANNUAL MEETING
San Antonio, TX
March 12-16, 2006

2007 TMS ANNUAL MEETING
Orlando, FL
Feb. 25-Mar. 1, 2007

NEWSWIRES