Vol. 25 No. 5
September-October 2003

Polymer Characterization

6-9 January 2004, Guimarães, Portugal

The POLYCHAR-12 Forum will be held in January 2004 at the University of Minho in Guimarães, which is located in the northwest part of Portugal, 50 km northeast of Porto. The previous forum, POLYCHAR- 11, attracted participants from more than 40 countries. One of the goals of the forum is to give young scientists opportunities to present results as oral contributions or posters.

The forum will involve characterization, as well as synthesis, processing, manufacturing, and properties, with an emphasis on predictions of service performance. All polymer-based materials, including thermoplastics, thermosets, heterogeneous and molecular composites, hybrids, blends, polymer melts and solutions will be covered. Scientific topics will include: predictive methods, synthesis, nanomaterials and smart materials, mechanical properties and performance, dielectric and electrical properties, surfaces, interfaces and tribology, rheology, solutions and processing, biomaterials and tissue engineering, natural and biodegradable materials and recycling, and characterization and structure-properties relationships. A course on Polymer Characterization will be held on Monday, 5 January. The course will include computerized mechanical testing (tension, compression, bending, impact, stress relaxation, dynamic mechanical analysis), tribology (friction, scratch testing), thermophysical characterization (differential scanning calorimetry, thermogravimetric analysis, thermal mechanical analysis, PVT measurements for solids and melts), electrical properties (dielectric spectroscopy, thermally stimulated depolarization), microscopy, chromatography, and interfaces. Lecturers from Germany, Greece, Spain, and the USA will teach the course.

See Calendar for contact information.

www.unt.edu/POLYCHAR/P12.htm