The investigator and his colleagues organize a conference with the Society for Natural Philosophy on the topic, "Mathematical Modeling and Analysis of Materials." The conference The conference program consists of four elements: the Truesdell lecture (a distinguished named lecture instituted by the Society), six lectures by senior researchers, three lectures given by recent Ph.D.s, and an open forum on future directions. The conference is widely advertised, specifically seeking graduate student attendance. Participation of graduate students and young investigators is especially encouraged by devoting a large component of the budget to supporting their travel expenses. The conference themes address mathematical and physical aspects of the interaction between thermal, electric, and mechanical properties in novel crystalline and soft matter systems. The systems addressed include ferroelectric liquid crystals and polycrystals, and elastomers. Applications include electro-optical switches for video displays, actuators, sensors and miniature pumps designed to exploit electro-mechanical interactions. These are important state-of-the-art applications that present significant mathematical challenges in their analyses. The speakers are mathematicians and physicists who present their research on analysis, modeling, and simulations for these systems. Several common themes are highlighted. The natural setting for these systems is in the form of films, filaments, and thin strips. One theme is the application of gamma-convergence and compactness techniques to capture lower-dimensional models. These systems all have complex energy landscapes with many meta-stable states. A second major theme is deterministic and stochastic investigations of dielectric and ferroelectric switching between such states. A third theme is the investigation of flows in these materials.
The Society for Natural Philosophy Conferences have a history of being cross-disciplinary endeavors and that spirit is central to this meeting. The conference is advertised to the science community and the list of speakers includes physicists and engineers. A goal of the conference is to expose students and young researchers to the challenges and open problems in this area. This is accomplished by supporting the travel expenses for these people, having young researchers as speakers, and by holding a session on future directions.
