This NSF award by the Chemical and Biological Separations program makes funds available to assist with a symposium entitled New Materials and Concepts for Next Generation Membrane. The symposium will be held at the 2010 International Chemical Congress of Pacific Basin Societies (i.e., Pacifichem 2010) in Honolulu, HI from Dec. 15-20, 2010.
New materials for membranes play an important role in this area because efficient separations of fluids are important for biofuels purification, water remediation, fuel cell operation, etc. The organizers of the New Materials and Concepts for Next Generation Membranes symposium are the PI from the University of Colorado at Boulder, USA; Prof. Kazu Nagai from Meiji University, Japan; and Prof. Normand Voyer from Laval University, Canada. This symposium will focus on new materials design approaches and chemical concepts that potentially could be used to develop unprecedented membranes with new or enhanced separation capabilities. The overall goal of this symposium is to bring together rsearchers who make new functional porous and dense materials but have little membranes experience, with membrane experts at the cutting edge of new membranes development and application. The goal is to have this international forum for sharing new materials ideas and membrane needs/possibilities will catalyze new collaborations and enable development of next generation membranes.
The requested NSF funds will be used to cover registration fees for invited speakers, young professors and graduate students.
Broader Impacts
The abstracts from the symposium will be made accessible via the Internet to the general public as a research and educational tool. The symposium will also serve as an important international platform for allowing young U.S. scientists (i.e., starting professors, graduate students, and postdoctoral fellows) to participate in and learn about the exciting opportunities at the intersection of materials chemistry (of all forms) and membrane science and engineering. It is hoped that this Pacifichem 2010 symposium will encourage more young (i.e., the next-generation of) materials chemists in the U.S. and other countries to apply their skills in that direction. The PI plans to have extensive young scientist participation in the talk sessions by choosing young chemists and membrane engineers to give a large portion of the contributed talks. In doing so, new and often revolutionary ideas and concepts in membrane materials and design will be highlighted.
The purpose of this $5000 grant from the NSF CBET Division’s Chemical and Biological Separations Program was to provide partial travel assistance for several invited and contributing U.S. speakers to present their research at a symposium entitled "New Materials and Concepts for Next Generation Membranes". This symposium was held at the international Pacifichem 2010 meeting in Honolulu, HI as three talk sessions on Dec. 15–16, 2010, plus one poster session on the evening of Dec. 16. The organizers of this symposium were the Prof. Doug Gin (Univ. of Colorado, USA), Prof. Kazu Nagai (Mejei University, Japan), and Prof. Normand Voyer (Laval University, Canada). The focus of this Pacifichem 2010 symposium was on new materials design approaches and chemical concepts that potentially could be used to develop unprecedented membranes with new or enhanced chemical separation capabilities. The overall goal of this symposium was to bring together chemists (who make new functional porous and dense materials but have little membranes experience) with membrane experts at the cutting edge of new membranes development and application. Hopefully, this international forum for sharing new materials ideas and membrane needs/possibilities served to catalyze new collaborations and enable development of next generation membranes. The NSF grant money was used to cover Pacifichem 2010 meeting registration costs ($625/person early registration) for 8 participants from the U.S. who presented invited or contributed talks, or high quality posters. Special consideration was made to use the funds to reimburse young or beginning faculty, for whom travel to the Pacifichem 2010 meeting in Honolulu, HI might be a financial burden at this early stage in their careers. As a result of this symposium, the PI was invited by a senior editor at Science magazine (who attended the talks), to write a Perspectives article based on the topic and papers presented at this symposium, in order to highlight this area to the general scientific public: Gin, D. L.;* Noble, R. D. "Designing the Next Generation of Chemical Separation Membranes," Science 2011, 332, 674–676 In terms of Intellectual Merit, this Pacifichem 2010 symposium served as a unique international and interdisciplinary forum for the presentation and discussion of how new materials and design concepts could potentially be used to make new and better membrane materials for current and future global separation needs. Given the importance of membrane separations across many fields, this symposium served to encourage continuing advances in this important area to be realized via a higher degree of cross-disciplinary participation. This symposium also helped members of the U.S. membrane science and materials chemistry communities to remain at the forefront of this globally important research area. In terms of Broader Impact, this symposium served as a vehicle for educating U.S. researchers with interests in designing/making new membranes, as well as the general scientific public, on the importance of investigating new materials for designing better membranes. This symposium also served as an important international platform for allowing young U.S. scientists (i.e., starting professors, graduate students, and postdoctoral fellows) to participate in and learn about the exciting opportunities at the intersection of materials chemistry (of all forms) and membrane science and engineering. Currently, only a relatively small number of materials chemistry groups in the U.S. and world-wide make or design new functional materials for membrane applications. This symposium hopefully encouraged more young (i.e., the next-generation of) materials chemists in the U.S. and other countries to apply their skills in that direction.
