News

Seminar Series 2011

2011 will see the start of a Seminar Series, rather than an annual event as in previous years. The seminars will start in Dublin on September 27th at the premises of Engineers Ireland on Clyde Road. The seminar will cover the use of photoactive materials as tools for dealing with Hospital Acquired Infections (HAI). With over 24,000 members from every discipline of engineering, Engineers Ireland is the voice of the engineering profession in Ireland.

For further details please see the Events Guide.

Young Person Lecture Competition 2011/12

The national final of the IOM3 Young Person Lecture Competition (YPLC) is being held on 24th January 2012 in conjunction with the Irish North Materials Group. Candidates (aged under 28 years of age) are invited to make contact with the committee members to arrange local heats. The winners of the heats will then compete in January to progress to the 2012 World Finals. The 2011 world finals are being held in Sao Paulo on  September 29th.

Postgraduate Positions Available

A fully funded postgraduate research position for 2 years (and possibly leading to PhD) is available at the Centre for Research in Engineering Surface Technology (Dr. Suresh C. Pillai), Camden Row, Dublin 8 in collaboration with School of Chemical and Pharmaceutical Sciences (Dr. Declan McCormack), DIT, Kevin Street. The objective of this project is to develop novel highly photocatalytically active semiconductor nanomaterials for water disinfection. The objective of this project is to develop novel visible light active (VLA) photocatalyst semiconductor nanomaterials for water disinfection. Titanium dioxide (TiO2) is the most suitable photocatalyst for water treatment; however, it requires UV excitation meaning that only 4% of the solar spectrum can be utilized. The development of visible light active (VLA) photocatalyst materials would be a major step forward towards the effective utilization of solar energy for the treatment of polluted water.  

The project is in collaboration with the University of Ulster, University of Cincinnati and International University of Florida. The student working on the project will obtain training in various disciplines of science and engineering, with the possibility for travel to the US to work with the collaborators at the University of Cincinnati and the International University of Florida.    

The project will involve chemistry, materials science and biology and interfacing this with materials synthesis and characterization (FESEM, TEM, XRD, XPS, UV/Vis). Applicants should have a good degree in Chemistry/Materials Science/Chemical Engineering. Previous experience in materials synthesis (sol-gel, solution processing etc.) and characterization is highly desirable but not essential. Upon successful completion of 18 months of research and subject to the availability of further funding the student may enrol on the PhD register at DIT.

Application details can be found here.

Dublin Materials Society

The Dublin Materials Society is a recently formed materials group focussing on Materials Science in the Dublin area. For further details please contact Dr David J. Browne, Acting Chair, Dublin Materials Society   University College Dublin Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland tel. +353 1 716 1901     fax +353 1 283 0534 e: david.browne@ucd.ie.

The DMS recently held its inaugural meeting and also hosted the CECAM event "MultiScale Modelling of Amorphous Materials: from Structure to Mechanical Properties". Full details are available at the society website http://www.dublinmaterialssociety.com