Workshop: Analytical Instrumentation for the New Millenium - Materials; New Orleans, LA

This award to Penn State University from the Office of Multidisciplinary Activities in MPS is to support a Workshop entitled' Analytical Instrumentation for the New Millennium- Materials' to be held March 2-3, 2001 in New Orleans, LA.

Materials research is becoming an increasingly interdisciplinary field, with strong links to chemistry and biological sciences. The availability of new tools for materials characterization has in large measure transformed the field over the course of the last decade.

The Workshop will bring together 45 scientists from academia, industry, and national laboratories who are makers of new materials, developers of characterization tools, and users of these new tools. The Workshop will seek to provide a forward-looking assessment of major opportunities in materials research where innovative new instrumentation could make significant contributions. It will also identify existing techniques or technologies in which significant increase in sensitivity and /or resolution could contribute substantively to progress in materials research. The Workshop will provide a written report with recommendations on how the community - both academic and private sectors - working in partnership with the federal support structure could facilitate the development of new instrumentation and the training of the next generation of scientists to creatively use these new tools.