Speaking of the University of Wisconsin…

I rarely purchase engineering textbooks from the campus bookstores anymore, because the copies they have for sale are usually painfully expensive. Online I can find copies of the books that are slightly less painfully expensive. I recently ordered an MSE textbook online, and on the printout tucked inside the front cover, the seller had written this note:

All I have to say to that is: we are the Buckeyes, we are killer nuts!

Um, yes.

Other MSE kids going the metalsmithing route

Turns out I’m not the only metallurgist dabbling in jewelry-making: MSE students from the University of Wisconsin-Madison have been making aluminum earrings and tie tacks for years to raise money for student programs. This year they brought their wares to the TMS conference (and I’m totally bummed that I missed their booth). A brief article about EnginEarrings can be found in March 2009’s issue of JOM.

So what if I’m a treehugger?

A very educational spring break

I spent a few days of my spring break visiting a friend who lives just outside New York City. Although I didn’t get to spend much time locked in a loving embrace with my favorite American city, we did head into Manhattan for an afternoon at the American Museum of Natural History.

The eight-year-old in me was thrilled to see the dinosaurs. The “grown up” kid in me was fascinated by the exhibits on human evolution and the world’s native cultures. The snake and sea creature exhibits terrified me as usual. And I decided I’d like to have a pet mouse lemur. They’re so cute!

As we roamed around the museum looking at all of the exhibits and trying not to trip over the children tearing around the building, I felt a bit jealous of these city kids. They have no idea how much culture they have at their fingertips! When I was a kid, we’d have to brave an hour-long school bus ride up to Cleveland for most of our really good field trips, which I’d always thought was not too bad. Cleveland was so convenient! (And for all of the naysayers out there, Cleveland also rocks.) But the concept of having a wealth of educational opportunities within one’s own city blows my mind a little.

RARR!

Also–dinosaurs!

The finished products

In addition to producing a lot of partially-completed problem sets this quarter, I created some crafty metal-wear.

The copper link bracelet is the pièce de résistance of my work in metalsmithing class at the Cultural Arts Center in downtown Columbus. Exciting is the fact that this may very well be the first bracelet that has ever fit my stick-like wrist. Also exciting is the fact that no one was injured in the making of this bracelet. (There were a few close calls, one involving a broken drill bit and a projectile spinning sheet of copper.)

The nu-gold triangular thing in the middle of the photo is possibly a zipper pull. Or just a triangular thing. Both of the pieces I made in class have a “distressed” look. I had the option to toss them in the tumbler to make them shiny, but I had neither the patience nor the desire for shininess. (Plus, the guilt won’t be quite so overwhelming when I scuff up the bracelet through wear, because I probably won’t be able to tell that it’s been scuffed.) Anyway, I made the triangular thing during my last class, sort of to have an excuse to break out the torch again.

There is also a smushed bug at the bottom of the picture.

I made the sterling silver pendant with my artsy friend Carole when she introduced me to the world of precious metal clay (PMC) over winter break. PMC is so much easier to work with than a sheet of metal. (But again, a sheet of metal holds the promise of potential torching.) Apparently Mitsubishi is a big producer of PMC — the company has quite the materials department! I wonder if they could do PMC accents on their automobiles…

The importance of stupidity in scientific research

Via PostSecret:

“[R]esearch is immersion in the unknown. We can’t be sure whether we’re asking the right questions or doing the right experiment until we get the answer or the result. … [I]f we don’t feel stupid it means we’re not really trying.“

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Speaking of stupidity, I’m still alive — just recovering from the quarter. I’ll be back to somewhat regular posting before too long. Until then, please talk amongst yourselves.

TMS conference overview

Pictured below is the program for the 2009 TMS conference. It is HUGE.

Not a phone book

Inside the program, you can skim through hundreds of pages of research abstracts and timetables for session speakers.

Time to break out the microscope!

Luckily, the program had an index of researchers (to satisfy the groupies) and a table of contents of general topics presented in each room and the date and time of each topic. Even though our group attended only two days of the conference, I was overwhelmed by the choices, so I chose a room with sessions focusing on a relatively new material in which I am interested but would otherwise not have the opportunity to learn about (bulk metallic glasses – Dr. Flores‘ area of expertise) and camped out there for a few hours. I occasionally bopped over to the biomaterials room, my other area of interest, and discovered that there was some crossover between bulk metallic glasses and biomaterials. Interesting. I also attended a session presented by Dr. Williams, because I am an unapologetic Williams groupie. (There were quite a few of us in the room for his talk.)

Overall, I really enjoyed listening to a lot of the presentations at the conference and learned so much about materials research being performed worldwide. It’s easy to find your scope limited by your required classes at school (which can cover only so much material in ten weeks), so TMS provided the breath of fresh air that I needed to see that there are still a lot of possibilities out there in the materials world.

Networking, Caitlin-style

The first official TMS 2009 activity we participated in this past week in San Francisco was a student mixer. (Photos can be viewed here.) For some reason, the phrase “student mixer” conjures up images of sock hops and root beer floats in my mind, but this was not the case on Sunday night. Instead, a couple hundred materials science students and professors converged on a ballroom at the downtown Marriott and got down with their bad selves. The best part was getting to meet people from all over the world, from exotic places like Finland, Quebec, Germany, and Iowa.

(It’s worth mentioning at this point that OSU’s MSE contingent has become huge fans of McGill University and is currently in the planning stages of a road trip to Montreal spring quarter. Bonjour to Jen, Max, Theo, and Rosen!)

Somehow my networking skills have been reduced to inadvertently networking only with people who live in locations I’ve always wanted to visit. I end up feeling guilty that I can’t offer them a comparably cool place to visit – no offense, Columbus – but I assure them that in about four months, I am hopeful that I will be off to live someplace worth getting one’s passport stamped to visit. Many of my new international friends asked me variations on the question “What’s the most beautiful place in America?” (also phrased, Where should I visit the next time I’m in the States?). Instead of listing places that I love but I don’t think are worth traveling hundreds or thousands of miles to see (Hocking Hills in the autumn, I’m looking at you), I threw out some locations on the west coast. This is where my mind is these days, on beautiful beaches with temperatures above freezing. I also mentioned New York City as my favorite city to visit, since there’s an endless supply of fun things to do and delicious things to eat.

So, gentle reader, what would be your response to the question?

California, here I come

A bunch of us MSE kids are headed out to San Francisco for the annual TMS conference over the next few days. What will it be like to witness a conference center overtaken by materials engineers? If I’m able to snag some free wi-fi while I’m there, I’ll give you a glimpse of the event in somewhat real-time – otherwise, you’ll just have to hold your horses and wait till I get back to Columbus.

And if there’s a commemorative pocket protector vendor there… souvenirs for everyone!

Whispers of spring?

Nearly two weeks later, the ice has finally melted.