IUVSTA NEWS BULLETIN
No. 154, July - December 2003

What's been happening (May-October 2003)

The Croatian Vacuum Society hosted ECM-93 in scenic Dubrovnik on September 19-21, 2003. The excellent warm weather and clear blue sky and sea accounted for the large number of vacationers there and, consequently, the difficulty some attendees encountered in getting convenient flights to Dubrovnik! However, the meeting facilities were excellent and everything went smoothly, thanks to the detailed arrangements made by Nikola Radic and his colleagues from the Croatian Vacuum Society, a number of whom attended. Nikola had to deal with several hotel changes due to renovations. During a boat trip, we saw the Palace Hotel, where the meeting was originally to be held; it was still a construction zone and a long way from holding a meeting!

ECM-94 will be hosted by the French Vacuum Society. The meeting will be held in Chateau de Pizay, north of Lyon, on February 13-15, 2004. The Program Committee for IVC-16/ICSS-12 will meet in Genova on the following day, February 16, 2004. The travel time from Lyon to Genova by car or train is about 4 hours. The Congress will be held in Venice from June 28 to July 2, 2004. During ECM-93, Massimo Sancrotti, the General Chair, reported that all the conference activities, including the equipment exhibit, will be held in the Palais de Cinema on the Lido. The triennial General Meeting and both ECM-95 and ECM-96 will also be held there.

In preparation for the General Meeting and the next triennium, the Presidents of all member societies were invited to make nominations for President-Elect, and to nominate their society's Delegates to the General Meeting, and Councillors, Alternate Councillors and Electoral College members for the next triennium,, and to make a bid to host IVC-18 in 2010.The deadline for these is between December 12, 2003 (for President-Elect) and January 15, 2004 (for Councillors).

The change in name of the Vacuum Metallurgy Division to Surface Engineering Division has been approved by the Division's Electoral College and the Executive Council.

The winner of the Welch Scholarship this year is Maksim Kireitseu of Belarus, who will study "Fundamental rheological modeling and failure mechanics of nanostructures and nanocomposites containing ultra dispersed diamonds and CrC nanoparticles" at the University of New Orleans. The deadline for the next competition is April 15, 2004. The Scholarship of US$15,000 is intended to provide partial support for a post-doctoral fellow to carry out research for one year in a foreign laboratory. If you know of someone to whom this applies, check the IUVSTA web site for detailed information on how to apply.

IUVSTA receives information from a number of organizations throughout the year, including UNESCO, the International Council of Science (ICSU) and the International Standards Organization (ISO). More of this information is now being made available on the web. For example, UNESCO's new Natural Sciences Quarterly Newsletter "A World of Science" is available at www.unesco.org/science.; the third issue contained an item on SESAME, the particle accelerator which is being relocated in Jordan. ICSU Insight, provides information of direct interest to members of the ICSU family, partner organizations, and the broader scientific community. The International Visitors Office (IVO) of the National Academies of the USA has launched a new Web site (http://www.nationalacademies.org/visas) to provide information on visas for visiting scientists and scholars and advice for organizers of international scientific meetings in the United States. This site includes a questionnaire through which scientists, engineers, medical professionals, and scholars can report their difficulties with the visa process.