VIENNA, AUSTRIA
15 - 17 October 2019
Materials Design User Group Meeting
Thank you to all participants for a successful meeting. We look forward to seeing you in Vienna in 2019!
Materials Design Annual User Group Meeting
The annual Materials Design User Group Meeting was held in Vienna on October 15-17 with interactive training sessions and an intensive technical symposium dedicated to new developments and applications of computational materials science. Vienna and the Parkhotel Schönbrunn Hotel provided a perfect setting for discussion and collaboration with friends and colleagues. It was a great pleasure to see the many interactions between our customers and the Materials Design team.
Day one began with an informative and educational training workshop, including technical discussions relating to specific modeling applications using the brand new release, MedeA 3.0. The workshop was led by the Materials Design support team: Travis Kemper, David Reith, Ray Shan, René Windiks, with collaborative assistance from Walter Wolf, Volker Eyert, Mikael Christensen, Xavier Rozanska, David Reith, Dave Rigby, Ken Roberts, Martijn Marsman, Bruce Eichinger, and Marianna Yiannourakou.
Training sessions were followed by a two-day technical program highlighting the role of contemporary atomistic and electronic structure simulation in research and development. The technical program was introduced by Erich Wimmer, the Chief Scientific Officer of Materials Design, who noted that Thomas Alva Edison had stayed at the meeting hotel (the Parkhotel Schönbrunn) in 1911 just as the quantum mechanical age was dawning. Scientific speakers included Professor Georg Kresse who described organic perovskites using RPA (random phase approximation density functional theory) and their phase stability using machine learning to accelerate the accurate exploration of phase space. Moritz to Baben extended the discussion of phase diagram simulation, also using VASP to complement experimental information. Véronique Lachet, Antoine Claisse, Richard Smith, and Stéphane Brice Olou’ou Guifo discussed a range of simulation applications in the nuclear and automotive industries; and Krzysztof Parlinski provided an update on the simulation of anharmonic phonons based on his recent research and the latest developments of the PHONON code.
Professor Richard Catlow of the Royal Society described a wide range of simulations of catalytic materials, noting that catalytic processes are essential to society, and Professor Jimmy Stewart, the author of MOPAC, illustrated the exquisite control that evolution has exerted over the enzyme catalysts that repair the oxidative damage of the oxygen rich atmosphere that might have otherwise have severely limited life as we know it. Ryan Thomas and Wes Everhart illustrated the use of simulation in complementing experimental information in the analysis of hydrogen trapping and alloy properties. Marianna Yiannourakou reviewed the accuracy that can be achieved using modern Molecular Dynamics and Monte Carlo methods for molecular systems from gases to glasses. Arthur France-Lanord of MIT's final talk of the scientific session returned to the topic of machine learning and the analysis of the migration modes for charged species in polymer electrolytes. Erich Wimmer concluded the session of first-class talks, raising the question - what process improvements, innovations, and transformations will present day researchers, their companies, and institutions make of the technologies that have emerged since the original and brilliant Edison stayed at the meeting hotel.
Customers can find available presentation slides by logging in to their account. UGM attendees can also receive presentation slides by contacting info@materialsdesign.com.
The meeting dinner was held at the Hotel Sacher located next to Vienna’s State Opera house. In addition to UGM participants, Hotel Sacher guests have included Gandhi, Queen Elizabeth and President John Kennedy. The establishment's history can be traced to a chocolate confection, known as a Sacher-torte after its creator, first made for an Emperor and leading to the hotel of today. Technical discussion, planning for future collaboration, and Sachertorte tasting concluded the meeting.
We would like to thank all those who attended this year's meeting in Vienna. To all the customers who participated and made the meeting successful-- thank you; to the speakers for the exceptional presentations-- thank you; and to Katherine Hollingsworth, who managed all the logistics of the meeting, with able assistance from Anna McNair, Reynald Takchi, Ken Roberts, David Reith, and Laetitia Cheguillaume -- thank you!
Materials Design is privileged to work with an exceptional community. We look forward to working with our colleagues and friends in the materials research community and to future Materials Design annual UGM meetings.
