Program: Monday Day 1

8:50-9:00 AM Welcome & Opening Remarks: Dr. Andrew R. McGhie, Associate Director, Emeritus, Laboratory for Research on the Structure of Matter, UPENN

Morning Session Chair: Dr. Larry Judovits, Arkema

9:00-10:00 AM Dr. Steve Sauerbrunn, Research Scientist, Center for Composite Materials, UDEL, “Introduction to DSC”

10:00-11:30 AM Dr. Charles Potter, Senior Scientist, Haleon, “Introduction to TGA”        

11:30-12:15 PM Mr. Peter Ralbovsky, Northeast Sales Manager, NETZSCH Instruments North America, LLC, “Safety Calorimetry”

Lunch (12:15-1:15 PM) Break and Vendor Slot (TA Instruments)

Afternoon Session Chair: Dr. Steve Sauerbrunn, Center for Composite Materials, UDEL

1:15-2:00 PM Dr. Larry Judovits, Principal Scientist, Arkema, “Introduction to TMA”

2:00-2:30 PM Dr. Brian N. Turner, Technical Specialist, Mettler Toledo, “TOPEM”

2:30-3:15 PM Dr. Peggy Cebe, Professor, Tufts University, “Equilibrium heat of fusion of new materials using fast scanning calorimetry”

3:15-4:45 PM Dr. Ehsan Akbari Fakhrabadi, Field Application Scientist, TA Instruments, “Introduction to DMA and Rheology”

Program: Tuesday Day 2

8:50-9:00 AM Welcome & Opening Remarks: Dr. Larry Judovits, Principal Scientist, Arkema    

Morning Session Chair: Dr. Steve Sauerbrunn, Center for Composite Materials, UDEL

9:00-9:45 AM Dr. Deepak Arora, Associate Professor Department of Chemical Engineering IIT Jodhpur, Rajasthan, India, “Hot Stage Microscopy”

9:45-10:30 AM Dr. Lei Zhu, Professor, Department of Macromolecular Science and Engineering, Case School of Engineering, “DEA”           

10:30-11:15 AM Dr. Bertrand Roduit, Senior Research Scientist, AKTS, “How thermal analysis can help to predict the thermal behavior of polymers: advanced merge of kinetic analysis with heat balance”

11:15-12:00 PM Dr. Jürgen Schawe, Senior Application Scientist, Mettler-Toledo GmbH – Analytical, “The reason for scanning rate variation in DSC and Fast DSC”

Lunch (12:00-1:00 PM) Break and Vendor Slot (Mettler-Toledo)

Afternoon Session Chair: Dr. Sara Reynaud, Senior Research Scientist, Arkema

1:00-1:45 PM Konstantin Tartakovsky, “Hyphenated Techniques”

1:45-3:00 PM Dr. Kalman Migler, Staff Scientist, NIST, “Crystallization and Sortation of Mixed Polyolefins:  Implications for Recycling”

3:00-4:15 PM Dr. Joao Maia, Professor, Department of Macromolecular Science and Engineering, Case Western Reserve University, “Real-time On-Line Structural and Chemical Quantification of Extrusion-Based Processes”

4:15-4:30 PM  Closing Remarks and upcoming events

Short Course Lecturers & Session Chairs

Ehsan Akbari

Dr. Ehsan Akbari is a rheology Field Application Scientist working at TA Instruments -Waters LLC Headquarters in Newcastle, DE. Ehsan earned his Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the University of Toledo in 2021. Ehsan’s Ph.D. research focused on flow behavior and rheology in particulate systems, and specifically suspensions and slurries. Ehsan joined TA in 2021 and he has been providing pre- and post-sale application support for the rheology, DMA, and rubber product lines since then.

Deepak Arora

Dr. Deepak Arora is a faculty with the department of Chemical Engineering at IIT Jodhpur. He has a Ph.D. and M.S. in Polymer Science & Engineering from University of Massachusetts Amherst. He is a BTech Dual Degree in Chemical Engineering from IIT Madras.

His industrial experience is in the area of material, process and technology development in the domain of electronic packaging while working with Intel Corporation and Fujifilm Electronic Materials. Current research, at IIT Jodhpur, is focused on development of novel polymeric formulations and composites for semiconductors and Agritech.

Peggy Cebe

Peggy Cebe is a Professor of Physics at Tufts University. Current research involves structure and properties of semicrystalline and amorphous polymers, nanocomposites, and biopolymers. She performs high precision, high accuracy heat capacity measurements on these systems, combined with dielectric relaxation and X-ray scattering. In 2010, Prof. Cebe received the Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring from President Obama. She is a Fellow of NATAS, the American Physical Society, and the American Chemical Society. She received the Mettler Award for Outstanding Achievement in Thermal Analysis in 2013

Larry Judovits

Professor João Maia graduated in Technological Physics Engineering from the Technical University of Lisbon in 1992 and obtained his PhD Degree in Rheology from the University of Wales Aberystwyth in 1996. Between 1996 and September 2009 he was faculty at the University of Minho, Portugal and since October 2009 he’s been a Professor with the Department of Macromolecular Science and Engineering of Case Western Reserve University. He is also the Director of CAPP – Center for Advanced Polymer Processing, of CWRU.

He was a Fulbright Fellow in 2007 and received the 2010 Annual Award of the British Society of Rheology and the 2011 Morand Lambla Award of the Polymer Processing Society. He was the organizer of the XVIth International Congress on Rheology held in Lisbon, Portugal in August 2012. He has authored or co-authored more than 160 papers, book chapters and patents and more than 300 conference presentations. He has led more than 50 R&D projects including more than 30 with industry.

His main research interest is in the area of Rheological & Physical Design of Soft Matter System, in particular on the design of novel complex, multiphase polymeric systems with new, improved functionalities through multiscale modeling and blending and compounding operation, with a view to developing engineering solutions to industrially relevant polymer processing problems.

Kal Migler

Dr. Kalman Migler leads the Polymers-based Additive Manufacturing Project for the National Institute of Standards and Technology, where he has worked for 25 years. His primary interest is in the measurement of non-equilibrium phenomena that occur during polymer processing.   Throughout his career he has developed technologies to measure polymer blend extrusion, polymer processing instabilities, fluoropolymer additives, polymer slippage and carbon nanotube composites.  Before joining NIST, he was a postdoctoral research fellow at Exxon’s Corporate Research Laboratory and at the Collège de France. He earned his Ph.D. in Physics from Brandeis University.  He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society, the Society of Rheology and of the Washington Academy of Sciences. http://www.nist.gov/mml/msed/polymers/kalman-migler.cfm

Charles Potter

Dr. Potter, a thermal analyst with expertise in the polymer, paper, adhesive, composites, explosives and many other industries, will present the “Introduction to TGA” lecture.  Most analysts under appreciate the full potential of TGA.  TGA is much more than just a simple temperature ramp.  Our speaker today will share his knowledge on the many diverse experimental strategies available to solve both the simple and very complex problems by TGA.  Dr. Potter received his doctorate from the University of Georgia in analytical chemistry and also hold a Masters in Business Administration from the University of Delaware.

Peter J. Ralbovsky

Mr. Ralbovsky is an energetic and battery material specialist for NETZSCH Instruments North America LLC.  Over the last 30 years, he has developed numerous methods and instruments for the public and private sector in the area of thermal analysis, calorimetry and evolved gas analysis.  Mr. Ralbovsky is an expert in adiabatic calorimetry and the testing of energetic materials. 

Sara Reynaud

Sara Reynaud joined the Analytical & System Research Department at Arkema in May 2012. She leads research projects on rheological behavior and mechanical properties of polymers and works on the implementation of new analytical methodologies. Her main interest is in the characterization of branched polymers, films & coatings. More recently she introduced powder rheology analysis to help optimize formulations and solve conveying problems.

Prior to joining the company, Sara was a post-doctoral associate at the Center for Ceramic Research at Rutgers University, where she oversaw the Malvern rheological lab. She collaborated with industrial partners on the development of titania-alumina based materials for advanced ceramics and catalyst applications. Sara is holding a Ph.D. degree in Material Science and Engineering from Rutgers University and a combined B.S./M.S. degree from the University of Naples in Italy.

Bertrand Roduit

Dr Bertrand Roduit is head of research and software development at AKTS AG. He graduated in chemical engineering from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich) and got there his PhD in 1998. He is the primary author and developer of all AKTS software applied in the area of thermokinetics, determination of the shelf life of the materials, thermal stability and safety analysis.  He was invited to participate in the ICTAC Kinetic Projects in 1999 and 2013 and is the author of more than 50 papers (cited more than 2300 times) and lectures at scientific conferences.

Steven Sauerbrunn

Steven Sauerbrunn is a research scientist at the University of Delaware, Center for Composite Materials.  Steve serves as the subcommittee chairman of ASTM E37.01 on Calorimetry and Mass Loss.

Jürgen E. K. Schawe

Jürgen E. K. Schawe obtained a Ph.D. in solid-state physics in 1984. After that, Dr. Schawe worked at the University of Rostock in the Polymer Physics Group, and from 1992 to 1999 for the Calorimetry Group at the University of Ulm. Since 1999, he has worked for Mettler-Toledo AG in Schwerzenbach, Switzerland. Dr. Schawe is a Senior Application Scientist for Material Characterization and has been a Visiting Scientist at the Department of Materials at the ETH Zurich. He received the 2010 STK Award of Applied Chemical Thermodynamics by the Swiss Society for Thermal Analysis and Calorimetry. To date, Dr. Schawe has published more than 80 articles in pre-reviewed scientific journals, edited of a special issue of Thermochimica Acta,  and has been awarded 5 patents.

Konstantin Tartakovsky 

As the retired head of the Israeli Air Force’s (IAF) analytical laboratory, Konstantin has over twenty years of analytical expertise. Konstantin’s exceptional experience with multiple analytical techniques benefited him in aircraft failure investigations, air quality evaluations, and applied research at the IAF. He created several methods for nonmetal quality assurance, predictive maintenance, and forensic analysis. He has detailed knowledge of hyphenated methods, including TGA-FTIR, Pyr-GCMS, and Oven Karl Fischer. Konstantin received his BSc in Chemistry and MSc in Medical Science from Tel-Aviv University. Now, Konstantin works as a chemical consultant for the labs Analytical Chemistry and Predictive Maintenance.  
LinkedIn Profile,  Website 

Brian Turner

Brian N. Turner is a business development specialist at Mettler-Toledo International.  He received his Ph.D. in chemistry from Vanderbilt University and his B.S. in chemistry from the University of Dayton.  He has published research in the areas of electrochemistry, monolayer protected gold nanoparticles, biological mimetics, and materials printing.  Prior to joining the Mettler-Toledo sales team 3 years ago, he spent the previous 7 years as the senior thermal analysis technical specialist for USA and Canada.

Lei Zhu

Professor Lei Zhu received his B.S. degree in Materials Chemistry in 1993 and M.S. degree in Polymer Chemistry and Physics in 1996 from Fudan University.  He received his Ph.D. degree in Polymer Science from University of Akron in 2000. After two-year post-doctoral experience at the Maurice Morton Institute, University of Akron, he joint Institute of Materials Science and Department of Chemical, Materials and Biomolecular Engineering at University of Connecticut, as an Assistant Professor.  In 2009, he moved to Department of Macromolecular Science and Engineering at Case Western Reserve University as an Associate Professor.  In 2013, he was promoted to full Professor.  His research interests include high-κ polymers and organic-inorganic hybrid nanomaterials for high energy density capacitor applications and electroactive polymers for piezoelectric/electrostriction applications.  He is recipient of NSF Career Award, 3M Non-tenured Faculty Award, DuPont Young Professor Award, Rogers Teaching Excellence Award, and University of Akron Distinguished Alumni Award of Polymer Science.  He is author and co-author of 229 refereed journal publications and 10 book chapters, and he has delivered over 200 invited presentations.