PMSE 2004 Fall Meeting Preface

It is a great honor to present the proceedings for the Fall 2004 meeting of the ACS Division of Polymeric Materials: Science and Engineering (PMSE). The preprints of papers to be presented at oral and poster sessions during the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania meeting are contained in these Proceedings. The Proceedings also provide information on future meetings and proposed symposia, awards and grants sponsored by PMSE, membership information and PMSE committee structure. The PMSE program for this ACS Meeting is comprised of 10 Symposia and one poster session. Several of the symposia are cosponsored with other ACS Divisions. At this meeting, PMSE will host two award symposia. Together, PMSE will offer 381 oral presentations and 200 poster presentations at this meeting. Below is a brief description of the PMSE hosted symposia:

• Tess Award Symposium in Honor of Omkaran Nalamasu: This symposium will focus on recent advances related to the design and development of polymeric materials for electronic applications. In particular, advances in patternable materials for sub-100nm microlithographic applications will be discussed, followed by new approaches to organic materials for plastic electronic and photonic applications.
• ICI Student Award: The six student-finalists for the 2004 ICI Student Award in Applied Polymer Science will present their competition papers in the ICI Student Award Symposium at the Fall ACS National Meeting in Philadelphia. The finalist giving the best presentation based on technical merit and quality of presentation will receive the 2004 Award. The ICI Student Award is sponsored by the Polymer Education Committee (PolyEd) of the ACS Divisions of Polymeric Materials: Science and Engineering (PMSE) and Polymer Chemistry (POLY) and ICI, which is one of the world's largest producers of specialty products and paints.
• Emerging Frontiers in Polyolefins: This is a three-session symposium comprising a one-session tutorial and two sessions devoted to catalysts and processes and structure/property relationships. The topics also discuss characterization and applications.
• Film Formation: This symposium consists of two sessions that cover kinetics and novel morphologies. There are also discussions related to film forming processes.
• Fire and Polymers: This symposium features 5 sessions devoted such topics as nanocomposites, non-halogen flame retardants and innovative flame retardant concepts. There is also a session devoted to holistic flame retardants.
• General Papers/New Concepts in Polymeric Materials: This symposium includes 7 sessions discussing a wide variety of topics. Papers will discuss such diverse areas such as nanomaterials, nanofibers, nanocomposites and electrospinning techniques and property development. Papers reviewing self-assembly will also be given. A number of papers covering analysis and processing of different polymeric materials will also be presented.
• Functional Polymers and Dendrimers: This is a full 10 session symposium devoted to the science and technology of functional polymers and dendrimers. Topics discussed include the synthesis and application of novel dendrimers, hyperbranched polymers and block & graft copolymers. Additionally, nanoassemblies, supramolecular assemblies and hydrogels are also discussed.
• Organic Thin Films for Photonic Applications: This 4 session symposium discusses second order nonlinear optical polymers, photorefractive and photovoltaic materials. Thin film issues and device patterning will also be examined.
• Semicrystalline Polymers: This symposium covers crystallization kinetics and morphology as well as processing and property issues. Semicrystalline nanocomposites will also be discussed.
• Vibrational Spectroscopic Advances in Polymer Characterization: This is a one session symposium devoted to advances in polymer characterization methods centered around vibrational spectroscopic techniques.

  I wish to thank and acknowledge Timothy Bunning, Vladimir Tsukruk and Zhenan Bao, the current Program Committee Chairs, and our Symposium Organizers for their contributions to this meeting program. A special thank you goes to Eileen Ernst, PMSE Administrative Assistant, for her perseverance in compiling the PMSE Preprint Proceedings.

  Ronald N. DeMartino
  Vice-Chair, PMSE

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