- Email: [email protected]
How this issue came about…
International Journal of Refractory Metals & Hard Materials 23 (2005) 1–2 www.elsevier.com/locate/ijrmhm
Editorial
How this issue came about. . .
Dear readers and friends of (IJ)RMHM! This is a very Special Issue containing only two contributions from your Managing Editor: ‘‘Trials and Tribulations in editing IJRMHM for 13 years (1991–2004)’’ is essentially a review of editing this journal, and is intended to communicate some urgent requests to contributing authors, mainly concerning the best way to present numerical data. ‘‘Fascination of the micro- and macrocosmos—Morphologies of science and of the Tyrolean Alps’’ concerns beauty as an essential feature of our lives—admittedly an unusual topic in a scientific journal but hopefully justified by the fact that the area of which the article speaks is our home and also the place of the Metallwerk Plansee AG, which is certainly one of the most important origins of the production of refractory metals and hard materials—the topic of our journal. In addition, beauty can also be found even in such simple objects as metal powders. May be two epigrams could explain the motivation for the first part of this article: A picture says more than 1000 words and this is demonstrated by some striking examples such as, for example, by scanning electron micrographs of basic morphologies of information technologies. The second epigram stems from Konrad Lorenz, the famous Austrian Nobel Prize Winner: Research means to see what others see, too, but to think, what nobody has thought before I hope you can understand that the two topics in this issue have to do with the two visions of my life: Very early already during high school I started to think that becoming a university professor would be my ultimate wish for a professional career. However, my second vision was totally incompatible with the first one: to live in an Alpine area with ample possibilities to ski and to mountaineer. It was clear from the beginning that those two visions could not be fulfilled at the same time but, if at all, only consecutively—unless I would have acquired a professorship at Innsbruck or Salzburg which was not 0263-4368/$ - see front matter Ó 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ijrmhm.2004.11.003
the case. The second vision was realized first by accepting a job at Metallwerk Plansee in Reutte in 1971 where I then lead the Central Analytics Department for 20 years—an interesting and demanding job, especially with the rapid development of highly automated and instrumental possibilities of materials characterization. When a colleague and friend of mine, Professor Manfred Grasserbauer of the Vienna University of Technology called me on the phone and told me that I should apply for a professorship in materials characterization at Darmstadt University of Technology (TUD) where a new faculty of Materials Science was planned I did so in 1989. It took another two years until I received a phone call from the former well known analyst of the Chemistry Department at TUD, Professor Lieser, asking whether I would really consider going to Darmstadt. I was ranked first on the election list for a full professorship of Chemical Analytics in the Material Science Department. After some difficulties with the Hessian Ministry of Education I finally agreed to build up this department within this new faculty. The start was awful for many reasons. One of them was the reunification of Germany in 1989, since due to this action all finances for university investments were blocked. Furthermore finding a proper and affordable flat in the Darmstadt area was almost impossible. And the move from the Alps to the Darmstadt area made me suffer more than anticipated—although I of course spent all vacation times at home in Breitenwang. It was in this time that I came across a poem of a friend of mine, Martin Gutl, which pretty well describes my psychic situation at that time and which I translated: Longing The longing of the caterpillar to open its wings as a butterfly, the longing of a captured bird in a cage to fly from tree to tree in the jungle the longing of the ice shelf to dance as a wave
2
Editorial / International Journal of Refractory Metals & Hard Materials 23 (2005) 1–2
the longing of an extinct star to be able to shine once more the longing of the blind to be able to see the longing of the persecuted to find peace the longing of a stranger to come home again longing nothing but longing constitutes the universe Our two children were already building up their own families in Tyrol. It was fortunate that we had built a house at Breitenwang where the growing families could meet at occasions like Christmas and Easter. Hence, the two visions were realized consecutively and after the initial difficulties I very much enjoyed installing and leading a department of materials characterization at TUD. An essential part of this endeavour was editing RMHM, which I greatly appreciated due to the close scientific connection to my former work at Plansee, where I also organized four of the world known Plansee Seminars in 1981, 1985, 1989 and 1993. In particular during my first difficult time in Darmstadt, I started to assemble a slide show of morphologies of powder metallurgy and the Tyrolean Alps. Now that I am in the process of retiring I decided to try to publish the ‘‘result’’ of this endeavour, so to speak the morphological harvest of my two visions in ‘‘my’’ journal and I was very happy that my partners at Elsevier England agreed. I am quite aware that this is a risk because it is a very uncommon topic for a scientific journal and a very personal account. However, it is one of the important experiences of my life that the search for beauty is a very common and essential feature of mankind. Nevertheless I would appreciate your comments on this Special Issue. I sincerely hope that you like this issue and I am, of course, also open to any criticism you may want to express.
Finally it should be mentioned that the Morphologies-article was presented within the frame of the ICSHM-8 (the 8th International Conference on the Science of Hard Materials) which took place in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Nov. 8th–12th, 2004. It was, as the previous ICSHMs, excellently organized by Vinod Sarin (Boston) and Luis Llanes (Barcelona) and gave a vivid picture of the present state of the science of Hard Materials. As already a tradition of these conferences, the conference site was very beautiful and fascinating and all participants enjoyed it thoroughly. The respective issues covering the presentations to this conference are in preparation. Hugo Manfred Ortner Your Managing Editor Darmstadt University of Technology Department of Chemical Analytics Institute of Materials Science Petersenstr 23, 64287 Darmstadt Germany Tel.: +49 61 51 166379; fax: +49 61 51 166378 E-mail address: [email protected] New Editorial address: Osterbichl 16 A 6600 Breitenwang/Reutte E-mail address: [email protected] P.S.: Please, observe my new Editorial address (home address) since we recently moved home to Breitenwang from Darmstadt after retirement with 1st October 2004. It seems that the two visions of my life are indeed more or less combining in retirement—although with a loss of scientific responsibility and massively aided by modern electronics, especially e-mail.
Editorial
How this issue came about. . .
Dear readers and friends of (IJ)RMHM! This is a very Special Issue containing only two contributions from your Managing Editor: ‘‘Trials and Tribulations in editing IJRMHM for 13 years (1991–2004)’’ is essentially a review of editing this journal, and is intended to communicate some urgent requests to contributing authors, mainly concerning the best way to present numerical data. ‘‘Fascination of the micro- and macrocosmos—Morphologies of science and of the Tyrolean Alps’’ concerns beauty as an essential feature of our lives—admittedly an unusual topic in a scientific journal but hopefully justified by the fact that the area of which the article speaks is our home and also the place of the Metallwerk Plansee AG, which is certainly one of the most important origins of the production of refractory metals and hard materials—the topic of our journal. In addition, beauty can also be found even in such simple objects as metal powders. May be two epigrams could explain the motivation for the first part of this article: A picture says more than 1000 words and this is demonstrated by some striking examples such as, for example, by scanning electron micrographs of basic morphologies of information technologies. The second epigram stems from Konrad Lorenz, the famous Austrian Nobel Prize Winner: Research means to see what others see, too, but to think, what nobody has thought before I hope you can understand that the two topics in this issue have to do with the two visions of my life: Very early already during high school I started to think that becoming a university professor would be my ultimate wish for a professional career. However, my second vision was totally incompatible with the first one: to live in an Alpine area with ample possibilities to ski and to mountaineer. It was clear from the beginning that those two visions could not be fulfilled at the same time but, if at all, only consecutively—unless I would have acquired a professorship at Innsbruck or Salzburg which was not 0263-4368/$ - see front matter Ó 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ijrmhm.2004.11.003
the case. The second vision was realized first by accepting a job at Metallwerk Plansee in Reutte in 1971 where I then lead the Central Analytics Department for 20 years—an interesting and demanding job, especially with the rapid development of highly automated and instrumental possibilities of materials characterization. When a colleague and friend of mine, Professor Manfred Grasserbauer of the Vienna University of Technology called me on the phone and told me that I should apply for a professorship in materials characterization at Darmstadt University of Technology (TUD) where a new faculty of Materials Science was planned I did so in 1989. It took another two years until I received a phone call from the former well known analyst of the Chemistry Department at TUD, Professor Lieser, asking whether I would really consider going to Darmstadt. I was ranked first on the election list for a full professorship of Chemical Analytics in the Material Science Department. After some difficulties with the Hessian Ministry of Education I finally agreed to build up this department within this new faculty. The start was awful for many reasons. One of them was the reunification of Germany in 1989, since due to this action all finances for university investments were blocked. Furthermore finding a proper and affordable flat in the Darmstadt area was almost impossible. And the move from the Alps to the Darmstadt area made me suffer more than anticipated—although I of course spent all vacation times at home in Breitenwang. It was in this time that I came across a poem of a friend of mine, Martin Gutl, which pretty well describes my psychic situation at that time and which I translated: Longing The longing of the caterpillar to open its wings as a butterfly, the longing of a captured bird in a cage to fly from tree to tree in the jungle the longing of the ice shelf to dance as a wave
2
Editorial / International Journal of Refractory Metals & Hard Materials 23 (2005) 1–2
the longing of an extinct star to be able to shine once more the longing of the blind to be able to see the longing of the persecuted to find peace the longing of a stranger to come home again longing nothing but longing constitutes the universe Our two children were already building up their own families in Tyrol. It was fortunate that we had built a house at Breitenwang where the growing families could meet at occasions like Christmas and Easter. Hence, the two visions were realized consecutively and after the initial difficulties I very much enjoyed installing and leading a department of materials characterization at TUD. An essential part of this endeavour was editing RMHM, which I greatly appreciated due to the close scientific connection to my former work at Plansee, where I also organized four of the world known Plansee Seminars in 1981, 1985, 1989 and 1993. In particular during my first difficult time in Darmstadt, I started to assemble a slide show of morphologies of powder metallurgy and the Tyrolean Alps. Now that I am in the process of retiring I decided to try to publish the ‘‘result’’ of this endeavour, so to speak the morphological harvest of my two visions in ‘‘my’’ journal and I was very happy that my partners at Elsevier England agreed. I am quite aware that this is a risk because it is a very uncommon topic for a scientific journal and a very personal account. However, it is one of the important experiences of my life that the search for beauty is a very common and essential feature of mankind. Nevertheless I would appreciate your comments on this Special Issue. I sincerely hope that you like this issue and I am, of course, also open to any criticism you may want to express.
Finally it should be mentioned that the Morphologies-article was presented within the frame of the ICSHM-8 (the 8th International Conference on the Science of Hard Materials) which took place in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Nov. 8th–12th, 2004. It was, as the previous ICSHMs, excellently organized by Vinod Sarin (Boston) and Luis Llanes (Barcelona) and gave a vivid picture of the present state of the science of Hard Materials. As already a tradition of these conferences, the conference site was very beautiful and fascinating and all participants enjoyed it thoroughly. The respective issues covering the presentations to this conference are in preparation. Hugo Manfred Ortner Your Managing Editor Darmstadt University of Technology Department of Chemical Analytics Institute of Materials Science Petersenstr 23, 64287 Darmstadt Germany Tel.: +49 61 51 166379; fax: +49 61 51 166378 E-mail address: [email protected] New Editorial address: Osterbichl 16 A 6600 Breitenwang/Reutte E-mail address: [email protected] P.S.: Please, observe my new Editorial address (home address) since we recently moved home to Breitenwang from Darmstadt after retirement with 1st October 2004. It seems that the two visions of my life are indeed more or less combining in retirement—although with a loss of scientific responsibility and massively aided by modern electronics, especially e-mail.