First meeting of the season: Fellows Night

Please join us for our first technical meeting of the year at Rothchild Catering & Conference Center. Say hello to our new chapter officers for this year: James Hemrick, Elena Garlea, and Melanie Moses DeBusk.

Easo George will be giving a presentation titled Materials for Space Power Systems

Interplanetary spacecraft need onboard electric power that is reliable and stable over many years. Solar cells and fuel cells can be used for near-Earth missions but, for deep space missions, radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) remain the only viable choice. The present generation of RTGs work by converting the heat generated during the natural radioactive decay of plutonia directly to electricity with the help of Si-Ge thermoelectric elements. They have no moving parts and have proven to be extremely reliable over more than three decades of use. Most recently, they have been used on board the New Horizons spacecraft which was launched in 2006 and is currently on its nearly ten-year journey to Pluto. This talk will review the history and evolution of space power systems; their relative advantages and limitations; and some of the materials used in space power systems, including exotic metals like iridium. Some of the key materials that are currently in use in RTGs were developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The history of their development as well as ongoing research efforts aimed at improving their properties will be reviewed.

About the speaker . . .

Easo George received his PhD in 1985 from the University of Pennsylvania in Materials Science and Engineering. He worked briefly at the Southwest Research Institute before coming to ORNL in 1987. He currently heads the Alloying Behavior and Design Group in MSTD. In 2002, Easo began holding a joint faculty appointment in the Materials Science and Engineering Department at the UT. He has published over 130 peer-reviewed papers, and serves on the editorial boards of two journals. Easo has received numerous awards including the Humboldt Prize for senior scientists among others and is an ASM Fellow.

Make your reservation

Please RSVP by filling out this form, or contacting our Meeting Registration Chair, Amit Shyam, by e-mail or phone at 865.241.4841. We must have an accurate count of attendees by COB on Friday, September 21th, so please make your reservation on time if you plan on attending dinner. (Please RSVP even if you are not planning on eating dinner so we can arrange for enough chairs. Thank you.)

Our price structure has changed again. But don’t dispair! The normal meeting price has gone down!! Back to $20!!! The technical portions of our meetings are free to all, of course, but we do need to charge if you plan on joining us for the accompanying dinners. Students are completely free, if they register for the meeting on time—still $10 otherwise. And season passes—which are valid for the 6–7 planned normal technical meetings this season*—will still be available for the same price as last year: $75—still a great deal! Finally, on Fellows Night only, ASM Fellows may purchase a season pass at a $10 discount.

Footnotes

* Season passes are not valid for Industry Night or the Educational Symposium.

Venue
Rothchild Catering & Conference Center
8807 Kingston Pike
Knoxville, TN 37923
phone: 865.690.0103, 800.654.5938
fax: 865.690.0149
e-mail
map & directions
Agenda

5:30 PM Reception (cash bar)

6:30 PM Dinner

7:30 PM Presentation

Cost (dinner)

$20 Members & Guests

Free to students with on-time reservation

$5 for students with no or late reservation

$15 for ASM Fellows (for ASM Fellows Night only)

Season Passes will be available