Conference Proposal: Thirteenth International Conference on Continuum Models and Discrete Systems, July 21-25, 2014

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This project is to partially support the Thirteenth International Conference on Continuum Models and Discrete Systems (CMDS13) which is being held at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, Utah, between July 21st and 25th, 2014. The CMDS meeting series has been running for about 40 years, and this is the first time it is being held in the U.S.A. Having become quite influential over the years, these meetings attract leading experts and introduce young researchers to cutting edge developments. The meetings provide a unique forum for mathematicians and scientists, experimentalists and theorists, to get together and exchange ideas and results on a wide range of materials-related problems. The main focus of the CMDS13 meeting is the interplay between discrete and continuum descriptions of physical phenomena. This interplay is of fundamental importance to a range of interdisciplinary problems throughout physics, biology, materials science and engineering. These methods are crucial for the study of complex media, including composites, polycrystals such as metals and ice, biomaterials, nano-structures, and metamaterials, as well as smart (shape memory) alloys, optimally designed composite microstructures, and many other related systems. The conference website is www.math.utah.edu/~cherk/CMDS13/cmds13-home.html The conference topics encompass methods for the dual discrete-continuous description of complex materials as well as several active new areas such as composites (metamaterials) with extreme or unusual properties, the dynamics of failure of complex structures, the design and optimization of structured materials, the dynamics of metastable structures with multiple equilibria, complex fluids, models for sea ice, and multiscale computational methods. The format of the conference will consist of 11 plenary talks and about 40 invited lectures together with some contributed presentations. The meeting will foster interdisciplinary and international contacts among scientists, engineers, and applied mathematicians who would not normally interact, thus increasing the potential for future ground breaking collaborations. The organizers will try to maximize the participation of younger researchers,from postdoctoral associates to graduate and undergraduate students, which provides career development opportunities for them. Much of the NSF support will be allocated to students, postdocs, junior researchers and participants from underrepresented groups, including women.