Travel support for students and early career scientists to The Clay Minerals Society Conference

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These NSF funds provide support to students and early career clay scientists. U.S. based participants will have the opportunity to attend an international conference dedicated to the study of clays in Istanbul, Turkey. The meeting is being jointly run with the U.S. based Clay Minerals Society and the International Association for the Study of Clays (AIPEA). The conference will cover clay-focused topics. Clays exist in soils, household products, medicines, building materials, new nanomaterials, and with strategic resources (including oil shales and rare earth element deposits). It is important to bring together senior U.S. based clay scientists with like-minded senior international scientists. This way ideas are shared, debated, and advanced through collaboration and ultimately publication. This International clay conference first met nearly 70 years ago. Like the Olympics, it occurs every four years to showcase the world’s best clay innovations. It is the largest and most respected gathering of clay scientists. At this meeting, U.S. based students and early career scientists become educated and network with senior scientists on a variety of topics. The goal of networking is to train future scientists and develop international relationships. These relationships make it more accessible to explore the timeless advancements of clay science.This conference hosts four workshops on the topics: 1) AIPEA School for Young Scientists on Kaolin origins, properties, and applications, 2) Advances in the characterization of smectites and bentonites, 3) Clay minerals catalysis of organic reactions, and 4) Early Career Clay Scientists workshop. The first and fourth workshops are targeted toward connecting experienced scientists with younger scientists on key topics and explore ways to better publish, obtain funding, and network. All the workshops are led by experts from government, academia, and industry, who have widely published and are highly respected in the clay research community. Two field trips will be led to important economic clay deposits where the exploration, mining, and end-product uses of clays are examined. Over 27 thematic sessions at the conference cover a wide range of topics, which are of interest to geobiology and low temperature geochemistry. Technical disciplines include those relating to mineralogy, critical zone science, environmental science, medicine and health science, functionalized clays and materials science, soil science, engineering and geotechnical applications, planetary sciences, teaching clay science, history of clay societies, and industrial materials. Low-cost housing is available to all student participants. This is located on the campus of Istanbul Technical University, Istanbul, Turkey. This venue also boasts historically important locations in the legacy of science where “East meets West”. This is indicated by the conference theme “New Interfaces: Bridging Continents and Cultures with Clays”.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.