Members of the International Centre for Diffraction Data, the world center for quality diffraction and related data, met 11–15 March 2024 for their Annual Spring Meetings. The event was held as a hybrid meeting, with many members traveling to ICDD Headquarters in Newtown Square, PA, USA, while others attended virtually through the Zoom platform. ICDD members where active in continuing their mission of exchanging ideas and information related to the identification of materials by holding various committee and subcommittee meetings to discuss the future of the Powder Diffraction File® and its impact on the scientific community.
Spring Meetings began on Monday with Committees of the Board of Directors gathering to discuss various ICDD related topics such as Membership, Awards, Marketing, and Finance. The committees sent recommendations to the Board of Directors such as new candidates for active membership and recipients for the 2024 Distinguished Fellow and Fellow awards. Monday was also the final meeting for the 2022–2024 Board of Directors. Three members would retire from the Board: Winnie Wong-Ng, NIST, as Vice Chair; Pamela Whitfield, Excelsus Structural Solutions, as Director-at-Large; and Matteo Leoni, University di Trento, as Past Chair. We thank the 2022–2024 Board of Directors for their commitment of time and talent to the ICDD organization (Figure 1).
Figure 1. ICDD's 2022–2024 Board of Directors.
A Plenary Session was held on Tuesday morning and began with welcoming remarks from ICDD's Executive Director, Tom Blanton. The first Plenary presentation was given by Dr. Travis A. Olds, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, New Data for Undescribed Uranyl Minerals Supporting the CURIES Database. The second Plenary speaker, Dr. Stephen Hillier, James Hutton Institute, spoke on, A Tale of Two Halloysites. Dr. Anja Vieira Dosen, ICDD, gave a third presentation, Characterization of Clay Minerals through X-ray Diffraction and Rigorous Data Curation, and the final Plenary speaker was Dr. Anthony R. Kampf of the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, who made the virtual presentation, The Journey from an Unknown to a New Mineral. All four speakers received an appreciation award for extending their time and expertise to the membership (Figure 2).
Figure 2. ICDD's 2024 Annual Meeting's Plenary Speakers stand with their awards. From left to right: Steve Hillier, Travis Olds, Anthony Kampf (on screen), Anja Dosen, and ICDD Executive Director, Tom Blanton.
On Tuesday afternoon, the group headed into the city of Philadelphia for a lecture and tour at the Wagner Free Institute of Science. The institute is a museum and educational institution that remains nearly unchanged from the nineteenth century in both the arrangement of its specimens and in its mission. Founded by William Wagner in 1855, the institute was designated a National Historic Landmark by the United States Department of the Interior in December of 1990.
Tuesday evening, members, guests, and staff gathered at the host hotel, the Best Western Plus Concordville in Glen Mills, PA, for a poster session and reception, followed by dinner. At the end of the evening, “Best Poster” awards were announced. The winners of the Best Poster awards were:
• Tomohiro Shibata, Kennametal, Inc., Revisit of Scattering Vector Method for Residual Stress Analysis (Figure 3).
• Silvina Pagola, Old Dominion University, Multidrug Co-Crystals and Drug-Drug Salts: Quinine and NSAIDs as Pharmaceutical Hybrids (Figure 4).
• ICDD Interns, Adarsh Kabekkodu and Rohit Lobo of Downingtown East High School, won two Best Poster awards for their works, Mineral Powder X-ray Diffraction Data (PXRD) Search/Match for Raman Spectroscopy Project and Assigning IMA Approved Mineral Symbols to Minerals in The Powder Diffraction File™ (Figure 5).
Figure 3. Best Poster award winner, Tomohiro Shibata (right), receives his award from Tom Blanton (left).
Figure 4. Best Poster award winner, Silvina Pagola (right), receives her award from Tom Blanton (left).
Figure 5. ICDD Interns, and Best Poster Award Winners, Adarsh Kabekkodu (right) and Rohit Lobo (center), receive their award from Tom Blanton (left).
Wednesday morning, two more meetings from Committees of the Board were held – Long Range Planning and Scholarship. The Scholarship Committee gave a review of the 2024 Ludo Frevel Crystallography Scholarships, which gave six aspiring crystallographers $2,500 each to help support their education and research. Countries represented by the awardees were Poland, UK, and USA. Information on present and past recipients, as well as details for applying or donating to the fund, can be found on the ICDD webpage: https://www.icdd.com/ludo-frevel-scholarship/.
Twelve Technical Subcommittees met on Wednesday. The Technical Subcommittees are divided into three categories: Materials, Characterization Methods & Tools, and ICDD Activities. Active members belonging to a subcommittee are eligible to vote on topics of concern that affect the PDF (Powder Diffraction File), which are then brought to the Technical Committee for further consideration.
Thursday was the last day for members to attend meetings, beginning with a New Features presentation by Justin Blanton, Engineering and Design Manager, and Steffen Weber, Senior Software Programmer. Justin and Steffen offered the membership an exciting demonstration of the upcoming 2025 versions of The Powder Diffraction File and JADE®.
Following the New Features demonstration was the Technical Committee Meeting chaired by Robert Dinnebier, Max-Planck Institute, and featuring Keynote Speaker, Dr. Paul R. Bartholomew, Quinnipiac University, Superb LLC who reviewed the progress on his collaboration with ICDD, Collecting Reference Spectra for the ICDD Raman Database (Figure 6). After the keynote presentation, reports were given from ICDD's Technical Co-chairs, who shared current news and events from their region of the world, as well as Technical Subcommittee Chairs who reported on their subcommittees' activities throughout the year.
Figure 6. Keynote Speaker, Paul Bartholomew (left), receives a certificate of appreciation from Robert Dinnebier (right).
Spring Meetings concluded on Thursday afternoon with the Annual Meeting of Members, hosted by ICDD Chairman of the Board, Andrew Payzant, Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Tom Blanton, ICDD's Executive Director, reported on ICDD Headquarters' activities of the past year and Treasurer, Jim Kaduk, Poly Crystallography, Inc., gave a report on the financial outlook of the organization.
ICDD awards were also announced during the Annual Meeting of Members. Elite members are honored with prestigious awards, led by Award Committee Chairman, Greg McCarthy. The 2024 Award winners were:
• Nichole Wonderling, Penn State University, was named an ICDD Fellow, honoring her contributions to the ICDD, in particular as a Lead Instructor at the XRD Clinics; Chair of the Education Subcommittee, and for her dedication educating the materials characterization community.
• Cyrus Crowder, Emeritus ICDD, was named an ICDD Distinguished Fellow, honoring his long and meritorious service to the ICDD, as well as the international powder diffraction community, as a Lead Instructor at the XRD Clinics; Chair of the Micro and Meso Subcommittee; Member of the Ludo Frevel Crystallography Scholarship Committee, and also in recognition for his long history of excellent scientific contributions furthering ICDD's Powder Diffraction File (Figure 7).
Figure 7. ICDD 2024 Distinguished Fellow, Cyrus Crowder (left), receives his award from Andrew Payzant (right).
For a complete listing of the past and present winners, please visit: https://www.icdd.com/icdd-awards-and-scholarships/.
2024 was an ICDD Election year, and the Annual Meeting concluded with the current Board of Directors passing their authority to the new 2024–2026 Board. Robert Dinnebier, Max-Planck Institute for Solid State Research, was elected Chairman of the Board; Carlo Segre, Illinois Institute of Technology, as Vice Chair; and Charlene Greenwood, Keele University, as Technical Committee Chair. Ashfia Huq, Sandia National Laboratory, Leopoldo Suescun, University of Uruguay, and Antonio M. dos Santos, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, were elected as Directors-at-Large; joining Graciela Diaz de Delgado, University de Los Andes and Takashi Ida, Nagoya Institute of Technology, who began their D-a-L terms in 2022. Andrew Payzant, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, will remain on the Board as Past Chair, and Jim Kaduk, Poly Crystallography, Inc. (Treasurer), Tom Blanton (ICDD Executive Director) and Denise Zulli (ICDD Corporate Secretary) were appointed by the new Board to continue their service, thus constituting the new 2024–2026 Board of Directors (Figure 8).
Figure 8. ICDD's 2024–2026 Board of Directors.
ICDD's Annual Spring Meetings continue to be a relevant and essential event that strengthens the tenacity and focus of the membership. We hope to have as many members as possible join the 2025 Spring Meetings, which will be held on 10–14 March 2025.
