SPE ACCE welcomes students to submit poster competition abstracts

First place winners, Amit M. Deshpande and Johnathan Behr from the 2023 ACCE poster session competition. Source | SPE ACCE

The SPE Automotive Composites Conference & Expo (ACCE) invites graduate, undergraduate, community college and high school students to submit abstracts on innovative composites technologies for automotive and ground transportation, to present at the event’s annual student poster competition. Sponsored by Dassault Systèmes (Waltham, Mass., U.S.) competition will be held during ACCE, Sept. 4-6, 2024 in Novi, Michigan.

Judges — industry experts, SPE board members and members of the media — will review all posters with student authors during the conference. Students entering the poster competition will also give a 5-minute mini-talk podium presentation on their poster topic in a special technical session. First-, second- and third-pace awards will be presented to winners in graduate, undergraduate and high school categories during a ceremony during the ACCE.

Poster titles and abstracts are due by July 1, 2024. Digital copies of posters are due by Aug. 20, 2024 for pre-review by judges. Abstracts and digital copies of the posters need to be submitted online via the “submit 2024 papers, presentations and posters” button here. Questions should be sent to Douglas_E_Smith@baylor.edu.

Students will need to bring 24 × 36-inch printed copies of their posters to the conference (find the poster template here). Large multi-poster panels and push pins for displaying the posters in the Student Poster Display area will be provided. All students presenting a poster in the competition will receive free registration to the conference, and a shared hotel room provided by SPE ACCE. Students who submit abstracts and posters early will be provided with accommodations at the Hyatt Place hotel on-site at ACCE.

Poster topics may include, but are not limited to, subjects such as:

Automotive composites
Composites and lightweight materials for trucks
Biocomposites
Nanocomposites
Glass, carbon and hybrid fibers
Thermoset and thermoplastic technologies
Recycling and green technologies
Multi-materials
Joining technologies
Applications of composites in electric vehicles
Modeling and analysis of lightweight materials
CAFE standards and mandates
Cost-effective manufacturing
Use of advanced materials in innovative applications
Virtual prototyping and design
Microstructure, failure and fracture
Failure envelopes and theories
Additive manufacturing of composites
Air mobility

Students and their posters are ranked using the following criteria:

Content (student and poster demonstrate clarity of topic, objectives and background);
Motivation for research and technical relevance to conference theme;
Methodology and approach to problem;
Quality of proposed research results/findings;
Conclusions are supported by information presented;
Presentation (display aesthetics are pleasing and there is a logical flow between sections);
Knowledgeable (presenter has a good grasp of the subject);
Understandability (poster is effective even without student being present to explain it); and
Overall rank versus other posters and presenters.

The 2023 ACCE Student Poster Competition first place winners included:

Amit M. Deshpande from the University of Delaware, for his poster “Manufacturing and Validation of a Carbon Fiber Reinforced Thermoplastic Composite Door” in the Graduate Category;
Johnathan Behr of Clemson University for his poster “Ultra-lightweight Carbon Foams from a Lignin for High-Temperature Thermal Insulation Applications” in the Undergraduate Category.