Materials Sustainability Symposium Recognizes Apelian

Nov. 14, 2022 - The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society’s (TMS) Extraction and Processing Division held a symposium in honor of UCI Distinguished Professor Diran Apelian last spring. Titled “Coupling Metallurgy and Sustainability: An EPD Symposium in Honor of Diran Apelian,” it was held during REWAS 2022, a sustainability driven conference focused on recycling and waste management, in conjunction with the TMS 2022 Annual Meeting in Anaheim.

Apelian, a faculty member in the Samueli School’s Department of Materials Science and Engineering, is widely recognized for fostering innovations in design and recycling of materials. His research has helped establish mechanisms and fundamentals in metal processing and helped lay the foundations for significant industrial developments. His most recent work focuses on the development of technologies to recover and recycle materials. He is co-founder of Ascend Elements, one of the leading companies in the nation for Li-Ion battery recycling. Apelian is a fellow of TMS, ASM International and the American Powder Metallurgy Institute; he is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, National Academy of Inventors, the European Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Armenian Academy of Sciences. He was recognized as Worcester Polytechnic Institute Innovator of the Year in 2018, and as the Samueli School’s Innovator of the Year in 2020.

The five-day event included 20 talks and drew over 400 people. Themes covered included sustainability opportunities in aluminum, innovations in materials design and processing and recycling as well as building sustainability in metals through partnerships. The symposium highlighted Apelian’s broad impact on the field both as a retrospective view into critical scientific contributions by some of his closest colleagues and as a path forward for the community.

– Lori Brandt