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From the Director

Norman Marsolan  

During this early spring in Atlanta, we look forward to our April Meeting of Members with signs of regeneration and growth all around us. As you will see in this newsletter, the Institute is steadily gaining traction. Membership has reached sixteen companies. We undertook $9.7 million in research investments last year of benefit to the industry, and we are on track to exceed that in FY 12. We have gained recognition on campus, notably through our sponsorship of the Georgia Tech Research Innovation Conference in February and the prizes offered by the Institute of Paper Chemistry Foundation—more than a third of the entries were submitted in the forest bioeconomy category. Georgia Tech has designated IPST a strategic research theme area on campus. We were one of three centers featured in the Georgia Tech/State of Georgia Next-Generation Manufacturing Conference last October. Details of all of these events are provided in the articles in this issue. We are a portal to Georgia Tech for the industry, and clearly we are serving as a portal to the industry for Georgia Tech.

We are getting the word out. We will sponsor the TAPPI Nanotechnology Conference in June and host the annual meeting of the Pulp and Paper Education and Research Alliance this spring. I continue to chair TAPPI and serve as an affiliate member of the forest products industry’s Agenda 2020 Technology Alliance. Our faculty continues to contribute to the advancement of industry-relevant science and earn recognition (see articles below).

We are listening intently to our members. We conducted a study last fall to explore members’ research interests and to determine their preferences about certain member-value initiatives; the findings are helping us shape our programs and offerings.

And we’re refurbishing our building and facilities. We are planning significant upgrades to our laboratory equipment and capabilities. Visitors will find new furniture, carpeting and wall-coverings in several common areas, as well as a flat-screen video storyboard in the lobby to spotlight students, faculty, and the industry. Come and see our museum’s new Green Room, a display highlighting the industry’s sustainability and environmental performance. 2600 students, teachers, and members of the public visited the museum in the last year. We’re preparing to welcome 80 temporary residents to the building in May, as the Civil and Environmental Engineering School joins us while its own building is being modernized. We know that will promote additional collaboration among the faculty and the graduate students.

Come and see us—it’s all here!