PSI - Issue 14

R Sunder / Procedia Structural Integrity 14 (2019) 1–2 Author name / Structural Integrity Procedia 00 (2018) 000–000

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of SICE2018 Organizing Committee Chairman, Dr. Vikas Saxena, Director, Defence Metallurgical Research Laboratory (DMRL) and his team headed by the young and dynamic Conference Convener, Dr. Kartik Prasad deserve special mention. Kartik orchestrated the concerted effort of over a dozen Sub-Committees entrusted with the responsibility of different activities associated with putting together this major event. The resounding success of SICE 2018 was largely due to the highly structured and tireless ‘behind the scenes’ effort of dozens of DMRL scientists over the preceding year. This involved interaction with over 500 interested participants of the two events, with potential sources of financial support and sponsorship and with providers of logistical and other services, filtering and sorting the hundreds of abstract submissions. planning the sequence of technical presentations across several parallel sessions, handling the entire logistics of the events over an entire week (this included the 2-day Workshop that preceded the Conference) and also including an attractive cultural programme that enthralled local and overseas delegates alike. The INSIS Executive Committee instituted the honorary status of Founding Fellows of INSIS to recognize the lifetime achievements of ten active researchers of global repute. Prof. Krishnan Balasubramanian (IIT, Madras), Prof. Alberto Carpinteri (Politecnico di Torino), Dr. Ravi Chona (Air Force Research Laboratory, USA), Prof. B. Dattaguru (Jain University), Prof. Masahiro Endo (Fukuoka University), Prof. R. Narasimhan (Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore), Dr. Sergey Panin (Institute of Physics of Strength of Materials, Tomsk), Dr. N. Eswara Prasad (DMSRDE, DRDO, Kanpur), Prof. K. Ravi-Chandar (University of Texas) and Prof. Ashok Saxena (University of Arkansas) were formally inducted at SICE 2018 as Founder Fellows of INSIS. Most of them were present at SICE2018 to receive formal citations of their contributions. Many of them delivered plenary lectures. INSIS Young Scientist’s award for special achievements was awarded to Prof. Suhasini Gururaja of the Indian Institute of Science (academia) and Dr. S. Ammanagi from BISS (industry). The venue for SICE2018 was Courtyard by Marriott, just across from the picturesque Hussainsagar Lake, a pleasant tourist landmark that stands between the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad. For three days, the venue saw the busy movement of conference delegates moving across parallel sessions and through the SICE exhibition stalls manned by industrial sponsors of the event that included leading test and analytical equipment manufacturers and their representatives. The Session chairpersons and Co-Chairs did a commendable job of ensuring timely closure of presentations with adequate time for discussion. A team of knowledgeable volunteers scouted around all the parallel sessions and across the poster stands to identify outstanding contributions that were recognized by a Certificate and token cash reward at the SICE2018 valedictory meeting that concluded the event. The awards were segregated to identify outstanding contributions from post-graduate students, from research scholars and from professional researchers. The ‘Conference hangover’ came in the way of the stupendous effort required to have all the written submissions reviewed and revised as required to conform to the demanding criteria of this journal. The guest-editors of this special issue would like to express their appreciation to the reviewers as well as authors for having exercised their effort in a timely manner. On behalf of the almost 200 members of INSIS, I would like to express my sincere appreciation to the DMRL team, to the SICE2018 sponsors and to all the delegates for an eventful and inspiring meeting of the Structural Integrity community. We look forward to the opportunity of meeting up with all of you at SICE2020 to be organized conjointly with the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay at the financial capital and megapolis of Mumbai in December 2020.

R. Sunder, President, Indian Structural Integrity Society (INSIS) On behalf of the SICE2018 Editorial Team