HIGHLIGHTS ADVANCED MATERIALS & PROCESSES | NOVEMBER 2026 61 MEMBERS IN THE NEWS MEMBERS IN THE NEWS Liu Named Materials Theory Award Recipient Zi-Kui Liu, FASM, will receive the 2026 Materials Theory Award from the Materials Research Society. He is being recognized “for impactful contributions to developing predictive theories for materials properties by integrating quantum, statistical, equilibrium, and nonequilibrium thermodynamics.” The award will be presented at the 2026 MRS Fall Meeting in Boston, November 29 – December 4. Liu is the Corning Faculty Fellow in Materials Science and Engineering at Penn State University. He served as president of ASM International, 2019-2020, and received ASM’s J. Willard Gibbs Phase Equilibria Award in 2014. Perepezko Awarded RQ Distinguished Fellow John Perepezko, FASM, received the 2026 RQ Distinguished Fellow Award from the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s department of materials science and engineering. The ceremony was held during the 18th International Conference on Rapidly Quenched and Prof. John Perepezko (center) receives the 2026 RQ Distinguished Fellow Award in Busan, South Korea. Liu Metastable Materials, August 23-28 in Busan, South Korea. The award honors career-long contributions to the field of rapidly quenched and metastable materials. Perepezko has spent more than four decades at UW-Madison studying the microstructures of materials and how they hold up in real-world use. His research spans phase transformations, kinetics, metal powders, high temperature intermetallic alloys, and microgravity processing. In 2020, he received the ASM Albert Easton White Distinguished Teacher Award for his record of excellence in teaching and mentorship. IN MEMORIAM Russell Judd Diefendorf, FASM, 93, of Seneca, South Carolina, passed away on October 24, 2024. He was born in Mount Vernon, New York, and was a 1949 graduate of The Stony Brook School in Long Island. Diefendorf attended the University of Rochester and University of Toronto, where he earned a Ph.D. in physical chemistry in 1958. His career began at G.E.’s Missile & Space Division where he developed pyrolytic-graphite, a sheet-like material that was efficient at conducting heat. At age 28, he was invited by the U.S. Department of Defense to serve on a scientific advisory board for the U.S. Air Force. Over the next decades, he served on numerous government advisory boards and was a consultant in advanced composite materials to the Air Force, Navy, and NASA. In 1965, he was recruited by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) and later became director of the engineering program in advanced composites. Over the next 25 years at RPI, Diefendorf worked closely with hundreds of graduate students, helping to launch their careers in chemistry, engineering, and aeronautics. In 1990, he accepted the P.W. McAlister Professorship at Clemson University in South Carolina, where he taught the science of ceramics. When he retired 10 years later as the McAlister Professor Emeritus of Ceramic Engineering, he was recognized as the American Ceramic Society’s James Mueller Memorial lecturer. In 2007, he traveled to Tokyo to receive the Union of Japanese Scientists and Engineers’ Ishikawa Prize. Diefendorf was a member of the ASM Carolinas South Piedmont Chapter. Diefendorf
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTYyMzk3NQ==