The 2023 Conference on Magnetism and Magnetic Materials (MMM) was held from October 30–November 3 at the Dallas Hyatt Regency, at the base of the iconic Reunion Tower. There, 703 on-site attendees from 37 different countries discussed cutting-edge research in fundamental and applied magnetism, made new connections, and met old friends and colleagues at one of the first primarily in-person conferences in our field since the major disruptions of the pandemic era. The format of the conference was primarily in-person, with supporting online content that included recordings of the most popular programs and presentations, made available after the conference (including all symposia, the tutorial, and selected other special content). All presenters had the option to contribute online content, as did 96 participants who did not travel to the venue and elected to present virtual posters. Attendees enjoyed a vibrant celebration of the magnetism research community that included a Texas-sized welcome reception, tutorials on machine learning in magnetism, seven symposia, a lively exhibit hall that hosted poster sessions and bierstuben, a full roster of special events, coffee breaks to facilitate active scientific discussions, and of course, excellent technical presentations. These technical presentations, organized into 45 oral sessions, 23 in-person poster sessions, and 17 virtual poster sessions, were selected by a Program Committee of 57 members, capably coordinated by three Program Chairs: Hendrik Ohldag (ALS-LBNL), Karin Leistner (TU Chemnitz), and Takahiro Moriyama (Nagoya University). These three Program Chairs worked seamlessly and tirelessly over many months to make the central mission of MMM a huge success. The Program Committee selected seven symposia from nominations provided by the magnetism community: “Frontier Topics in Antiferromagnetism: Altermagnetism and Topology,” “Rare Earth Spintronics,” “Recent Advances in Cavity Magnonics,” “Emerging Topics in Magnetic Tunnel Junctions: Altermagnetism, Probabilistic Computing and Energy Efficient Switching,” “Orbitronics: From Orbital Currents Created by Charge Currents to Creation by Light or RF Excitation,” “Imaging Magnetic Textures at the Nanoscale,” and finally “Magnetization Dynamics in Two-Dimensional van der Waals Magnets.” These symposia highlighted a wide range of exciting new areas for magnetism, and were part of a total of 101 invited talks, 28% of which were presented by women. The contributed program was selected by the Program Committee from more than 900 submitted abstracts.
Attendees also enjoyed an exciting slate of special sessions, planned and managed with tremendous energy and tenacity by Special Sessions Chair, Cindi Dennis (NIST) (see Fig. 1 for conference logo)". These included an engaging and well-attended tutorial on Machine Learning in Magnetism that kicked off the week, a Tuesday evening session on Realism in Micromagnetics, a Wednesday evening session on Magnetoionics, the always-popular Student Lunch with the Speakers and Experts, the Outreach Challenge, and a lively and informative lunchtime presentation on Ethics and Integrity in Publications. We also featured a number of special sessions and events aimed at students and younger researchers in magnetism, including the Magnetic Sensors Challenge (coordinated by Phil Mather, from Bosch Sensortec GmbH), a “Lightning Talk” competition for Young Professionals (which we thank Dmytro Bozhko from University of Colorado, Colorado Springs for organizing), a Students in Magnetism networking reception (organized with amazing energy by May Inn Sim from the National University of Singapore), and a third evening session specially aimed at students and younger researchers on Spotting the Next Big Idea in Magnetism. This featured a panel of experts from various fields of magnetism, who fielded tough questions on science and career trajectories from students and post-docs in attendance. Finally, we held a fantastic networking reception for Women in Magnetism, coordinated by Montserrat Rivas of the University of Oviedo.
The logo for MMM 2023 featuring M vs H data interpreted to evoke the Texas longhorn, and a modified big “D” suggesting the spin and orbital degrees of freedom, and echoing the Reunion tower, as pictured at right.
The logo for MMM 2023 featuring M vs H data interpreted to evoke the Texas longhorn, and a modified big “D” suggesting the spin and orbital degrees of freedom, and echoing the Reunion tower, as pictured at right.
The review and publication of the 178 conference papers appearing with this editorial in AIP Advances were managed with grace by our Publications Chair Connie Li (NRL), and a hard-working and experienced team of editors: Claas Abert (Uni. Vienna), Yacine Amara (Uni. of Le Havre), Felipe Bohn (Fed. Uni. of Rio Grande do Norte), Ravi L. Hadimani (Virginia Commonwealth U.), Manh-Huong Phan (USF), Jia Yan Law (Uni. Sevilla), Nicoleta Lupu (Nat. Inst. of R&D for Tech. Phys, Romania), and Prem Piramanayagam (Nanyang Tech. Uni). I thank all of them for their contributions to this important record of the conference.
The conference relies in part on exhibitors and other supporters, and this year our team of Exhibits Chairs were particularly effective in this arena. The team of Eric Montoya (University of Utah), Ilya Krivorotov (UC Irvine), and Igor Barsukov (UC Riverside) made huge contributions to keeping MMM functional and engaging for our attendees and exhibitors. Activities in the Poster Sessions, the Exhibit Hall, and all over the Conference were publicized effectively and widely by two energetic and effective Publicity Chairs, Sophie Morley (ALS-LBNL) and Xin Fan (University of Denver). The task of managing the financial records of the conference is certainly among the most important, and perhaps most stressful. Despite some extreme circumstances, and wildly fluctuating projections of the bottom line, I was always grateful for the calm, upbeat, and utterly capable work of Treasurers Jean-Anne Incorvia (UT Austin) and Timo Kuschel (Uni. Bielefeld).
We also had opportunity to honor the work of several contributors to the conference, including announcing the Winner of the “Advances in Magnetism Award,” sponsored by AIP Advances, which is presented annually to the best paper submitted to the previous MMM conference. This year’s winner, Michael Vaka, was honored with a $3500 cash award and travel allowance to attend our meeting, for the paper “Finite image size effects on the characterization of magnetic domain patterns via magnetic force microscopy.”1 The Magnetism as Art Showcase was also very successful, and we thank Saturo Emori (Virginia Tech.) for organizing this year’s competition. The conference attendees selected Sreya Pal’s image, “Magnetic woodland through the eagle’s aerial canvas,” as this year’s winner, from four impressive finalists. We thank Liuliu Han, Md. Mahadi Rajib, and Kazuyasu Murayama, who were the other finalists, as well as all those who shared their magnetism-inspired artistic visions. In addition to running three grant programs that support various attendees, our MMM Student Awards and Travel chair, Emilie Jué (NIST), managed the important task of collecting entries for the long-running “Best Student Presentation” award, and organizing judges to select finalists and judge the presentations at the conference. The winner this year was Muhammad Usama Hasan (MIT), for the presentation “Magneto-Ionic Enhancement of Exchange Bias and Modulation of Ferromagnetic Bi-Stability.” The other finalists, Eunjin Jeong (Korea University), Sabri Koraltan (University of Vienna), and William Parker (University of Oregon) also presented excellent work, and all are to be commended. The grant programs included Student Travel Grants of $750 each, awarded to 19 attendees, Childcare Grants of $580 each awarded to 6 attendees, and special grants funded by the IEEE Magnetics Society to supplement travel costs from international attendees traveling from countries with recognized hardships (related to war, financial, or other circumstances) of $1665 each, awarded to 6 attendees.
Our final award was a somewhat unexpected addition. I and a few other members of the organization learned in the weeks ahead of the conference that this would be the last MMM for Bill Burke, our long-serving representative from AIP Publishing. Bill’s contributions to MMM over the last 27 years have been truly profound, and his dedication to the success of the conference has been invaluable. After consultation of the MMM Advisory Committee, and with support from more than two decades of MMM Conference General Chairs, we awarded the inaugural Bill Burke Award for Distinguished Service to the Conference on Magnetism and Magnetic Materials to Bill Burke of AIP Publishing. This award “celebrates an individual whose dedication and commitment to MMM goes above and beyond, and whose work over the years has played an essential role for the magnetism and magnetic materials community.” This certainly describes our friend Bill, who we hope will be fondly remembered each time his namesake award is given at future MMM conferences.
It was an honor to be asked to lead the organization of MMM 2023, and I am profoundly grateful for the dedicated and inspired work of the entire Steering Committee. In addition to the Program Chairs, Special Events chair, Publications Chair, Exhibits Chairs, Publicity Chairs, Student Travel and Awards Chair, and Treasurers that I already named above, this included the Past Chair of MMM, Yayoi Takamura (UC Davis), and Future Chair Mark Stiles (NIST). The conference also benefits from the incredible talents and hard work of the professional staff from Simply Vintage: Molly Bartowski, Regina Mohr, Shelbie Jenkins, and Ashley Cesare. Our conferences would simply not function without their steady hands. All deserve extra gratitude, though I must give special recognition to Molly Bartowski, whose amazing work for MMM 2023, ranging from repeated contract renegotiations to repeated calm reassurance of the General Chair, quite literally saved the conference.
Finally, I would ask the entire magnetism community to join me in thanking the sponsors of MMM, the IEEE Magnetics Society and AIP Publishing. I also give special thanks to the representatives of these sponsors, who were also trusted and valuable members of the Steering Committee: Rudi Schäfer from the Magnetics Society, and Bill Burke, Melissa Patterson, and Ginny Herbert from AIPP.
I hope you enjoy the MMM 2023 contributions to AIP Advances, and of course look forward to the next MMM!
