The interdisciplinary workshop “Winter Workshop on Manufacturing, Mechanics & Characterisation of Advanced Engineering Materials” organised on 26-29 January 2021 by the University of Luxembourg and the University of Limerick gathered more than 60 participants.

The event was held in the frame of the Horizon 2020 Twinning project DRIVEN “Increasing the scientific excellence and innovation capacity in Data-Driven Simulation of the University of Luxembourg”. It brought together researchers from the University of Luxembourg, the University Limerick, LIST, Cardiff University, University of Twente, Delft University of Technology, Ecole Pigier Nancy, Hochschule Trier & Saarland University, the International Space University, the Indian Institute of Technology, and the Indonesian Institute of Sciences. Johnson & Johnson Vision Care (Limerick) and SISTO Armaturen S.A. participated too. 

The workshop presented state-of-the-art as well as new advances in manufacturing, mechanics, and characterization of advanced engineering materials by senior researchers of the organising institutes, fostering exchanges about recent research activities in those fields. 18 doctoral students presented their projects in five minutes pitches. A jury of five members evaluated the pitches according to the following criteria: slides and story clarity as well as power of delivery. 

The winners of the pitches’ competition reflect the interdisciplinary of the event: 

• 1st prize: “On the Internet nobody knows you're a dog: Proving your digital identity”, Vytautas Tumas, University of Luxembourg (Interdisciplinary Centre for Security, Reliability and Trust)
• 2nd prize: “Laser welding of copper to aluminium”, Karthik Mathivanan, University of Luxembourg (Faculty of Science, Technology and Medicine)
• 3rd prize: “Multi-stable reconfigurable metamaterials with translational and rotational degrees of freedom”, Yong Zhang, Delft University of Technology

The last day of the workshop was devoted to two PhD training sessions: “Technology valorization and IP training” by Sigmar Lampe, Legal Advisor for IP and Licensing at the University of Luxembourg and “On European grants & life after PhD” by Stefano Pozzi Mucelli, Senior Advisor for European R&D and Innovation Support at Luxinnovation.

Most of the participants enjoyed the interdisciplinarity, the interaction opportunities offered despite the circumstances, the doctoral students' pitches, and, of course, the fair and open competition.