IPST again will administer a $10,000 prize from the Institute of Paper Chemistry (IPC) Foundation in conjunction with this year’s Georgia Tech Research Institute Conference (GTRIC), to be awarded for the highest score among Innovate Competition entries that relate to advancing the horizons of the forest bioeconomy. Abstracts are due by 6 p.m. October 16, and the award will be presented at GTRIC ceremonies on February 12, 2013. This is the second year for the award sponsored by the IPC Foundation.

In addition, two $5,000 fellowships will be awarded for students in the poster competition whose proposals relate to paper science.

The object of the competition is to create innovations in forest bioproducts, including advances in manufacturing technologies. The topic areas include innovations in biomaterials, biofuels and chemicals that advance the horizons of the forest bioeconomy. Last year the $10,000 prize went to Jie Wu, who won the innovation prize in the category for his project, “Highly-Scattering, Nanostructured Optical Coatings for Sustainable Paper and Paperboard Products”.

The Foundation also awarded $5,000 prizes for poster presentations to Yan Li for “Microstructure-based Evaluation of Material Fracture Toughness” and to John Copeland for “Interactions of Biomass Molecules with Heterogeneous Catalysts in Aqueous and Vacuum Environments”.

Interested students may get more information at http://sga.gatech.edu/graduate/GTRIC.