From Curiosity to Presidency
Dr. Ali Erdemir | TLT President's Report July 2016
You never know where the road will lead when you get involved with STLE.
I’ve established some of my most important contacts and collaborators through STLE.
GOING BACK TO MY EARLY CHILDHOOD YEARS, I HAVE BEEN A VERY CURIOUS PERSON.
I was born in a small village in Turkey called
Goztasi. There was a natural spring behind our house that was perhaps the greatest inspiration for my early childhood curiosity.
In those days, I would gaze for hours and wonder: How do ducks remain afloat? Why does water flow downward? What is water made of? Why it is cold? How come it slips out of your palm or body?
Just prior to my grade school years, I made tiny paper boats and let them flow down with the spring water. One day I made a wooden turbine and let it spin on a small waterfall.
This was all cool and very enjoyable.
Upon my return home, with soaking wet clothes and shivering cold skin, my mom would yell at me—still with a loving tone of voice—and immediately change my clothes and offer hot milk or herbal tea, which I hated. During my first grade year, I became more curious about the natural things than the ABCs and 123s—these to me were too boring or had no logic or relation to what was going on around us.
Those early years played a pivotal role in shaping my life and destiny and who I am today.
That curiosity served me well. It wasn’t long before I went to college, which was a journey that carried me to this country and then to the presidency of STLE, again by sheer curiosity.
While completing my master’s thesis at Georgia Tech, I had heard the word tribology many times, thanks to professor Ward Winer, who very actively was pursuing tribology research. But I didn’t pay much attention, as it was not a sexy word for one thing and did not really ring a bell as a scientific discipline.
However, hearing it again and again, I eventually become very curious. One day I heard that a renowned British professor named Terry Quinn was offering a graduate-level class on tribology. As a partial fulfillment of the graduate degree program, I decided to take the course and quench my curiosity once and for all.
Professor Quinn was a very funny, colorful person and a good teacher. Coincidentally at that time, my thesis advisor, professor Robert Hochman, was awarded a very large NASA project that focused on surface modification of ball bearings for improved fatigue, wear and corrosion resistance. He needed doctorate-level students to work on the project.
All of a sudden, my curiosity about tribology made me a prime candidate for this project for doctoral research!
With the Ph.D. degree in my pocket, I landed (by pure luck, I always felt) a job at Argonne National Laboratory where I was fortunate to be part of a large DOE tribology project. One of the very first things that I did was to become an STLE member.
In the tribology field, I was fortunate to meet and befriend many distinguished tribologists who were extremely bright, supportive and fun people. I’ve established some of my most important contacts and collaborators through my involvement in STLE. In return, I have always enjoyed serving STLE every step of the way.
On March 2 of this year, a night I’ll never forget, Immediate Past President Martin Webster and I were invited to a celebration of the 50th anniversary of modern-day tribology at Buckingham Palace. HRH Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, was kind enough to visit with everyone in the room, including Martin and me.
Yes, it is a long way from a small village in Turkey to a celebration at Buckingham Palace. It shows that you never know where the road will take you when you get involved with STLE.
I look forward to serving as your president.
Ali Erdemir is a Distinguished Fellow at Argonne National Laboratory in Lemont, Ill. You can reach him at erdemir@anl.gov.