Gordon Research Conference on Liquid Crystals June 19 – June 24, 2011, Mount Holyoke College, Massachusetts Liang-Chy Chien, Kent State University, DMR This was an award to support U.S. students, postdocs, and junior faculty to attend the 2011 Gordon Research conference on Liquid Crystals. It was a very successful conference and here are some comments that we received after the conference. The large diversity in terms of the number of women was excellent. The minority is improving; keep up with the good work. The really fresh, brand-new unpublished researches are presented. Friendly atmosphere for getting to be face to face with the giants of the field of liquid crystals and asking questions at the poster sessions. Typical GRC – Exciting and stimulating; posters were up for 2 days each. Great opportunity to talk and to meet people. Ample time for discussion, up-to-date topics, and very tood talks and posters. Plenty of time for discussion and networking in a very relaxed setting. Excellent opportunity to meet with the leading experts in this field at the ‘extended’ poster sessions and meal times. Good selection of topics, diverse selection of speakers and excellent speakers. Great talks and ample time for discussions. Great opportunity to catch up on the state of the art, strong fundamental research presenters. Its very interesting and fascinating for young scientists especially in physics and device areas. The talks were engaging, diverse, and of overall high quality, giving a great survey of the field. Networking with colleagues and presentations of new material by experts in the field. Several excellent talks at the posters; Quality discussion at posters. Field is expanding to neighboring areas. More comments from participants on next slide

Talks were outstanding, refreshing for a physicist who works in the same range. I was exposed to lots of research outside my area of emphasis, some talks were more technological but very good. Excellent session on dynamic compression. Good number of posters. Good poster sessions. Broad range of topics and lively discussion. Fundamental studies are nice, very diverse. Poster sessions were very informative and well-planned. Opportunities to socialize and exchange ideas with other scientistws. Meeting people and sharing ideas of cutting edge science and technology. The vast majority of speakers were a great choice, a good number of talks given by young scientists. I always find the GRC poster sessions the best exchange of information. Friendly atmosphere make us young researchers feel easy to ask questions to big name scientists. Plenty of time for discussion in a very relaxed setting. Excellent opportunity to meet with the leading experts in this field. Networking with colleagues and experts in the field. Great discussions and sharing ideas. High level, state of the art. Nice subjects and great discussions. Gordon Research Conference on Liquid Crystals June 19 – June 24, 2011, Mount Holyoke College, Massachusetts Liang-Chy Chien, Kent State University, DMR More comments from participants: