Fiber reinforced polymer (FRP) composites has been widely used in many sectors of industry since 1960s. To ensure the quality and structural integrity of FRP, it is important to evaluate their physical quality and composition both during manufacture and while in use. For this purpose, a number of standardized tests have been developed to evaluate strength, flexibility, extent of wear, and so on. However, most of these tests require destroying the material to obtain relevant information.

For the past 10 years, the credit derivative markets have experienced unprecedented growth. Combined with this expansion, credit risk modelling has become quite a challenging task for many financial institutions. The Royal Bank of Canada has substantial trading exposure in credit derivatives and is looking to further its modelling research and management process.

Semiconductor materials are essential for today’s fast growing electro-optic and computer industries and semiconductor crystal growth is a key stage in the manufacturing process. There is constant market pressure to increase the size and quality of crystals so that more and better devices can be put on a single wafer. The most widely used crystal growth technique is the Czochralski (Cz) method, in which a semiconductor crystal is grown at the tip of a seed-crystal while the seed is slowly extracted from a pool of molten material.