The International Conference on Dielectrics (ICD) is a biennial event that draws together experts and researchers from around the world to discuss the latest advancements in dielectric materials and their applications. In 2024, the conference was held in Toulouse, France, and was the first ICD conference in full attendance since the COVID-19 crisis. Many researchers from all over the world presented their work on a wide range of topics, including space charge phenomena, dielectric modeling, aging mechanisms, and much more. I participated to the conference as a 2nd year PhD student to present my recent results and it was my second participation to a conference.
Attending the ICD conference this year was a very enriching experience for me. It was a unique opportunity to deepen my understanding of dielectric phenomena, as well as to discover fields of research that I was not familiar with. I thoroughly enjoyed the diversity of the contributions, covering everything from fundamental studies to practical applications. In particular, I really liked the poster sessions where there was more time for me to get in depth explanations. Beyond the scientific content, the conference was also a great moment to reconnect with researchers I had met during my first conference or to meet new people from across the world.
Giving my oral presentation was the – rather stressful but fulfilling – highlight of my week. My work focuses on the luminescence under thermal and mechanical stresses of epoxy resins typically used as electrical insulators to help identify degradation mechanisms taking place in the materials. I think this topic is relatively new in the dielectrics community and I received a lot of feedback. The discussions that followed were very interesting and gave me new ideas that I am very excited to try during my last year of PhD. To conclude the week of conference, it was a great honor to be awarded the best paper award in the Young Researcher contest. This award motivates me even more to pursue my research.
Finally, I would like to thank the organizers of the 2024 ICD for this great experience and the opportunity to share my results with this community.
