Donald Adams, Ph.D., owner and president of Wyoming Test Fixtures Inc. in Salt Lake City, Utah, has received the ASTM International Award of Merit from Committee D30 on Composite Materials. The prestigious award, which includes the accompanying title of fellow, is ASTM’s highest organizational recognition for individual contributions to standards activities.

An ASTM member for more than 40 years, Adams was honored for his great dedication to developing and continually improving international standards for composite materials. A member at large on the D30 executive subcommittee, Adams works on several D30 groups and is also a member of Committee C28 on Advanced Ceramics. He was a longtime editorial board member of the ASTM Journal of Composites Technology and Research. Past committee honors have included a D30 Certification of Appreciation and the Wayne W. Stinchcomb Memorial Lecture and Award in 2000.

Adams earned his doctorate in theoretical and applied mechanics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and also holds a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Southern California. He held senior scientist positions at Ford Motor Co. and The Rand Corp. before joining the faculty in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Wyoming as a professor in 1972. In 1988, Adams founded Wyoming Test Fixtures, an outgrowth of the fixture design and fabrication activities he conducted with colleagues at the university as director of the composite materials research group. He was named professor emeritus in 1999.

Outside ASTM, Adams is a member of the American Society for Composites and the Society for the Advancement of Material and Process Engineering. He has contributed to several publications during his esteemed career, and co-authored the book, Experimental Characterization of Composite Materials. Adams also writes the regular column, “Testing Tech,” in High-Performance Composites magazine.

ASTM PR Contact: Erin K. Brennan, tel: +1.610.832.9602; ebrennan@astm.org

Release #9883