The year 2025 was a successful one for the Scientific Technical Committee STC "G". Fifty-two (52) people attended the STC-G Winter Meeting in Paris on February 21, and seventy-five (75) people participated in the STC-G meeting during Part II of the 74th General Assembly in Stockholm, Sweden, on August 21.
The STC-G Winter Meeting featured seven technical contributions and status updates on the 2025, 2026, 2027, and 2028 keynote papers. The technical contributions covered various topics, such as laser-assisted grinding, 3D wheel topography analysis, the effect of dressing conditions on dressing depth, and laser spectroscopy for abrasive grit analysis. Presentations also covered the development of an intelligent grinding expert system, stress analysis during nano-scratching of brittle materials, and a feasibility study on enzyme-assisted machining.
"Abrasive machining for advanced semiconductor components" was presented as a proposal for a future keynote paper (2029 and beyond). It was agreed that the topic would be further developed and presented at the STC-G meeting at the General Assembly in Stockholm, Sweden, in August 2025. Two updates of STC-G essays for the CIRP Novel Topics in Production Engineering (CNTPE) were presented. These essays are under consideration for Vol. 3 of CNTPE. The STC-G board endorsed an additional proposal for a new CNTPE STC-G essay on "Hybrid grinding and polishing".
To Part I of the 74th General Assembly, the STC-G contributed ten regular papers and a keynote paper titled “Advances in magnetic field-assisted finishing” . The keynote reviewed the development of magnetic field-assisted finishing (MAF), a process that uses magnetic-abrasive tools suspended in a magnetic field to remove material. The paper traced the historical evolution of MAF, described its fundamentals, and examined major process variations, such as polishing, edge finishing, and mass finishing. The study summarized the current state of process modeling and introduced a new modeling approach. The advantages and limitations of MAF were discussed in terms of material removal characteristics, and the paper concluded by outlining potential applications and future research directions in MAF. The keynote presentation was well received.
The regular papers covered a wide range of topics, including material removal mechanism in laser-assisted grinding of composites, thermally induced material modification depth in grinding, electromagnetic field-assisted ultra-precision grinding, kinetic analysis of double-sided polishing, polishing of polycrystalline diamond by combining plasma modification and chemical mechanical polishing, polishing of GaN using hydrogen plasma, estimation of chip clogging with supervised learning, ultrasonic assisted abrasive nano-blasting, chemical mechanical polishing using micro-structured pads, and a glycerol-based slurry for crystal polishing.
The highlights of the STC-G meeting during Part II of the 74th General Assembly included seven technical contributions, recognition of the successful 2025 keynote paper, status updates on the 2026, 2027, and 2028 keynote papers, two proposals for future keynote papers, and three updates on STC-G essays for the CIRP Novel Topics in Production Engineering (CNTPE). The technical contributions covered the development of magnetic abrasive tool for dry polishing, investigations on the effect of fluid-jet-to-wheel-speed ratio on specific grinding energy, study of specific energy and tool wear in single-point diamond dressing, and data-driven identification of tool-related batch variation during grinding. Other topics presented included the Smooth Particle Galerkin (SPG) method for modeling of the diamond scribing, modeling of micro-grinding forces considering gradual wear of abrasive grains, and novel gear grinding performance perspectives through integrated process and tool development.
The success of the 2025 keynote paper was acknowledged. Progress on the 2026, 2027, and 2028 keynote papers was presented, and their contents were approved. Two proposals for future keynote papers were presented: (i) "Abrasive machining for advanced semiconductor components" and (ii) "Progress in abrasive processes for advanced functional ceramics." The first proposal was unanimously approved as the 2029 keynote paper and this decision was forwarded to the Liaison Committee. The second proposal received no objections, and the STC-G Chair recommended further developing the outline for the 2026 Winter Meeting in Paris.
The status of the CNTPE essays “Advanced polishing technologies for microstructured surfaces”, “Efficiency increase in grinding through integrated sensor technology”, and “Hybrid grinding and polishing” were presented, and the contents were approved.
STC-G Chair Mr. Heinzel encouraged the audience to prepare technical contributions for the 2026 Winter Meeting in Paris, particularly those related to future keynote papers. Other abrasive-related topics are also welcome.