Vita David May

PD Dr.-Ing. habil. David May (née Becker) was born 1987 in Baden-Baden. Following his military service at the German Airforce he has studied Industrial Engineering and Management, specializing in Mechanical Engineering at the Technical University of Kaiserslautern.

In January 2012 he graduated with a diploma thesis on the economic efficiency of the thermoplastic tape laying process. Subsequently, he was employed as scientific assistant at the Institute für Verbundwerkstoffe in the field of manufacturing science. In July 2015 he received his doctorate degree for his dissertation dealing with the impregnation behavior of textile reinforcements. 

In January 2016 he became manager of the competence field "Impregnation & Preform Technologies" and also lecturer for the TUK for “integrated product development with composites”.  Additionally, since March 2020 he is the leader of the interdisciplinary junior research group "TopComposite - Topology-Optimized and Resource-Efficient Composites for Mobility and Transport", which is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. In January 2023, the two areas were combined in the competence field "Digitalized Process & Material Development" and assigned to the new program area "Digitalization", which David May has also headed since January 2023.

After successful habilitation, Dr. May received the venia legendi for "Process Engineering for Composite Materials" at the TUK in June 2021.

David May is member of the editorial advisory board of the journal Science and Engineering of Composite Materials (De Gruyter). For the journals Composites Part A, Polymer Composites, Journal of Composite Material, Journal of Porous Media, Advanced Manufacturing: Polymer & Composites Science and Textile Research Journal among others Dr. May operates as evaluator. 

He is married and has two children.

Offices and Memberships

• Board member of the delegates assembly of the network for the promotion of young scientists of the TU Kaiserslautern
• Member of the Deutsche Hochschulverband e.V. (German Association of University Professors and Lecturers)
• Member of the international Scientific Committee 2016 and 2022 of the European Conference on Composite Material (ECCM)
• Session developer for the International Conference on Flow Processes in Composite Materials 2016 and 2018
• Organizer of a series of international benchmark studies on numerical permeability prediction, together with KU Leuven, EC Nantes and Univ. of Delaware (since 2020)
• Main organizer of the international benchmark study for in-plane permeability measurement (2016 - 2018)
• Co-organizer of series of international benchmark studies for textile out-of-plane permeability and compressibility measurement (since 2016)
• Lecturer for AVK industry association of reinforced plastic: „Development and design of a fiber reinforced polymer part“
• Member of the International Conference on Flow Processes in Composite Materials (FPCM)
• Member of the International Conference on Composite Materials (ICCM)
• Member of the European Society for Composite Material (ESCM)
• Member of the Society for the Advancement of Materials and Process Engineering (SAMPE)
• Reviewer for the journals “Polymer Composites”, “Advanced Manufacturing: Polymer and Composites Science”, “Applied Sciences”, „Composites Part A“, „Composites Part B“, “Journal of Composites Materials“, "Journal of Porous Media“, “Textile Research Journal“
• Member of the Journal Editorial Advisory Board of the journal "Science and Engineering of Composite Materials" (De Gruyter)
• Member of the Journal Topic Boards of the "Journal of Composites Science“ (MDPI)
• Guest Editor of the “Journal of Micromechanics and Molecular Physics“ (World Scientific)

Awards

• 2022: Winner in Leibniz-Competition (Collaborative Excellence) with the proposal „Machine Learning for Simulation Intelligence in Composite Process Design“
• 2022: AVK Innovation Award (2nd place) for „HyKoPerm-measurement technologies for an industry-relevant characterization of the textile impregnation behavior“
• 2022: 1st Place, Science Slam of BMBF Future Talk on Material Innovations for Sustainabilityand Climate Protection, 19.05.2022, Ingolstadt
• 2020: Equal Opportunity Award of Leibniz-Institut für Verbundwerkstoffe
• 2018: Winner of BMBF young research competition "NanoMatFutur"
• 2017: Honda Initiation Grant for a novel additive manufacturing concept
• 2014: Innovation Award of Rhineland Palatinate for a rapid test system for textile permeability measurement

Research focus and interests

• Process monitoring
• Process simulation from fiber to part
• Permeability of fiber structures
• Preforming & Liquid Composite Molding Technologies
• Integrated Product Development with fiber-reinforced polymers

Publications

The list of publications is available here.

Patents

• Becker, D.; Rieber, G.; Franz, H.: DE102013102486 – Method for the continuious measurement of the hydrodynamic compaction of a reinforcement structure
• Becker, D., Domm, M.: DE102016123505 – Apparatus and method for the placement of impregnated fibers