History of the International Association for Steel-Concrete Composite Structures (ASCCS)

In August 1985, the 1^st International Conference on Steel-Concrete Composite Structures was held in Harbin, China, which was organized by former Harbin Architecture and Civil Engineering Institute. At the conference, Masahide Tomii (Japan), M. J. N. Priestley (New Zealand), J.G. Potyondy (Canada) and Shan-Tong Zhong (China) jointly proposed to set up an international association, named as Association for Steel-Concrete Composite Structures (ASCCS), with the purpose of promotion for international cooperation and exchanges, and stimulation of the development and applications in composite structures.

In August 1988, the 2^nd International Conference of ASCCS was held again in Harbin, China, organized by former Harbin Architecture and Civil Engineering Institute (currently Harbin Institute of Technology). At the conference, the international Association for Steel-Concrete Composite Structures was formally established. Prof. Shan-Tong Zhong from China was elected as the president of the committee, Dr. C. D. Goode was appointed as general secretary. Each committee member serves for three years and president can only successively serve for two terms.

In September 1991, the 3^rd ASCCS Conference was held in Fukuoka, Japan. Professor Shan-Tong Zhong was re-elected as the president for the 2^nd term. Dr. C. D. Goode was re-appointed as general secretary. The Association Committee expands to 11 persons. Prof. T. Javor from Technical University of Kosice, Slovakia was elected as vice-president, in charge of the preparation of the 4^th International Conference of ASCCS.

In June 1994, the 4^th International Conference of ASCCS was held in Kosice, Slovakia. Prof. Chiaki Matsui from Japan was elected as the president, Dr. C. D. Goode was re-appointed as general secretary and Prof. Shan-Tong Zhong was awarded honorary president of the Association. Prof. Mikael W. Braestrap was elected as vice-president, in charge of the preparation of the 5^th International Conference of ASCCS.

In September 1997, the 5^th International Conference of ASCCS was held in Innsbruck, Austria. Prof. Chiaki Matsuiwas elected as the president,Dr. C. D.Goodewas re-appointed as general secretary. Professor S. A. Mahin from University of Southern California was elected vice-president, in charge of the preparation of the 6^th International Conference of ASCCS.

In March 2000, the 6^th ASCCS Conference was held in Los Angeles, USA. Prof. Shosuke Morino of Japan was elected as the president, Prof. Brian Uy from University of New South Wales, Australia, was appointed as general secretary. Professor G. J. Hancock from University of Sydney, Australia was elected as vice-president, in charge of the next conference.

In June 2003, the 7^th International ASCCS Conference was held in Sydney, Australia. Prof. Shan-Tong Zhong was elected as president. Prof. Brian Uy was re-appointed as general secretary. The Association Committee discussed and decided that the 8^th International ASCCS Conference to be held in China, organized by Harbin Institute of Technology.

The 8^th International ASCCS Conference was held in Harbin, China, in August 2006, China. Prof. Sumei Zhang was elected as President. Prof. Brian Uy was re-appointed as general secretary. Around 70 delegates attended the conference.

The 9^th International Conference on Steel Concrete Composite and Hybrid Structures (ASCCS 2009) was held on 8-10 July 2009 in Leeds, UK. The conference was organised by the University of Leeds and attended by about 100 delegates. Prof. Dennis Lam was elected as President of ASCCS. During the committee meeting, the committee decided to hold the next ASCCS conference in Singapore to be led by Prof. Richard Liew.

The 10^th conference is held in Singapore from 2-4 July 2012 chaired by Prof. Richard Liew from the National University of Singapore. The conference is jointly organised by the National University of Singapore and the Singapore Structural Steel Society. 155 papers, including 9 keynote papers and 146 contributed papers will be presented in the conference. Contributions came from 28 counties covering a wide spectrum of topics including composite beams; composite bridges; composite columns; composite coupled wall; composite slabs; CFRP composite structures; dynamics, earthquake and impact; fire engineering; hybrid structures; progressive collapse; steel and composite connections; structural analysis; shear connections; thin-walled structures and sustainable design.