The President of IFHTSE, Dr Yoshinao Mishima, after welcoming delegates, then presented the 2007 IFHTSE Medal to Dr George Krauss, Emeritus Professor, Colorado School of Mines, USA, for his extensive and significant contributions to education and research in the metallurgical and materials engineering community at all levels. In addition to the numerous students Dr Krauss has influenced over the years, his teaching accomplishments are most obvious in his classic textbook ‘Steels – processing, structure, and performance’. This text, along with his numerous other publications, has formed the basis of many courses. His educational efforts have been recognised in many teaching awards, including the Albert Easton White Award from ASM in 1999. Dr Krauss’s vision for the steel industry led to the development of the Advanced Steel Processing and Products Research Center in 1984, an industry/university cooperative that continues today as the most successful programme of its kind in the world. Research in the centre emphasises heat treating and surface processing of steels. His research on steels is extensive. Of particular note is his work on the relationship between microstructure and properties of low temperature tempered high carbon steels. This research refined the understanding of the fracture behaviour of martensitic microstructures, critical to the understanding of the fracture behaviour of carburised steels. The research also led to new alloying and process methods that have been adopted globally. He was IFHTSE President in 1989–90 and is a past President of ASM International. IFHTSE Fellowships were awarded to Professor Peter Mayr, formerly IWT Bremen, Germany, in recognition of a wide range of research and development contributions to many aspects of heat treatment, most notably in the study of distortion; and to Dr Zoltan Kolozsvary, SC Plasmaterm SA, Targu Mures, Romania, in recognition of his acknowledged industrial scale practice in the field of plasma nitriding, and of his enormous contributions to the heat treatment and surface engineering community manifest in his Presidency of IFHTSE for 1998–99 and his dedicated, long-term service as its Treasurer. The IFHTSE Young Author Award was made to Dr Imre Felde (see p. 5).