Dr. Will Mars is an international leader in the failure mechanics of rubber. He has received several awards for his scientific contributions and innovations, including the 2007 Sparks Thomas award of ACS Rubber Division, and the 1999 Henry Fuchs award of SAE Fatigue Design & Evaluation committee.

    Dr. Mars is the editor of the journal Rubber Chemistry & Technology, and past editor of Tire Science & Technology with 40 peer-reviewed publications and a patent. His experiences and contributions span a topic range including material characterization, product evaluation, constitutive modeling, crack nucleation, fracture mechanics and fatigue life prediction methods.

    He has more than 20 years’ experience developing testing and simulation methods in the rubber industry. Dr. Mars’ professional activity has focused generally on applying experimental and computational mechanics in pursuit of better-performing rubber products. He has taught graduate courses as an adjunct professor at the University of Toledo in continuum mechanics and fracture mechanics. He has been an invited lecturer in numerous international venues. Dr. Mars earned his Honors BSME with Polymer Specialization at the University of Akron, and his MS and Ph.D. degrees at the University of Toledo.