Shan missed opportunity to attend the 8th Symposium on Biodegradable Metals in Esterel Resort, near Montreal, Canada, as her Canadian visa arrived too late. Just bad luck as she submitted request for her visa in the last week of March, much ahead of this key scientific meeting. Nevertheless, Prof. Drelich attended the meeting and presented his paper entitled “Importance of stable oxide film in endovascular biodegradable stents,” along with Shan’s paper “Biodegradation of a novel Zn-Li alloy in abdominal aorta of rat.” More importantly, he was invited by the symposium organizers as one of the two panelist speakers for the Hot Topic Round Table: “Zn-based Degradable Metals: Hype or Hope?” for which he received many compliments from attendees and a nice plaque. The meeting gathered more than 60 participants from around the world, whose research is focused on biodegradable metallic implant materials. This meeting allowed Prof. Drelich to learn research and characterization approaches and techniques practiced by others in the field of biodegradable metals. Scientific and friendly atmosphere of this meeting also produced several collaborative arrangements with our team that will expand team’s capabilities and most likely will conclude with new joint publications in a future.