Materials Science and Engineering
Materials-related issues are at the core of many of the most important technological challenges, from developing faster computers to more powerful jet engines. Materials Science and Engineering is an interdisciplinary field that focuses on developing advanced materials to meet these challenges. Research in Materials Science is based on understanding the relationship between a material's properties (e.g., strength, corrosion-resistance), the conditions under which it was processed, and its microstructure (from the atomic level up to the macroscopic). This understanding is used to develop new materials with enhanced properties and new techniques for processing materials.
The Materials Science and Engineering Group at Brown is actively engaged in forefront research covering a broad range of materials including structural materials (metals and ceramics), electronic materials, and biomaterials. Current areas of research include: high temperature materials, mechanical properties and failure mechanisms, biomaterials for fuel cells, thin films (chemical vapor deposition, sputtering, molecular beam epitaxy), residual stress, texture evolution, and corrosion. The research effort is supported by outstanding facilities for materials processing, microstructural characterization, and mechanical testing. Important collaborations with the Solid Mechanics Group provide excellent opportunities for computational studies of materials. The Materials Science Group is a key contributor to the NSF Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (MRSEC) on Micro- and Nanomechanics of Electronic and Structural Materials.
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