What is Materials Engineering?

Summary

Materials engineering focuses on designing and analyzing solid materials' structure, properties, and performance. It plays a crucial role in various industries, such as aerospace, automotive, and manufacturing, where materials must withstand extreme conditions or possess specific properties. The field encompasses the study of metals, ceramics, polymers, and composites, with an emphasis on mechanical, electrical, and thermal properties. Materials engineers also address challenges like corrosion, fracture analysis, and improving material efficiency. The curriculum includes practical applications, lab work, and a balance of math and chemistry, preparing students for a broad range of sectors.

Takeaways

• 🔬 Materials engineering involves the design, processing, testing, and discovery of solid materials, focusing on their structure, properties, performance, and processing.
• 🔍 A Google search for 'materials engineering' reveals the interconnectedness of material structure, properties, performance, and processing, where changes in one aspect can affect the others.
• 🚀 Materials engineers play a crucial role in industries like aerospace, where they design materials to withstand high temperatures and friction in supersonic aircrafts.
• 🚗 In automotive engineering, materials engineers determine the right materials and structures for car safety, including the crumple zones designed to absorb energy during crashes.
• 🔬 Failure analysis is a significant part of a materials engineer's job, where they examine broken parts like jet engines or computer components to understand why they failed.
• 📏 Materials engineers study fracture, material properties, and the microstructure of objects to determine how structures fail and to improve designs.
• 💧 Corrosion is a major concern for materials engineers, especially in designing pipes and marine technologies that resist destructive effects from various environments.
• 🧬 Biomaterials, used in artificial organs and tissue replacements, require materials engineers to ensure compatibility and safety with the human body.
• 🚄 Superconductors, materials with zero electrical resistance, are an area of interest for materials engineers, with applications in high-speed circuits and magnetic levitation trains.
• 🌐 Nanotechnology allows materials engineers to manipulate atomic and molecular structures to create materials with improved mechanical, electrical, and magnetic properties.
• 📚 In college, materials engineering students study the four main classes of materials: metals, ceramics, polymers, and composites, with a focus on their mechanical, electrical, and thermal properties.

Q & A

What is materials engineering and what does it involve?

Materials engineering is about designing, processing, testing, and discovering materials, mainly solids. It involves analyzing the structure, properties, performance, and processing of materials and objects. It also includes how changes in one aspect, like the structure of a material, can affect everything else.

How do materials engineers contribute to the aerospace industry?

Materials engineers in the aerospace industry design materials that can withstand high temperatures and friction caused by supersonic speeds. They ensure the materials can handle the extreme conditions without failure.

What role do materials play in the safety of car crashes?

Materials in cars are designed to crumple during a crash to absorb energy and protect the passengers. Materials engineers determine the right material and structure to ensure the car crumples in a way that saves lives.

Can you explain the importance of failure analysis in materials engineering?

Failure analysis is crucial in materials engineering as it involves examining broken parts to determine the cause of failure. This helps in designing better materials and structures to prevent future failures.

What is the significance of understanding corrosion in materials engineering?

Understanding corrosion is significant because it helps in designing materials that resist degradation from environmental factors. This is important for structures like pipelines, marine technologies, and vehicles where corrosion can lead to failure.

How do materials engineers work with biomaterials?

Materials engineers work with biomaterials to construct artificial organs or replace bone and tissue. These materials need to interact well with the human body without causing harm.

What are some applications of nanotechnology in materials engineering?

Nanotechnology in materials engineering involves manipulating atoms and molecules to form new structures with improved properties. This can lead to innovations like more efficient solar panels and stronger, unbreakable glasses.

What are the four main classes of materials studied in materials engineering?

The four main classes of materials studied in materials engineering are metals, ceramics, polymers or plastics, and composites.

How does heat treating affect the properties of metals?

Heat treating alters the properties of metals by changing their microstructure through heating and cooling processes. This can result in different mechanical properties such as hardness, ductility, and toughness.

What are some examples of mechanical, electrical, and thermal properties studied in materials engineering?

Mechanical properties include hardness, ductility, and brittleness. Electrical properties refer to a material's ability to conduct electricity. Thermal properties involve how well heat can flow through an object.

How does the arrangement of atoms affect the properties of a material?

The arrangement of atoms significantly affects a material's properties. For example, graphite and diamond, both composed of carbon, have vastly different hardness levels due to their atomic structures.

Outlines

00:00

🔧 Materials Engineering Overview and Applications

This paragraph introduces materials engineering as a discipline focused on the design, processing, testing, and discovery of solid materials. It highlights the interconnected nature of a material's structure, properties, performance, and processing. The paragraph also touches on the diverse career opportunities for materials engineers, such as working with supersonic aircrafts, designing cars to crumple safely in crashes, and conducting failure analysis in labs. The importance of understanding material behavior at a microscale is emphasized, with examples like analyzing a cracked landing gear and the role of materials in corrosion resistance and biomaterials.

05:01

🧬 Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology in Engineering

This section delves into the advanced aspects of materials engineering, including nanotechnology and the manipulation of atoms and molecules to create materials with superior mechanical, electrical, and magnetic properties. It discusses the potential applications of these advanced materials, such as improving solar panel efficiency, creating unbreakable glasses, and developing materials with tailored properties for various industries. The paragraph also outlines what students can expect to learn in college, covering the four main classes of materials: metals, ceramics, polymers, and composites, with a focus on their mechanical, electrical, and thermal properties, as well as atomic structures.

10:02

🛠 Practical Applications and Academic Exploration of Materials

The paragraph discusses practical applications of materials engineering in everyday objects, such as an ice cream scooper designed with a heat-conducting fluid and an aluminum alloy to resist corrosion. It emphasizes the importance of material selection and optimization in design. The discussion then moves to composites, which are crucial for meeting the demanding property combinations required by modern technologies, such as aircraft manufacturing. The paragraph also briefly mentions ceramics and polymers, giving basic examples and noting the vast array of materials studied within the field. Labs and mathematical aspects of the curriculum are also touched upon, including the use of microscopes, hardness testers, and the application of calculus in understanding material behavior.

15:02

🎓 Academics and Future of Materials Engineering

The final paragraph provides an overview of the academic aspects of materials engineering, including the interplay of math, chemistry, and engineering principles in the curriculum. It acknowledges the presence of math and calculus but clarifies that they are not the primary focus, unlike in other engineering disciplines. The paragraph also touches on the distinction between material science and materials engineering, suggesting that while they may be categorized differently, both are integral to the study of materials. The video concludes with a call to action for viewers to engage with the content and an anticipation of future topics.

Keywords

💡Materials Engineering

Materials Engineering is a field focused on the design, processing, testing, and discovery of materials, primarily solids. It is central to the video's theme as it encompasses the analysis of material structures, properties, performance, and processing. The script discusses how altering a material's structure can affect its overall characteristics, highlighting the importance of materials engineering in various applications such as aerospace and automotive industries.

💡Mechanical Properties

Mechanical properties refer to the characteristics of a material that govern its response to applied forces. These include hardness, ductility, and brittleness. In the video, mechanical properties are crucial for understanding how materials behave under stress, such as in the case of cars designed to crumple in crashes to absorb energy and protect passengers, demonstrating the direct application of these properties in materials engineering.

💡Structure

The term 'structure' in the context of materials engineering denotes the arrangement and organization of atoms, molecules, or fibers within a material. The script explains how changing a material's structure can fundamentally alter its properties, such as in the case of graphite and diamond, which have vastly different hardness levels due to their atomic structures, despite both being composed of carbon.

💡Failure Analysis

Failure analysis is the process of investigating the cause of a component's malfunction or breakdown. The script describes how materials engineers work in labs to determine why components fail, such as analyzing a cracked plane's landing gear, which is a critical aspect of ensuring safety and improving designs in materials engineering.

💡Corrosion

Corrosion is a destructive process that affects metals, often leading to material degradation due to environmental exposure. The video script mentions corrosion as a significant concern for materials engineers, who must design materials to resist corrosion in various applications, such as pipes carrying fluids or marine technologies like submarines.

💡Biomaterials

Biomaterials are materials designed to interact with biological systems, often used in constructing artificial organs or tissue replacements. The script touches on biomaterials as an area of study within materials engineering, where the materials must be compatible with the human body without causing harm, such as hydrogels for repairing heart tissues.

💡Superconductors

Superconductors are materials that exhibit zero electrical resistance, allowing for lossless transmission of electricity. The video script discusses the potential applications of superconductors, such as in high-speed digital circuits and magnetic levitation trains, as an example of advanced materials that materials engineers may work on developing.

💡Nanotechnology

Nanotechnology involves the manipulation of matter on an atomic, molecular, or supramolecular scale to create materials with specific properties. The script explains how nanotechnology can be used to rearrange atoms and molecules to form new structures with improved mechanical, electrical, and magnetic properties, which is a cutting-edge aspect of materials engineering.

💡Heat Treating

Heat treating is a process used to alter the physical properties of a material by heating and cooling it in a controlled manner. The video script describes heat treating as an important topic in metals engineering, where different cooling rates can result in varying mechanical properties, such as hardness and brittleness.

💡Composites

Composites are made from at least two different materials combined to create a new material with unique properties. The script highlights composites as crucial for technologies requiring specific properties not achievable with traditional materials, such as in aircraft design where a combination of strength, stiffness, and low density is needed.

💡Stress-Strain Curve

A stress-strain curve is a graphical representation of the relationship between the stress applied to a material and the strain (deformation) it undergoes. The video script uses the stress-strain curve to illustrate how materials behave under tension, such as the difference between brittle and ductile materials, and how engineers analyze these curves to understand material properties.

Highlights

Materials engineering involves designing, processing, testing, and discovering materials, mainly solids, with a focus on their structure, properties, performance, and processing.

A Google search for 'materials engineering' reveals the interconnected nature of materials' structure, properties, performance, and processing.

Materials engineers play a crucial role in aerospace, designing materials to withstand high temperatures caused by friction at supersonic speeds.

In automotive engineering, materials are engineered to crumple during crashes to absorb energy and protect passengers.

Materials engineers work in failure analysis, examining broken parts like jet engines or computer components to determine the cause of failure.

The microstructure of materials can reveal the origin and propagation of fractures, as demonstrated in a failure analysis lab.

Engineers design materials to fail in predictable ways, such as aircraft landing gear that cracks along a specific path to ensure safe landing even with damage.

Corrosion is a significant field for materials engineers, who design materials for pipes, marine technologies, and other applications to resist environmental degradation.

Biomaterials, used in artificial organs and tissue replacement, require careful interaction with the human body and are a subject of study within materials engineering.

Materials engineers also work on superconductors, materials with no electrical resistance, which have applications in high-speed circuits and magnetic levitation trains.

Materials processing and manufacturing are key areas in materials engineering, focusing on improving production methods for materials like semiconductors.

Nanotechnology, the rearrangement of atoms and molecules to form materials with superior properties, is an emerging field within materials engineering.

In college, materials engineering students study the four main classes of materials: metals, ceramics, polymers, and composites, with a focus on mechanical, electrical, and thermal properties.

Mechanical properties, such as hardness, ductility, and brittleness, are analyzed through stress-strain curves in materials engineering education.

Heat treating of metals is a significant topic, involving the analysis of temperature versus time graphs to understand material transformations.

Composites, made of at least two different materials, are crucial for technologies requiring specific combinations of strength, stiffness, and low density.

Materials engineering curriculum includes math and calculus, particularly in understanding diffusion, stress-strain curves, and integral calculations.

Materials engineers are essential in various sectors, addressing challenges such as reducing vehicle weight, environmental pollutants, and improving fuel cell efficiency.

The distinction between material science and materials engineering is often made in academia, with the latter focusing more on application and engineering solutions.

Transcripts

materials engineering is about designing

processing testing and discovering

materials mainly solids

it's about analyzing the structure

properties performance and processing of

materials and objects in fact if you do

a Google search for materials

engineering right now you'll see this

come up and this basically says that all

four of these things are connected and

by changing one like the structure of a

material you change everything else the

less versatile is careers like what

would a materials engineer be doing or

be needed for well like I said in our

aerospace video aircrafts traveling at

supersonic speeds are subject to so much

friction from the air molecules that the

aircraft can be heated to several

hundred degrees Fahrenheit

the materials engineer might have to

figure out or design the best material

to use that could handle these

conditions materials engineers are very

important when it comes to cars did you

know cars are designed to crumple when

they are in a crash they are made to

have that accordion-like response and it

saves lives the cars crumpled to absorb

energy from the crash and they need the

right material and structure to do this

if the car was extremely tough and no

damage was done in a crash all that

energy would be transferred to the

driver the frame of the car may have

harder metals at the top compared to the

bottom because of how that will transfer

energy from a crash away from a driver

how a car will be impacted in a crash

it's kind of predictable because that's

how engineers design them and a huge

part of this is picking the right

materials with the right properties and

on that topic materials engineers deal a

lot with fracture and how components

fail so you could work in a failure

analysis lab where you have broken parts

that can range from jet engines to

computer parts and have to figure out

what went wrong and it's really about

looking at the structure and material

itself the materials engineer who wrote

this video with me

had a job in a failure analysis lab we

had to look at the landing gear of a

plane but not shown here the landing

gear had a huge crack around it which

almost broke it during landing so he had

to use a microscope and analyze the

microstructure of the landing gear this

is a micrometer scale picture but tells

us a lot at this scale you can actually

see where the

originated from and how it physically

propagated through the structure the

crack isn't shown here but you'll learn

how to analyze these in school and guess

what just like with the car landing gear

is designed to fail like this the

material and structure is designed so

that if it fails it wouldn't just snap

it would crack along a certain path so

that during landing even though there

was a crack the plane could still make

it through the runway so a materials

engineer could also design how a

structure will fail if and when it does

then based on the failure analysis

results we can design even better

landing gear and various other

structures or maybe if the computer part

failed you're not going to do circuit

analysis like an electrical engineer

would but you may be looking for a

soldering issue where there's a

connection problem and a component came

loose from the circuit board so again

you have to analyze this on a micro

scale using a microscope and determine

what happened and why they also have to

deal with corrosion which is a big field

for materials engineers and you can even

take elective classes on this in college

corrosion is destructive to metal so any

pipes that carry some fluid will be

subject to corrosion and need to be

designed properly whether it's pipes

that carry water to and from our houses

one for oil ones in our cars and so on

or various marine technologies like

submarines need to be designed not to

corrode from all the interactional

saltwater planes also need to account

for this and there's many more and

different environments these are subject

to like freshwater saltwater oil etc

cause for different types of

considerations when designing them

materials engineers need to take

preventive measures to pick the right

material to account for all this you

could work on biomaterials which is

something biomedical engineers take

classes on as well but biomaterials are

used for constructing artificial organs

or to replace bone or tissue and these

materials need to interact well with the

human body and not cause harm for

example there are hydro gels that are

needed to repair damaged heart tissues

this incorporates biology and is

something you could take an elective

class on as well or you can see in grad

school if it interests you you could

work on making superconductors which are

materials that have no resistance to

electron flow like no heat or other form

of energy is given off unlike your

electronics which get hot as you use

them

and superconductors can be used for

high-speed digital circuits particle

detectors trains that use magnetic

levitation and don't make contact with

the ground and so on they can also work

on materials processing and

manufacturing materials engineering

isn't just about analyzing properties of

materials and how to use them but also

better ways to manufacture these

materials like with the fabrication of

semiconductors that are used in our

electronics electrical engineers may do

circuit analysis with these but how

those components are made is done by

other types of engineers including

materials or you could work on the study

of carefully rearranging atoms and

molecules to form new structures that

have better mechanical electrical and

magnetic properties for a material this

is also known as nanotechnology the way

the atoms are arranged or what gives the

materials a lot of their properties it's

why some things break when we drop them

and why other things stretch when we

pull on them if we can manipulate the

arrangement of atoms then we can change

the object's properties and how it

behaves we can use this to create solar

panels that can absorb energy much

better all the way to making glasses

that won't break when being dropped but

there are so many more applications

materials engineers could make clothes

that don't smell bad after use tires

that grip the road better stronger

tennis rackets and the list goes on but

now let's see what you can expect in

college and kind of zoom in a little

more on these materials so you're going

to cover the four main classes of

materials which are metals ceramics

polymers or plastics and composites and

although you learn a lot about

everything there's a big focus on metals

now when it comes to all these materials

big things we care about that you'll

learn are the mechanical properties

electrical properties thermal properties

as well as the atomic structures

mechanical properties include hardness

ductility or an object's ability to form

when being pulled brittleness or

materials brittle if you pull on it and

it breaks without much deformation so if

you have a material and you pull it

eventually it will break if it's brittle

it will just snap glass would be an

example of this but if the materials

ductile it will actually be elongated

into four

before totally snapping and certain

types of steel would be an example of

this in school you're going to learn how

to analyze certain graphs without stress

or force over area versus deformation or

strain like how far it's been stretched

then they'll give you some curve and you

have to understand it this shows that if

you pull an object very hard

it only stretches a little so you know

this is a stiff material versus a more

flexible one which might look like this

like for a rubber band and there'd be

more to these curves you'd have to

understand like it's fracture point

ultimate strength what the slope of that

initial line means and so on that can

tell you more things like how brittle it

is and so on and every material will

have a different stress-strain curve

nothing you have to worry about now but

realize this is something that you learn

and there's more mechanical properties

but you get the idea then you'll learn

electrical properties like how well

materials conduct electricity thermal

properties would of course be how well

heat can flow throughout an object

you'll learn the atomic structures and

bonding within these materials which is

very important because sometimes those

structures allow us to determine uh

materials properties for example take

graphite versus diamond graphite is

relatively soft while diamond is

extremely hard yet both are made out of

carbon this difference in mechanical

properties comes from the way the atoms

are arranged in these materials and

there's more properties like magnetic

properties and optical properties but

this is the general idea so now like I

said you go over the four main classes

of materials and everything you just saw

you will apply to all of these but

a-bake when you go over is metal the

main metals you go into include aluminum

steel stainless steel titanium copper

and so on one important topic dealing

with metals you'll learn is heat

treating which I'm going to explain a

little so you can see it's applications

you're going to learn how to analyze a

graph that has temperature versus time

the temperature may go up to something

like 800 degrees Celsius

and down to let's say 100 and let's say

this is for something like steel which

would be solid at all of these

temperatures because again you don't

really go into liquids or gases

and the time may go from one second to

something like a hundred thousand

seconds or about twenty eight hours then

on the graph you'd be given something

like this don't even worry about what

these are right now just realize these

are the different transformations the

material can go through different

materials have different looking graphs

just like this red and green curve

actually represent two different steels

so let's say we heat up steel to about

800 degrees Celsius and start there then

we cool it to a hundred degrees Celsius

in one second so very quickly that curve

or line in this case tells us which

transformations material goes through

during cooling see how it goes through

those regions with an M this goes

through different transformations than

if we slowly cooled it to the same

temperature over the course of about a

day so what does this do well if it's

cooled very quickly like that first line

that might yield a very hard but brittle

material if you cool the material slower

it may yield a slightly softer material

but that is much tougher and doesn't

break easily it's all the same material

but we can achieve different mechanical

properties just by cooling it

differently now moving on you may do

projects or reports on basic objects but

go into depth on the material beyond

what you may know these projects can be

for anything but since we're on the

topic of metals at one school students

to the project on an ice cream scooper

seems simple but what you may not know

is that there is heat conducting fluid

within the scooper this is designed to

transfer the heat from your hand to the

metal of the scooper and this warms the

metal so that when you scoop the ice

cream it kind of melts the ice cream

making it a little easier for you to

scoop as well as making it so that the

ice cream does not stick to the metal

also you can't read the words on the box

in this image but on it it says new

aluminum alloy that helps resist

corrosion so hopefully you're seeing how

the material is used in nearly

everything down to a simple ice cream

scooper are optimized by the designers

and how corrosion is a huge field as

well now I want to skip to composites

this is something you may take an entire

class on an undergrad

composites are made up of at least two

different materials from the other three

categories these are crucial because

many technologies of today require

materials with certain properties that

cannot be met with normal metals

ceramics and polymers for example when

it comes to aircrafts we are trying to

find materials that are strong stiff and

have low densities and more which is a

tough combination of properties to

achieve often strong materials are also

dense as an example so engineer's are

trying to design and find materials that

can provide the properties we want to

achieve which is where composites can

come in so you're going to learn about

these mechanical properties look at

stress-strain curves of fiber reinforced

composites as a random example methods

of manufacturing composites and so on

now I'm really not going to cover

ceramics and polymers in any detail but

if you want to know some basic examples

ceramics might be like a china cup a

brick or a dining glass and polymers or

plastics might include a bicycle helmet

pool balls dice and so on now these are

very basic examples but in school you

cover more advanced materials that have

engineering applications like silicon

carbide that can be used to create very

hard ceramics which can be used for car

breaks all the way to bulletproof vests

also note that there are many materials

that we've all heard of but there are

way more that you probably haven't heard

of these are just a few out of hundreds

that were just in an intro textbook on

materials engineering no you don't have

to memorize all these but this is a

challenge with materials engineering

because of the sheer amount of materials

out there that all have their different

properties now just briefly when it

comes to labs the equipment you can

expect to see would be like microscopes

pencil testers hardness testers and

things like that a lab you might do is

cool a material very rapidly then do

tensile testing on it you use a machine

that pulls the object in opposite

directions which is what tensile

stresses in denotes the material is very

brittle like we saw earlier but do use

microscopes to look at the micro

structures of various materials which is

very important like I said you'll learn

what these mean and how much they can

tell you about uma care

I said that they can reveal material

properties but they can even reveal how

the object was made like with heat

treating and how fast it was cooled for

those wondering how much math you see

during college there is math and

calculus but it's not the majority of

the curriculum for example in a kinetics

class which you will take one thing

you'll learn is diffusion and how atoms

move throughout a material so you may

have a high concentration of let's say

carbon so to represent how the

concentration changes over time you

would have to use calculus because the

rate that that concentration is changing

at is not constant or remember that

stress-strain curve well the area under

it is the energy absorbed and for those

who've taken calculus you know this

involves an integral so you see there is

calculus and definitely math like

algebra and linear algebra that I didn't

mention but it's definitely not as much

cows in higher-level math as an

electrical mechanical or aerospace

engineer might see then as you can see

there's also a lot of chemistry which

you will learn within your materials

engineering classes so if you struggle

with math you should expect it in this

major and be ready for it

but you should also be able to handle it

over all materials engineering covers a

wide range of sectors and there are

still many challenges that we face and

materials engineers are doing research

to overcome these challenges whether it

be to reduce the weight of cars and

aircrafts reduce environmental

pollutants in the production and

fabrication of various materials or

finding better materials for fuel cells

to improve their efficiency aerospace

mechanical and civil engineers are just

a few examples of majors that also learn

about materials and material properties

in their curriculum as you can see

materials engineers dive much deeper and

lastly well there is a distinction that

can be made between material science and

materials engineering and how we

categorize and define them at least in

terms of undergrad at many schools it

will just be called one or the other and

you will likely be in the College of

Engineering if you go into this major if

you liked this video don't forget to

comment like and subscribe and I'll see

you all next time