Materials Science Education Research Articles

Materials education at the pre-college level

The importance of the pre-college level materials science and technology education in the United States is discussed. A description of materials science based educational curricula program under development at Northwestern University is given. Preliminary results show that materials science is of considerable interest to both the high school science teachers and students. Such a program will not only provide an interdisciplinary approach to the study of science and mathematics, but it will also enhance the awareness of students of the contributions of science and technology to society and their surrounding environment.

材料学教育と環境社会

材料学教育と環境社会

Initiating New Academic Programs in Materials Science

Materials science has come of age. The need now exists to establish programs in education and research in materials science at colleges and universities throughout the world. It is not realistic to expect that every university will receive funds to found entirely new programs. However, the infrastructure for materials science already exists at most universities that have offered traditional studies in the natural sciences. It is the purpose of this article to provide ideas and suggestions for initiating new academic programs in materials science by using existing resources. The major prerequisite for success is a faculty and staff who are willing and able to adapt to a rapidly advancing scientific environment and who have the individual initiative to seize and profit from the many new opportunities in materials science. This article reports an experiment in progress at Bowling Green State University, Ohio which uses the strengths of the Departments of Biology, Chemistry, Geology, Physics and Technology to develop a new program in materials science. I hope it will serve as a model for other universities.

Materials Science and Engineering Education

Materials science and engineering (MSE), as a field as well as a discipline, has expanded greatly in recent years and will continue to do so, most likely at an even faster pace. It is now well-accepted that materials are crucial to the national defense, to the quality of life, and to the economic security and competitiveness of the nation. Mankind has recognized the importance of manmade materials to the quality of life for many centuries. In many cases, the security and defense of tribes and nations have substantially depended on the availability of materials. It is not surprising that historical periods have been named after materials—the Bronze Age, the Iron Age, etc. The major requirements from materials in those days were their properties and performance. Today, in this age of advanced materials, the importance of materials to defense and quality of life has not changed. However, the critical role of materials has taken an additional dimension: it has become essential to enhancing industrial competitiveness.The knowledge base within MSE has also expanded vastly throughout these years and continues to do so at an increasing rate. We are constantly gaining a deeper understanding of the fundamental nature of materials, developing new ways to produce and shape them for applications extending from automobiles to supersonic airplanes, optoelectronic devices to supercomputers, hip implants to intraocular lenses, or from household appliances to gigantic structures. We are also learning that, in many of these applications, we need to depend on the combinations or composites of different classes of materials (metals, ceramic, polymers, and electronic materials) to enhance their properties.

Materials science education in the USA and the UK: the industrial influence

A short account is given of educational developments in materials science in the USA which have led to the introduction of more broadly based courses, interdisciplinary studies, and stronger links with industry. The objectives of Materials Research Laboratories, which do not themselves seek industrial funding, is contrasted with the new Materials Research Centers which actively seek industrial participation and finance. Such developments have features in common with the Interdisciplinary Research Centres currently being established in the UK. Finally, a tribute is paid to the many contributions made by Sir Alan Cottrell to education in the materials field.MST/1312

Materials science education in the USA and the UK: the industrial influence

AbstractA short account is given of educational developments in materials science in the USA which have led to the introduction of more broadly based courses, interdisciplinary studies, and stronger links with industry. The objectives of Materials Research Laboratories, which do not themselves seek industrial funding, is contrasted with the new Materials Research Centers which actively seek industrial participation and finance. Such developments have features in common with the Interdisciplinary Research Centres currently being established in the UK. Finally, a tribute is paid to the many contributions made by Sir Alan Cottrell to education in the materials field.MST/1312

The Undergraduate Physics and Materials Science Connection

Materials science is fundamentally an interdisciplinary field. For purposes of discussing undergraduate preparation for work in materials science, I think it useful to take chemistry, physics, and materials science and engineering as three more-or-less separate disciplines which combine to form the overall field of materials science. The primary reason for this particular taxonomy is pragmatic rather than philosophical. Undergraduate students choose major fields of study on the basis of disciplinary boundaries. Thus, in thinking about undergraduate preparation for work in the overall field, analysis of the present situation and/or recommendations for change must revolve around that reality.The recent report entitled Materials Science and Engineering for the 1990s (the MS&E Study), sets forth the four elements of materials science and engineering as “structure and composition, properties, performance, and synthesis and processing.” An examination of these specific elements permits us to make useful distinctions among the three disciplines that combine to form the field of materials science. For example, while input from the point of view of physics certainly can contribute rather directly to expansion of our knowledge in the first three areas, its possible contribution to the last is, at best, indirect. To somewhat belabor the point, the research field of condensed matter physics is certainly contained within the field of materials but arguably not part of the discipline of materials science and engineering.The MS&E Study includes a chapter entitled “Manpower and Education in Materials Science and Engineering.” Within that chapter is a section called “Undergraduate Education in Materials Science and Engineering.”

Making Education in Materials Science and Engineering Attractive to Undergraduate Students

Materials research and education is currently one of the liveliest areas of science and engineering and is likely to be so for many decades. It is an outstanding example of an interdisciplinary field; persons who call themselves materials researchers are found in departments of chemistry, physics, metallurgy, ceramics, electrical engineering, chemical engineering, and mechanical engineering, and also in many departments that now call themselves by the name “materials science and engineering.” The field has grown so rapidly that the term “materials science and engineering,” has many different meanings. In fact, most of the funding that supports materials science and engineering research is awarded to investigators in the more traditional disciplines, and the vast majority of scientists and engineers working in the field were educated in these traditional core disciplines.There is no question that the field of materials science and engineering is a success. However, is materials science and engineering now a discipline as well as a field? Should MS&E departments exist and what should be their educational mission? Should MS&E departments offer undergraduate and graduate majors? These questions are being discussed by many university faculties as they work to devise effective research structures and educational programs to respond to the growth of interest in a field that does not fit neatly into any single traditional discipline, but is far too important to ignore.Recently, the University Materials Council appointed a committee to consider these issues and specifically address the challenge of creating effective, attractive programs of undergraduate education in materials science and engineering.

Identity of and Need for Undergraduate Materials Science and Engineering Education

A litany has recently emerged which proclaims materials science and engineering a primary enabling technology for most aspects of a modern high technology economy. More materials engineers have been called for, but employers and academia have not yet agreed on what job description or curricula should define a materials engineer. While the research or science aspects of materials science have been functioning well, manpower availability and industrial materials technology for commercial, military, environmental, and other societal needs lag behind our worldwide competitors.to nucleate the growth of a consensus and to create awareness and understanding of materials science and engineering begs an answer. In the absence of a consensus to help focus curriculum and increase awareness of materials science and engineering, the current diverse educational practices will remain, and a rare opportunity for professional development will be lost.

Education in materials science and technology

An overview is presented which looks at the needs of service courses in materials for students in other branches of engineering and also for courses for materials specialists. Recent developments in Britain are summarised and put into the European context. A case is made for more extensive use to be made of training and retraining at the postgraduate level.

Up Close: The Department of Materials, University of Mons, Belgium

The State University of Mons was established in 1965, at the heart of an old industrial region of South Belgium. Since that time, the role of the University emerged as a source of new ideas for the region. The Department of Materials was founded in 1988, developing from the identification of various groups and their expertise in the materials science field. The goal of the Department of Materials is “to arrange and promote researches in this field. The Department will also work at improving education in Materials Science.” The Department will continue existing contacts and promote new contacts with regional, national, and international industries, and its experimental facilities are accessible to all interested researchers.The members of the Department of Materials belong to the Faculties of Science and Medicine of the State University of Mons. They form an interdisciplinary group, including physicists, chemists and biologists—experimentalists and theoreticians.Although some research activities involve more than one group, they can be arranged according to either the nature of materials (thin films, polymers, surfaces, quasi-one-dimensional conductors, bio-materials) or methods of preparation (laser irradiation, chemical vapor deposition, electron evaporation) and characterization (electron and x-ray diffraction, spectrophotometry, FTIR, micro-Raman, electrical conductivity, surface analytical techniques).

1987 MRS Fall Meeting An Unqualified Success

Chaired by J. Murray Gibson (AT&T Bell Laboratories), S. Thomas Picraux (Sandia National Laboratories), and Barry E. Scheetz (Pennsylvania State University), the 1987 MRS Fall Meeting in Boston shattered several attendance records as it offered an unprecedented collection of leading-edge technical symposia and short courses. Activities began before the start of the technical symposia with a one-day short course on Conventional and High Temperature Superconductors on Sunday, November 29. The 20 technical symposia ran from Monday through Friday, November 30-December 4, and short courses continued through Saturday, December 5.Rounding out the schedule were several additional events: the popular lunchtime Symposium X on Frontiers of Materials Research, a forum on Education in Materials Science and Engineering with an address by National Science Foundation director Erich Bloch, a workshop on Specimen Preparation for Transmission Electron Microscopy of Materials, the Plenary Address by William C. DeVries on “Medical and Materials Issues of the Total Artificial Heart” (to be published in an upcoming issue of the BULLETIN), and the Von Hippel Award lecture on “Orientation Mapping” given by the award's 1987 recipient, Sir Charles Frank (see p. 24 in this issue).Total meeting attendance passed 3,500, making 1987 another year of record growth for MRS. Similarly, the number of short courses and shortcourse students rose over previous years, and the increasingly popular equipment exhibit overflowed to additional booths outside the main exhibit hall. One exhibit featured its own speaker, Yorick, a talking skeleton, from the Division of Mechanics and Materials Science, U.S. Food and Drug Administration Center for Devices and Radiological Health.

米国における材料科学教育と国立研究所の役割

米国における材料科学教育と国立研究所の役割

Specific Materials Science and Engineering Education

Forty years ago there were essentially no academic departments with titles of “Materials Science” or “Materials Engineering.” There were, of course, many materials departments. They were called “Metallurgy,” “Metallurgical Engineering,” “Mining and Metallurgy,” and other permutations and combinations. There were also a small number of “Ceramic” or “Ceramic Engineering” departments. Essentially none included “polymers.” Over the years titles have evolved via a route that frequently followed “Mining and Metallurgy,” to “Metallurgical Engineering,” to “Materials Science and Metallurgical Engineering,” and finally to “Materials Science and Engineering.” The evolution was driven by recognition of the commonality of material structure-property correlations and the concomitant broadening of faculty interests to include other materials. However, the issue is not department titles but whether a single degree option in materials science and engineering best serves the needs of students.Few proponents of materials science and engineering dispute the necessity for understanding the relationships between processing (including synthesis), structure, and properties (including performance) of materials. However, can a single BS degree in materials science and engineering provide the background in these relationships for all materials and satisfy the entire market now served by several different materials degrees?The issue is not whether “Materials Science and Engineering” departments or some other academic grouping of individuals with common interests should or should not exist.

Views on a Comprehensive Materials Science and Engineering Education Program

Educational programs in materials science and engineering (MSE) departments must be comprehensive, addressing the main theme of structure-property-processing-application relationships in all materials. In addition, the programs must be dynamic in order to improve materials according to the requirements of our society. Dynamic materials limits and societal needs require the materials field to change constantly over relatively short times. In this respect, education in MSE differs substantially from that in traditional departments such as chemistry, physics, mechanical and chemical engineering, and even the more narrow fields of metallurgical, ceramics and polymer engineering.It may be argued that all departments, scientific or engineering, are dynamic because they are constantly changing and maturing. Obviously, though, departments close to maturity change less rapidly than young departments. MSE, a young department, is changing rapidly from both steady evolutionary growth as well as quantum changes in scope (e.g., electronic materials). In fact, advances in MSE have necessitated a redefinition of scope for other fields. A good example is the field of computers and communication, which is directly tied to the growth, processing, and characterization of high purity semiconductor materials. The opposite is true as well (e.g., high transition temperature superconducting materials). The old adage of “a good design will be limited by the materials available” is true. As such, MSE plays a dual role—simultaneously advancing and impeding progress in other areas of science and engineering.

Approaches to an Integrated Undergraduate Education in Materials Science and Engineering

This is an era of great excitement and opportunity in the materials field, particularly for those of us in universities. Our field has expanded greatly in recent years. Materials scientists and engineers have joined forces with physicists, chemists, electrical engineers and others to pave the way for major technological advances. Remarkable strides in instrumentation have brought insights unimagined a decade ago. The realization is growing in so many other fields of research and education that further advances are limited largely by the capabilities of materials. There is no field of engineering that could not improve the efficiency or performance of its products, if better materials were available.

New NSF sponsored program in materials science education

New NSF sponsored program in materials science education

New NSF sponsored program in materials science education

New NSF sponsored program in materials science education

“Symposium” on education in materials science and engineering

“Symposium” on education in materials science and engineering

Two decades of change in graduate education in metallurgy/materials—A perspective

It is now almost a decade since the introduction of massive federal support to universities for graduate education and research in the materials field. Accordingly, it is appropriate to examine the changes in the nature and activity of the field which have occurred during this period, both in the universities themselves, and in professional practice in industry and government, and also the implications of such changes for graduate education in metallurgy and materials science in the future.