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  3. Materials for Extremes

Materials for Extremes

Meeting the challenge: advancing alloys, ceramics, and their composites for technologies deployed in the world’s harshest conditions

Post-Doctoral Researcher Amine Benkechkache and student Lance Drouet conduct research in a class 100 clean room at the Micro-Processing Research Facility housed within UT’s new Institute for Advanced Materials and Manufacturing located at Cherokee Farm on April 05, 2022. Photo by Steven Bridges/University of Tennessee.
Nuclear reactor in a pool of blue-lighted water.
Orange arrow.

From the chemically corrosive environments experienced by sea-going vessels, medical implants, and nuclear reactors to the high-temperatures and mechanical shock exposures affecting hypersonic flight vehicles, materials developed to operate in extreme conditions have far-reaching implications for the economy, national security, and human health. Our researchers work across traditional metallic and ceramic material systems to uncover and advance how extreme environments impact the function of materials and how those extremes can be leveraged to form novel or enhanced performance materials.

Green aurora borealis seen from space. Photo courtesy of NASA.

UT’s Approach

Our researchers combine high-throughput computational and experimental techniques with state-of-the-art ion irradiation, neutron scattering, and multi-scale materials modeling capabilities to interactively design, synthesize, and test next-generation materials intended for operation in extreme conditions, tackling problems far outside of what is considered the norm.

By examining the paradigms of hierarchical microstructure and compositional complexity, we explore strategies to enhance material performance and survivability. We collaborate broadly to advance and apply state-of-the-art neutron, electron, and theoretical probes at UT and Oak Ridge National Laboratory to study and advance material behaviors under ion irradiation/high temperature/high pressure exposures, high mechanical strain rates, and more.

Our distinguished faculty and high-profile research platform attract a diverse group of students expertly trained in the materials for extremes design cycle and prepared to meet the material challenges of tomorrow. UT is actively recruiting undergraduates, graduate students and postdoctoral fellows to work in this exciting area.

Highlights

Hypersonics at UTSI

The UT Space Institute in Tullahoma is at the forefront of hypersonic flight research and is leading a multi-university team to develop the essential educational curricula for the future hypersonic workforce.

Learn about the hypersonics initiative.

Radiation-Resistant Materials

A group of UT and ORNL researchers have developed a breakthrough material using high-entropy alloys, which uses different combinations of elements to fine-tune chemical complexity at the level of both electrons and atoms, and produces alloys more tolerant to radiation, giving them a longer life in terms of their use in nuclear power production.

Read more about the material.

Several nuclear silos with and without air vapor.
Milky Way galaxy colored in red, yellow, and blue, provided by NASA.

Facilities & Initiatives

UT is home to a world-leading research facility for neutron scattering and fundamental physics, and is a member of the second largest IUCRC in the nation. On-campus labs offer capabilities for ion beam analysis, materials modification, ion-solid interactions, and neutron experimentation.

  • Center for Advanced Materials and Manufacturing
  • Center for Materials Processing
  • Ion Beam Materials Lab
  • Manufacturing & Materials Joining Innovation Center
  • Shull Wollan Center
  • Spallation Neutron Source at ORNL
Tables and racks full of equipment in the Ion Beam Materials Lab.

Talent

  • Brett Compton.

    Brett Compton

    Associate Professor, Mechanical, Aerospace & Biomedical Engineering

    Developing new high-performance materials for additive manufacturing technologies, printable fiber-reinforced polymer and ceramic matrix composites, multi-material hybrid structures

  • Yanfei Gao.

    Yanfei Gao

    Professor, Materials Science & Engineering

    Analytical and computational mechanics of materials, small scale mechanical behavior, failure of advanced structural materials, thin film heterostructures

  • Veerle Keppens.

    Veerle Keppens

    Chancellor’s Professor & Department Head, Materials Science & Engineering

    Elastic constants and lattice dynamics of novel materials, including transition metal oxides, frustrated magnets and spin glasses, thermoelectric materials

  • Maik Lang.

    Maik Lang

    Associate Professor, Nuclear Engineering

    Radiation damage and high-pressure studies, materials science

  • Eric Lass.

    Eric Lass

    Assistant Professor, Materials Science & Engineering

    Phase transformations and microstructural evolution in metals and alloys, thermodynamic and kinetics, high-temperature materials, additive manufacturing

  • Peter Liaw.

    Peter Liaw

    Professor, Materials Science & Engineering

    Mechanical behavior, fatigue and fracture behavior, nondestructive-evaluation, and neutron/synchrotron studies of advanced materials, including bulk-metallic glasses, nano-structural materials, high-entropy alloys, superalloys, steels, and intermetallics.

  • Chuck Melcher.

    Chuck Melcher

    Research Professor, Materials Science, Nuclear Engineering

    Scintillation materials for next-generation gamma-ray, x-ray, and neutron detectors; characterization of new luminescent materials via optical and x-ray spectroscopy, implementation of emerging scintillator technology in medical imaging systems, homeland security inspection systems, neutron and particle physics experiments, and remote sensing; single crystal growth and powder synthesis of novel scintillation materials

  • Katherine Page.

    Katharine Page

    Assistant Professor, Materials Science & Engineering

    New insights into complex functional materials, both bulk and nano, through advances in structural characterization, ferroelectric oxides, energy conversion materials, nanoscale catalysts

  • Dayakar Penumadu.

    Dayakar Penumadu

    Peebles Professor, IAMM Chair of Excellence, Civil & Environmental Engineering

    Carbon fiber reinforced polymeric composites and sandwich structures, environmental degradation, and multi-scale mechanics, multi-axial stress-strain-time behavior of multi-phase and granular materials, non-invasive characterization and residual stress using neutron and x-ray tomography and diffraction, direct numerical simulations and porous media

  • Phillip Rack.

    Philip Rack

    Professor, Materials Science & Engineering

    Quantum materials synthesis, molecular quantum systems, 2D materials, quantum magnetism, strongly correlated electron systems, nanoscale electron, ion and photon beam induced processing, thin film processing and characterization

  • Claudia Rawn.

    Claudia Rawn

    Professor, Materials Science & Engineering

    Materials engineering, macromolecular and materials chemistry, atomic/molecular physics, inorganic chemistry, neutron and X-Ray powder diffraction, small molecule crystallography, ceramic synthesis, structure/property relations

  • Tim Truster.

    Timothy Truster

    Associate Professor, Civil & Environmental Engineering

    Computational mechanics, interface mechanics, composite material modeling, stabilized methods, high-performance computing

  • Haixuan Xu.

    Haixuan Xu

    Associate Professor, Materials Science & Engineering

    Computational materials science, density functional theory and atomistic simulations, defect interaction and radiation effects, deformation mechanism and electronic/magnetic effects on mechanical properties of structural alloys, electromagnetic coupling and flexoelectric effects, materials for neuromorphic computing, mesoscale computational methods

  • Mariya Zhurauleva.

    Mariya Zhuravleva

    Associate Professor, Materials Science & Engineering

    Discovery, synthesis and characterization of scintillators for homeland security and medical imaging applications

  • Steve Zinkle.

    Steven Zinkle

    UT-ORNL Governor’s Chair for Nuclear Materials

    Physical metallurgy of structural materials; ion and neutron irradiation effects on the microstructure, physical and mechanical properties of metals and ceramics; fusion and fission reactor materials; deformation and fracture mechanisms.

See all Materials For Extreme Environments Faculty

Institute for Advanced Materials & Manufacturing

2641 Osprey Vista Way
Knoxville, TN 37920
865-974-8428
iamm@utk.edu

Research Areas
Advanced Materials,
Advanced Manufacturing,
Materials for Extremes,
Polymer Science, &
Quantum Materials

UT Research supports five gateways defining the university’s strategic priorities—the Institute for Advanced Materials and Manufacturing is one of them. Find out about the other four gateways here.
The university is committed to recruiting top-tier faculty members across multiple disciplines who are interested in addressing the nation’s greatest challenges. Learn more about the Cluster Hire Initiatives.
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The University of Tennessee, Knoxville
Knoxville, Tennessee 37996
865-974-1000

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