IRES Track I: Characterization and Modeling of Grain Boundaries in Hexagonal and Body Centered Cubic Alloys: Linking Processing and Properties

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The proposed NSF IRES program will provide support for 19 students pursuing research in materials science and engineering. These students will engage in collaborative international research with the IMDEA Materials Institute (IMDEA) in Madrid, Spain. Each year, 7 students will spend 7 weeks performing research on grain boundary formation and evolution during processing and its effects on the properties of hexagonal and body centered cubic (BCC) alloys. The IMDEA mentors are world leaders in physical and mechanical metallurgy, and modeling of advanced alloys, and the program focuses on the development of hexagonal magnesium alloys, which are targeted for application in the transportation and biomedical industries. The participating IRES students will gain experience with advanced computational and experimental methods, present their research in an international setting, write reports and manuscripts for publication in scientific journals, and build professional and personal networks in Spain with scientists from all over the world. Given the prominence of IMDEA in Spanish science and its interactions with industry, IMDEA is uniquely-positioned to provide students with new perspectives to prepare them for a variety of future careers in which collaborations with European agencies are desirable. Building on their experiences at MSU, this program will expose students to a different approach to research as well as to everyday life in a different culture. Walking tours in Madrid and excursions to nearby cities will be included in the program along with other cultural activities supervised by the IMDEA mentors. The broader impacts of the program will extend beyond the number of participating students and will include the following: This program is part of a larger push to make education abroad opportunities an integral part of undergraduate and graduate education at Michigan State University (MSU) offering a pipeline for future research-intensive educational abroad opportunities that are currently lacking. The experiences and collaborations the participating students bring back to MSU will enhance the development of an international, diverse, and inclusive culture at MSU, which is a high priority within the MSU College of Engineering and the greater university. The students will work on innovative projects that involve advanced concepts in solidification experiments and modeling, in-situ microstructural characterization techniques, deformation and its modeling, and processing-microstructure-property relationships. The unifying theme of these projects is characterizing and modeling grain boundaries. The projects are tied together by a rigorous structure- and mechanism-based approach whereby students examine hypotheses using advanced experimental and computational tools. The students’ contributions will bring new insights to designing hexagonal and BCC metals for targeted properties and applications. The intellectual merit of the proposed work lies in understanding processing-microstructure-property relations of hexagonal and BCC alloys to help produce polycrystalline microstructures with a balance of properties that are attractive for industrial applications.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.