New generation of tools for wood cutting industry

木材是一种容易获得的异质材料，品种繁多，用于家具，包装，建筑结构，梁闪光，地板和许多其他应用。考虑到加拿大森林工业的重要性（205,000个就业岗位和330亿美元的出口，2019年的数据），木材切割在该行业中扮演着关键角色。具体来说，根据加拿大政府2020年关于“加拿大森林状况”的报告，2018年加拿大采伐了超过1.58亿立方米的工业圆木。工业面临的主要挑战之一是刀具的快速劣化，这大大降低了被切割木材的表面质量，增加了木材浪费，并导致相同数量的加工木材的砍伐树木数量显着增加。因此，使用高性能耐用的工具将对加拿大产生重大的环境影响（在相同的总产量下砍伐更少的树木）和经济影响（工具更换，低质量木材生产等）。然而，生产高性能耐用刀具是一个多方面的复杂科学技术问题。这个为期4年的项目的目标是更好地了解合金成分、热处理参数、表面处理和涂层特性对木材切削工具性能的基本相互作用，以期开发下一代高性能木材切削工具。

Wood is a readily available heterogeneous material with plenty of varieties used in furniture, packing, building constructions, beam flashings, flooring, and many other applications. Considering the importance of forest industry in Canada (205,000 jobs and $33B in exports, 2019 data) wood cutting occupies a key role in this industry. Specifically, according to the government of Canada's 2020 report on the 'state of Canada's forests' more than 158 million cubic meters of industrial round wood has been harvested in 2018 in Canada. One of the major challenges faced by industry is the rapid deterioration of the cutting tool, which significantly reduces the surface quality of the cut wood, increases wood waste, and leads to significant increase of the number of cut trees for the same amount of processed wood. Therefore, the use of high-performance long-lasting tools will have significant environmental (cutting less trees for the same total production) and economic (tool replacement, low quality wood production, etc.) impacts for Canada. However, producing high-performance long-lasting cutting tools is a multi-faceted complex scientific and technological problem. The goal of the proposed 4-year project is to better understand the fundamental interactions between alloy composition, heat treatment parameters, surface preparation, and coating characteristics on the performance of wood cutting tools with the view to develop the next generation of high-performance wood cutting tools.