The Materials Science and Engineering Program offers graduate study and research in diverse technical fields. Students select an area as their major focus but since our program is highly individualized, students will likely pursue interests that cut across more than one research area. By selecting or developing a specific thrust area, students are able to study core MS&E subjects but also develop depth within a specific area of study that cuts across multiple aspects of science and engineering.
Starting in the Fall of 2021, we opened up our Thrust areas and dropped our predetermined list of courses available for each area. Instead, we encourage the student to work with their supervisor to develop their own individualized Thrust area and to take courses that would support that area and their research. Below are descriptions of the various areas of research TMI and the MS&E program can offer.
Nanomaterials
Nanomaterials consist of microstructural features (grains, domains, phases, precipitates, etc.) that range in size from 1 – 100 nm. At this scale, many materials exhibit properties that differ from their bulk-sized analogues. The ability to tune the properties of materials by controlling size allows nanomaterials to have applications in a broad range of fields including optics, magnetic devices, catalysis, microelectronics, pharmaceutics, and energy conversion and storage technologies. The University of Texas at Austin has strong expertise in the synthesis, characterization, property measurements, and performance evaluation of nanomaterials as well as devices based on nanomaterials. Unique phenomena occur in these size scales that can be exploited in novel applications. Nanomaterials are currently used in a wide array of applications including in bumpers on cars, paints, and coatings to protect against corrosion, protective and glare-reducing coatings for eyeglasses and cars, metal-cutting tools, sunscreens and cosmetics, tennis balls, tennis racquets, stain-free clothing, burn and wound dressings, inks, and automotive catalytic converters. In the future it is anticipated that nanomaterials will allow major advances in high energy density rechargeable batteries, improved low-cost solar cells, commercially viable fuel cells, more energy efficient catalysts, high-strength structural materials for aerospace applications, faster and more efficient semiconductor electronics, and improved methods for treating diseases by targeting diseased tissue.
Nanotechnology is a major thrust at UT Austin with over 100 faculty involved. Texas Materials Institute providse critical infrastructure and modern equipment for conducting interdisciplinary nanomaterials research. The Nanomaterials Thrust within the Graduate Program in Materials Science and Engineering offers a powerful opportunity for multidisciplinary research by fostering collaborations across eight academic departments ranging from chemistry to mechanical engineering. You can find a list of faculty interested in nanomaterials here.
Energy Materials
Rapid depletion of fossil fuels and growing environmental concerns make energy one of the greatest challenges facing humankind in the 21st century. As the world-wide demand for energy is expected to continue to increase at a rapid rate, it is critical that improved technologies for sustainably producing, converting, and storing energy are developed. Materials are key roadblocks to improved performance in a number of important energy technologies including energy storage in batteries and supercapacitors, and energy conversion through solar cells, fuel cells, and thermoelectric devices.The thrust includes materials for fuel cells, lithium-ion batteries, supercapacitors, photovoltaics, solar energy conversion, thermoelectrics, and hydrogen production and storage. The research activities include materials design, chemical synthesis, nanomaterials, advanced materials characterization, prototype energy storage/conversion device fabrication and evaluation, and computational modeling of materials and processes. The University of Texas at Austin is an internationally recognized leader in the development of clean energy materials and some of the researchers in this thrust are also affiliated with UT Austin’s Electrochemical Energy Laboratory. You can find faculty interested in energy materials here.
Structural Materials
Structural materials encompass materials whose primary purpose is to transmit or support a force. Applications can be in transportation (aircraft and automobiles), construction (buildings and roads), or in components used for body protection (helmets and body armor), energy production (turbine blades), or other smaller structures such as those used in microelectronics. Structural materials can be metallic, ceramic, polymeric or a composite between these materials. You can find a list of faculty interested in structural material here.
Electronic and Photonic Materials
Lying at the interface between chemistry, physics, chemical engineering, electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, and materials science and engineering, the study of electronic, magnetic, and optical properties of materials has broad applications to microelectronic devices, communications, phononic and photonic devices, recording, and others. You can find faculty interested in electronic and photonic materials here.
Polymers and Biomaterials
Research on polymers at UT Austin focuses on electronic, structural, and chemical properties for applications in microelectronics, low cost solar materials, biomass, structural composites, and membrane materials. Biomaterials research includes the study of biomaterials interfaces and materials for controlled drug release. You can find faculty interested in polymers and biomaterials here.
Computational Materials Science
Computer simulations are used increasing in Materials Science and Engineering to both develop new materials and to better explain the properties of existing materials. Tools such as molecular dynamics simulations, density functional theory, and finite element modeling are used to understand atomic and crystal structure, phase and microstructure evolution, and their correlations with electronic, transport, and mechanical properties. You can find faculty interested in computational materials science here.
Materials Characterization
Understanding the structure-property correlations of materials is at the heart of a Materials Science and Engineering research program. In TMI, new innovations are explored for the characterization using advanced instrumentation. This includes the integration of new direct electron detectors, utilization of techniques in new ways to manipulate atoms and characterize atoms, air-free cryo-processing of sensitive samples like batteries, and developing new surface science analysis methods for understanding elemental bonding in 3D. Materials Characterization research is an area that combines hardware and computational data analysis to see atomic structure at higher resolutions, with greater 3D mapping, and the ability to measure properties of materials with accurate and sensitivities beyond conventional approaches. You can find faculty interested in materials characterization here.
