The Elmet Group Co., Portland, Maine, has agreed to acquire ams OSRAM’s tungsten and molybdenum operations in Schwabmünchen, Germany, establishing its first EU production footprint for refractory metal components.
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GE Aerospace, Evendale, OH, announced a $225 million investment to modernize the GE Aerospace Research Center in Niskayuna, NY, advancing the site’s legacy as the innovation engine behind breakthroughs in aviation advancements.
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AML3D Limited, Australia, is participating in a AUD $3.9 million, three-year R&D project with an aerospace prime to qualify its Wire-Arc Additive Manufacturing technology for producing aerospace tooling.
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Bodycote, U.K., has invested more than $30 million across two facilities in Ohio, expanding its capacity and capabilities in response to growing demand from aerospace and defense manufacturers in the region.
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Researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have developed a real-time 3D X-ray imaging technique to observe spacecraft heat shield ablation as it happens, improving how engineers model and design thermal protection systems for space missions.
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LECO Corporation, St. Joseph, Mich., has demonstrated how its CS844ES elemental analyzer enables accurate determination of sulfur at levels as low as 0.1 µg in steel, nickel, and superalloys, extending the combustion technique to sensitivities previously unachievable
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Following a record-breaking year of thermal spray system deliveries in 2025, Switzerland-based TPS Solutions has strengthened its sales and engineering teams to expand its position in the European and North American aerospace sectors.
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Oerlikon Metco Coatings Ltd., U.K., has successfully completed the Nadcap accreditation process, marking an important milestone in the company’s continued expansion into the U.K. aerospace sector.
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A research team led by Saarland University materials scientist Ralf Busch is preparing its first space-based mission aboard the International Space Station, where researchers will remotely study metallic-glass alloys using hot, levitating droplets in a microgravity environment. Conducted in partnership with the European Space Agency and the German Aerospace Center, the experiments aim to generate highly precise data that could help improve the performance of these advanced materials. The unique weightless conditions aboard the ISS eliminate many of the effects of gravity, allowing scientists to better understand alloy behavior and accelerate the development of new materials, with additional space-based experiments already planned.
Busch is one of the international pioneers in the field of metallic glass. Metallic glasses are metals that solidify like glass. In numerous research projects, many of which were funded by the EU, the German federal government and the DFG, Busch and his team have been developing and refining these novel alloys, which can be tailored to have specific properties. The word ‘glass’ should not be interpreted to mean that a metallic glass is fragile. On the contrary, these alloys are stronger than steel. ‘They are also elastic and at elevated temperatures can be formed like plastics, which means they can be processed using techniques such as injection moulding or metal 3D printing,’ says Ralf Busch. This allows metallic glasses to be shaped into complex geometries of almost any kind, a further active area of research for Busch and his team. His research group at Saarland University already holds several patents for novel, ultra-high-strength alloys with new properties.
The metallic glasses being developed in Saarbrücken are new materials whose properties can be tailored for use in engines and machinery. Examples include new components that make electric motors more energy-efficient, as well as screws and geometrically complex parts that are strong enough to withstand the extreme conditions encountered in aerospace applications.
How metals solidify into glass
These metal alloys are described as glasses because of their internal structure. ‘Conventional metals have a crystalline structure, with their atoms arranged in regular lattices,’ explains Professor Busch. Metallic glasses are different: their internal atomic structure is disordered, just like that of glass. ‘The atoms in metallic glasses are not ordered; these materials are amorphous, like glass,’ explains Busch. To achieve this, the researchers develop alloys that are far less prone to crystallization and in which crystal formation is significantly slowed. This makes it difficult for the atoms to arrange themselves in the ordered patterns needed to form crystals, so the molten metal solidifies with its atoms in a disordered state.
The fact that metals can be made to ‘solidify into glass’, and that these alloys also exhibit the right properties for applications such as metal 3D printing, is the result of many years of research. The atomic composition of these alloys has to be very carefully fine-tuned. ‘It takes years to develop an alloy like this. We design them in a multidimensional compositional space in order to get alloys that crystallize more slowly and that show the right combination of properties,’ explains Busch. For decades, his research has involved collaboration with partners including NASA, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which builds and operates satellites and space probes for NASA, and the German Aerospace Center.
High-strength nickel-based alloys bound for the ISS
The experiments in the space station are scheduled to be carried out from 31 August to 4 September and will focus on nickel-niobium and nickel-niobium-sulfur alloys. Nickel-niobium alloy was first developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT, in the United States back in 1967. The nickel-niobium-sulfur alloy comes from Busch’s laboratory on the Saarbrücken campus. By studying the alloys under near-weightless conditions on the ISS, his team aims to broaden scientific understanding of the physical properties of metallic glass. The experiments to be performed on the ISS will examine levitated droplets heated to temperatures of up to 1,700 degrees Celsius, in order to study material properties such as surface tension, viscosity, thermal expansion, supercooling, oscillation behaviour and heat capacity. ‘The alloy is highly reactive, so on the ISS we don’t need a crucible to melt the beads,’ explains Busch. The metallic-glass beads that were specially produced on the Saarbrücken campus by Lucas Ruschel, a former doctoral researcher in Busch’s group, have already been flown to the ISS. They have been certified on the basis of tests carried out on Earth that they pose no risk on board the ISS.
The experiments will be carried out in ESA’s Columbus module, using the Electromagnetic Levitator, EML, which was installed in 2014 by German ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst. Lucas Eisenhut, another doctoral student in Ralf Busch’s research group, has a full week of measurement time on the ISS. He will be controlling the experiments from the DLR control centre in Cologne together with Dr. Fan Yang, a senior researcher working towards his habilitation in Ralf Busch’s group in Saarbrücken. ‘The ISS will transmit a live stream of the experiments to the control centre, which enables us to observe what’s happening in real time. We can send commands directly to the levitator on the ISS, which allows us to adjust process parameters and to influence the sample and the experimental conditions,’ explains Lucas Eisenhut.
Why a levitating droplet on Earth is not enough
Preparations for the space tests have been under way for years. The researchers have repeatedly levitated hot droplets of the alloy on Earth: in vacuum, and in electromagnetic and electrostatic fields at DLR in Cologne. At DESY, the German Electron Synchrotron facility, droplets were examined using X-rays. Lucas Ruschel, who completed his doctorate in Busch’s research group, undertook a total of 30 parabolic flights over the Atlantic off the coast of France in a single day in order to study the droplets during brief phases of weightlessness, each lasting around 22 seconds.
For the Saarbrücken research team, however, these short test phases are not long enough and there are too many interference factors that affect measurements on Earth. The conditions in space on the ISS are much better. ‘We expect results significantly more precise than those so far conducted on Earth. Here, the force we need to counteract gravity and keep the droplet in position is far greater than it is on the ISS. Under the near-weightless conditions on the ISS, we only need to apply far smaller forces to keep the droplet stationary – and that is a huge advantage,’ explains Ralf Busch. On Earth, phenomena, such as flow patterns within the droplet, can interfere with the measurement. ‘Another major advantage is the much longer experiment time under near-weightless conditions. On the ISS, we can run several experimental cycles a day, each lasting up to 45 minutes, which gives us several hours of measurement time in total. This makes it possible to conduct more extensive experiments and obtain more meaningful results than during 22-second parabolic flights,’ adds doctoral student Lucas Eisenhut.
The aim is to use the new and hopefully highly precise measurement data to further improve the material and to develop new materials for spaceflight, medical technology, high-performance components and even everyday products. Metallic glass beads made from other alloys have also been developed by Busch’s team and preparations are now under way for testing these materials, such as a palladium-nickel-phosphorus alloy, on a future mission to the ISS.
For more information: Saarland University
Image: Materials scientist Ralf Busch (standing) and doctoral researcher Lucas Eisenhut beside the apparatus used to melt and homogenize the constituent elements of metallic-glass alloys. The alloys for the ISS experiments were also produced here.
Partnership between GE Aerospace, Cincinnati, Ohio and the Singapore Economic Development Board brings AI-enabled inspection, predictive maintenance, and automated repair to speed turnaround and improve connectivity and customer experiences.
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Fraunhofer ICON Project “UltraGRAIN” demonstrates local microstructure control in metallic components during laser-based directed energy deposition, using pulsed-laser-induced melt pool excitation with potential for tailored products.
Continue readingTAFA Inc., a Praxair Surface Technologies Co., Concord, N.H., has developed and improved equipment for coating performance and repeatability, as reported in “Equipment Advances for Advanced Coatings,” a presentation at the thermal spray conference announced below. Advanced features such as recipe storage, data acquisition, and remote diagnostics are playing larger and more important roles in process development and control.
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Thermal Spray Technologies, Sun Prairie, Wis., in collaboration with the University of Wisconsin-Madison, helped to develop innovative thermal spray coatings to improve heat protection and fuel efficiency in the next generation of jet turbine engines. The team’s experimental results were published in the August issue of the Journal of Thermal Spray Technologies in an article titled “Application of Plasma Spraying as a Precursor in the Synthesis of Oxidation Resistant Coatings.
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Blacksmiths fire metals before hammering them, as heat always softens metal, making it more malleable and easier to reshape. Or does it? In a surprising new study, engineers from Northwestern University (Evanston, Ill.) discovered that, in extreme conditions, heat does not soften pure metals—it strengthens them.
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A research team at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University is teaming up with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory to test thin yet durable materials for hypersonic flight using an upgraded source of ultrabright x-rays.
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Researchers at the University of Michigan have developed a breakthrough method that brings quantum-level precision to molecular modeling, offering deeper insights into chemical reactions and material properties. This advancement addresses the quantum many-body problem—how electrons interact to form chemical bonds and influence electrical behavior—which traditionally requires immense computational power and is limited to small molecules. By enhancing the efficiency of this simulation approach, the new method could extend quantum accuracy to larger, more complex systems, potentially reducing the heavy demand on national lab supercomputers.
Density functional theory, or DFT, makes quantum chemistry more manageable by focusing on electron densities rather than tracking every electron individually. This approach keeps computing demands much lower, allowing simulations of systems with hundreds of atoms. A major challenge, however, lies in the exchange-correlation (XC) functional, which governs how electrons interact according to quantum mechanics.
Until now, researchers have had to rely on approximations of the XC functional tailored to specific applications, limiting the theory’s overall accuracy. Improving this functional is key to making DFT an even more powerful tool for chemistry and materials science.
According to Vikram Gavini, a University of Michigan professor of mechanical engineering and the corresponding author of the study, researchers know that a universal functional exists that applies to all electron systems – whether in molecules, metals, or semiconductors – but its exact form remains unknown.
Hence, understanding this functional is crucial for improving DFT, which models electron interactions and underpins simulations in chemistry and materials science.
Given DFT’s central role in advancing both materials research and basic science, the US Department of Energy provided funding and supercomputer resources to support the University of Michigan team’s efforts to approach the universal exchange-correlation functional.
The researchers began by analyzing individual atoms and small molecules using quantum many-body theory. Then, instead of applying approximate functionals to predict electron behavior, they used machine learning to determine which XC functional would reproduce the electrons’ behavior as calculated by the more precise quantum many-body method.
Bikash Kanungo, a University of Michigan assistant research scientist in mechanical engineering and first author of the study, explains that an accurate exchange-correlation functional has broad applications because it is material-agnostic.
It is equally important for researchers developing better battery materials, designing new drugs, or building quantum computers. By improving this functional, scientists can make density functional theory more reliable and widely applicable, enabling more precise simulations across chemistry, materials science, and emerging technologies.
Thus, researchers can now use the XC functional discovered by the University of Michigan team or apply their approach to new systems, starting with light atoms and molecules and eventually extending to solids, paving the way for more accurate and efficient simulations across chemistry and materials science.
For more information: University of Michigan
Image: A 3D map of the quantum potential.
Engineers at the University of Wisconsin–Madison have developed a versatile new electrolyte that advances the development of an initially anode-free sodium-ion battery—a promising alternative to lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles and grid energy storage. Led by Assistant Professor Fang Liu and PhD students Qianli Xing and Ziqi Yang, the team is also using this electrolyte as a model system to explore how molecular manipulation can improve compatibility between different battery components, potentially paving the way for more efficient and energy-dense battery technologies.
Containing solvents and dissolved salts, the electrolyte is the liquid medium that touches all parts of the battery’s cells and, in its charging or discharging process, helps ions travel between the electrodes.
In a battery, the anode and cathode are different materials—for example, graphite, hard carbon sodium or lithium for the anode and a transition metal oxide like lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxide or sodium nickel iron manganese oxide for the cathode.
One of the challenges in developing next-generation batteries is that there’s not a one-size-fits-all electrolyte that performs effectively with both electrode material types. Conversely, when an electrolyte contains multiple solvent molecules, controlling their interactions and behavior is challenging.
Tweaking the electrolyte is a balancing act involving multiple factors, including how solvent molecules in the electrolyte form a “shell” around ions that could accelerate or impede the ions’ movement between anode and cathode—which ultimately affects battery charging and discharging, along with overall battery performance. “Using this model system, we are basically trying to understand whether we can present different molecules to different electrode surfaces—for example, an anode-stable solvent to the anode, and then a cathode-stable solvent to the cathode,” says Liu. “In this way, the electrolyte mixture would ideally behave like an anode-stable solvent at the anode, and like a cathode-stable solvent at the cathode.”
To create its new electrolyte, the team mixed two ether-based solvents, 2-methyltetrahydrofuran, or 2-MeTHF, which is more stable at the anode, and tetrahydrofuran, or THF, which is more stable at the cathode. Importantly, they found a way to rationalize electrolyte design: Solvents that dominate the first shell around positively charged ions that travel between electrodes are key to anode stability, while “free” or more weakly bonded solvents are important to the stability of the cathode side. “Through this electrolyte engineering work, we were trying to demystify what determines the stability of the anode and cathode separately, and how to present suitable molecules to both electrodes,” says Liu. “Qianli found out that the key factor is the population of solvents in the first solvation shell versus outside, and their location determines their presentation during the battery formation process.”
Computational testing, conducted by collaborator Reid Van Lehn, an associate professor of chemical and biological engineering at UW-Madison, and his student Jung Min Lee, played a significant role in the research as well. They used all-atom molecular dynamics simulations to predict the composition of solvent molecules near sodium ions and determine whether those ions “preferred” one solvent over the other. “Our results indeed found—in good agreement with experiments from the Liu group—that we could identify a single strongly interacting solvent (2-MeTHF) and a weakly interacting solvent (THF),” says Van Lehn. “We further used these calculations to relate this behavior to the relative strength of interactions of each type of solvent, providing molecular-scale insight that can be extended to even more complex mixtures to continue optimizing electrolyte design.”
The research lays the groundwork for the next steps in developing not simply sodium-metal batteries, but also other new alternatives to lithium-ion batteries. “Through this research, we start to understand that the solvent and anion interactions become really important,” says Liu. “We’re trying to expand our solvent library to manipulate these kinds of interactions, to see whether this kind of working principle can be applied to broader solvent libraries and different battery chemistries.”
Scientists in Japan have uncovered unusual quantum behavior in “heavy” electrons within the crystalline compound CeRhSn, which could one day support advances in quantum computing. These electrons appear to carry hundreds of times their normal mass—not due to their intrinsic properties, but because of strong interactions with other particles in the material that slow them down. Unlike typical metals, the electrons in CeRhSn enter a “non-Fermi liquid” state, moving collectively and entangled rather than individually. Remarkably, this state follows a universal energy dissipation rule known as Planckian scaling, linking the behavior to fundamental constants of nature.
n ordinary conductors like copper, electrons scatter in a way that can be calculated with standard physics. But at the edge of magnetism, superconductivity, or other collective phases, those rules break down. According to the researchers, CeRhSn sits right at this edge, making it a prime example of what physicists call “quantum criticality.”
The significance, according to the team, is that quantum critical materials may offer new routes for building quantum technologies. While most current quantum computers use superconducting circuits or trapped ions, heavy-electron compounds could provide an alternative platform where information is stored in the collective motion of electrons.
Dr. Shin-ichi Kimura of The University of Osaka, who led the research, said, “Our findings demonstrate that heavy fermions in this quantum critical state are indeed entangled, and this entanglement is controlled by the Planckian time. This direct observation is a significant step towards understanding the complex interplay between quantum entanglement and heavy fermion behavior.”
To probe CeRhSn, the team grew single crystals of the material in a controlled furnace and then polished them for study. They shined polarized light along different crystal directions and recorded how the electrons responded across a wide range of energies.
The experiments showed a distinct directional difference. In the plane where the cerium atoms form a kagome-like pattern—a triangular lattice with inherent frustration—the electrons followed Planckian scaling below about 80 Kelvin, or -193°C. Along the vertical axis, however, the electrons did not follow the same rule. The researchers interpret this anisotropy, or direction dependence, as evidence that the geometry of the lattice strongly shapes how the electrons behave.
While the findings demonstrate that heavy electrons can follow universal scaling laws, they do not yet provide a recipe for building a quantum computer. According to the study, the scaling behavior appeared only along one direction in the crystal, underscoring the material’s complexity.
The researchers also note that different experimental probes sometimes yield conflicting results. For example, while optical conductivity measurements suggested Planckian behavior, other measurements such as heat capacity report different values. Reconciling these differences will require further experiments.
Quantum computing today is built on platforms that manipulate single quantum states and properly managing entanglement. Although there is work to do, the study points to a different possibility: harnessing the collective entanglement of many strongly interacting electrons. While speculative, the researchers argue that observing Planckian scaling in heavy-electron systems adds weight to this idea.
The researchers suggest that CeRhSn may represent a new class of quantum critical material, distinct from compounds where magnetism dominates. They propose studying other materials with similar lattice structures to see if the same directional scaling appears. Pressure, chemical substitution, or magnetic fields could also be used to test how far the Planckian regime extends.
If the phenomenon proves robust, scientists report they could eventually try to design materials where the collective state of heavy electrons can be stabilized and controlled. Such systems might support qubits that are less sensitive to noise than those in existing technologies.
NASA has tapped a lunar rover built at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, to advance our understanding of water on the moon as it autonomously explores near the lunar south pole. MoonRanger will be among the payloads aboard a 2029 mission to the moon. The rover will carry a neutron spectrometer to study the lunar soil for traces of hydrogen, a good indicator of the presence of water, and demonstrate new levels of autonomous navigation on the moon.
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Researchers at Northwestern University and Tel Aviv University have addressed a key challenge in developing affordable robotic touch by identifying a flaw in the materials used for robotic skin. They discovered that inexpensive silicone rubber composites form insulating layers on their surfaces, which block electrical contact between the sensing polymer and electrodes, leading to inaccurate readings. By eliminating this issue, the team has paved the way for low-cost robotic skins capable of mimicking human touch—enabling robots to detect curves and edges for more precise object handling.
“A lot of scientists misunderstand their sensor response because they lump together the behavior of the contacts with the behavior of the sensor material, resulting in inconsistent data,” Grayson said. “It turns out, if you are not aware of this problem, you can publish papers which no one can reproduce. Our work identifies the exact problem, quantifies its extent both microscopically and electrically, and gives a clear step-by-step trouble-shooting manual to fix the problem.”
The rubber that can be used for typical robotic skin, called an elastomer, is flexible, lightweight and inexpensive, and when electrically conducting fillers like carbon nanotubes are added to the mix, the resulting composite becomes an ideal candidate for a touch sensor, whose resistance changes locally when pressed. But to receive electrical signals, the sensors need to be electrically contacted, and the researchers detected a thin insulating layer ever-present in such composites which could drastically change the behavior of the contacts. Just by sanding down the ultrathin insulation layer, the team was able to achieve a much stronger electrical contact and calibrate the thickness of the insulating layer both electrically and microscopically.
“All interesting things happen at the interface,” said co-author and professor at Tel Aviv University Noa Lachman. “This publication not only shows the importance of sensor interfaces, but also the importance of working at the nexus between two different disciplines: materials science and electrical engineering. Materials experts suspected the presence of this insulating external layer in conductive polymer composites for years but couldn’t understand its electrical effects. Each of us has one piece of the puzzle, but only together can we get the whole picture.”
Robotics in particular can be tricky in part because it requires so many types of expertise. The polymer materials scientist designing the functional electronic material for a robot, for example, does not have the same training and skills as the electrical engineer whose electronics will process the sensor signals. Grayson said the “contact preparation” challenge was precisely where the conversation about this research began.
“That’s why our collaboration with Tel Aviv is essential – they know the materials science that we don’t know,” Grayson said. “We rely on them to prepare the materials we are studying, then we take and study the material before turning around to help the Tel Aviv materials scientists characterize their materials better.”
Producing new materials — and then reproducing them — requires consistency across many different variables that are often difficult or even impossible to control. In exposing the question of reproducibility in much of the literature on touch sensing, Grayson challenges the research community to hold itself to a higher standard with the quality check described in the paper. As awareness of this problem spreads among researchers, new publications can be more rigorously relied upon to advance the field with new capabilities.
For more information: Journal of Advanced Electronic Materials
Constellium, Paris, announced the successful completion of the “ISA3” R&D project, an initiative launched in 2021 to advance lightweight aluminium solutions for automotive applications. Conducted in collaboration with Renault Group, ESI Group, the Institut de Soudure, and the University of Lorraine, the project was supported by a grant from the France Relance investment program. The research focused on developing cost-efficient, recyclable aluminium components to enhance vehicle performance and sustainability.
A key achievement of the project was the development of a lightweight aluminium door in partnership with Renault. Utilizing Constellium’s proprietary uni-alloy 6xxx rolled and extrusion-based solutions, the door design achieved a 14% weight reduction compared to existing aluminium doors used in compact battery electric vehicles. By employing a single alloy series, the project streamlined closed-loop recycling, reducing the door’s overall carbon footprint. This innovation resulted in a 33% reduction in Global Warming Potential (GWP), reinforcing the project’s emphasis on sustainability.
Beyond material advancements, the project also explored more efficient and flexible production processes to enhance performance while optimizing costs. Ludovic Piquier, senior vice president, manufacturing excellence and chief technical officer at Constellium, emphasized that the results highlight the company’s commitment to providing sustainable, high-performance aluminium solutions for the automotive sector.
Patrice Belliard, expert in flat products at Renault Group, noted that the project demonstrated how aluminium can support both weight reduction and cost efficiency in automotive manufacturing. Mathilde Chabin, manufacturing product director at ESI Group, added that the use of advanced pre-certification and validation technologies eliminated the need for physical prototypes, accelerating innovation while reducing costs and environmental impact.
The completion of Project ISA3 underscores the potential of aluminium to contribute to the automotive industry’s decarbonization efforts while delivering economic and environmental benefits.
A research team led by Professors Zhiqin Chu and Yuan Lin at the University of Hong Kong, in collaboration with Professors Kwai Hei Li and Qi Wang, has developed a groundbreaking method for producing ultrathin and ultra-flexible diamond membranes. These membranes are compatible with current semiconductor manufacturing processes, allowing their integration into various applications, including electronic, photonic, mechanical, acoustic, and quantum devices.
The team’s innovative edge-exposed exfoliation method allows for the rapid, scalable production of free-standing diamond membranes. This technique surpasses traditional methods, which are typically expensive, time-consuming, and limited in size. Notably, the new process can produce a two-inch diamond wafer in just 10 seconds, setting a new benchmark for efficiency and scalability in the field.
These ultra-flat diamond surfaces, essential for high-precision micromanufacturing, along with the flexibility of the membranes, open up new possibilities for next-generation flexible and wearable electronic and photonic devices. The research team envisions significant industrial applications in electronics, photonics, mechanics, thermics, acoustics, and quantum technologies.
“We hope to promote the usage of the high-figure-of-merit diamond membrane in various fields, and to commercialize this cutting-edge technology and deliver premium diamond membranes, setting a new standard in the semiconductor industry. We are eager to collaborate with academic and industry partners to bring this revolutionary product to market and accelerate the arrival of the diamond era,” concluded Professor Chu.
Diamonds, renowned globally as valuable gemstones, possess exceptional versatility in various scientific and engineering applications. They are the hardest natural material, boasting unparalleled thermal conductivity at room temperature, extremely high carrier mobility, dielectric breakdown strength, an ultrawide bandgap, and optical transparency spanning from the infrared to the deep-ultraviolet spectrum. These remarkable properties make diamonds ideal for fabricating advanced high-power, high-frequency electronic devices, photonic devices, and heat spreaders to cool high-power-density electronic components, such as those in processors, semiconductor lasers, and electric vehicles. However, the inert nature and rigid crystal structure of diamonds pose significant challenges in fabrication and mass production, particularly for ultrathin and freestanding diamond membranes, thereby restricting their widespread usage.
For more information: Nature
Researchers at the US Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in Tennessee are leveraging advanced manufacturing techniques, such as Hot Isostatic Pressing (HIP) Powder Metallurgy and Additive Manufacturing, to produce parts weighing over 4,500 kg. ORNL highlights the urgent need for these large-scale components across various sectors, including aerospace, defense, nuclear, oil, gas, renewables, and construction. This demand is particularly pressing in the US, where traditional manufacturing methods like casting and forging have declined and moved overseas, leading to supply-chain shortages.
Senior research scientists Jason Mayeur and Soumya Nag are hoping to add Wire Arc Additive Manufacturing (WAAM), hybrid manufacturing, in-situ monitoring and advanced computational modeling to HIP technology to create molds faster and more accurately whilst leveraging the PM technology American manufacturers may be more acquainted with.
“PM-HIP is a vital pathway for diversifying the supply chain for producing large-scale metal parts that are becoming more difficult to source via conventional means,” Mayeur explained. “The technology is of particular interest to the nuclear and hydroelectric industrial sectors, as well as the Department of Defense.”
In contrast with traditional casting and forging techniques, PM-HIP involves fabricating pre-formed, hollow molds for each large-scale component and filling them with metal powder. Once the additively manufactured mold (aka a ‘can’ or ‘capsule’) receives an initial seal, any gas remaining inside is pumped out. Then, a more permanent hermetic seal is applied.
At this point, the capsule is heated and pressurized in prescribed cycles within a Hot Isostatic Press (essentially a pressurized furnace). Without melting, these cycles facilitate the consolidation of the metal powder into the required shape in a process exchange of heat and pressure known as solid-state bonding. When bonding is complete, acid leaching or machining is used to remove the exterior can, revealing the intended part.
Jason Mayeur works in the Deposition Science and Technology Group at ORNL, where he applies his knowledge in computational solid mechanics to manufacturing challenges. His two-decade research career began with the use of computational models to understand the relationships between materials microstructure and performance. He has since segued into the analysis of the structural material performance of metals and alloys.
In this arena, Mayeur develops theory, writes code to implement his theories, and then performs simulations of solids under various loading conditions to determine their suitability for use in a variety of applications. In short, Mayeur’s code can be used to improve the PM-HIP process, thus making it a more attractive alternative to traditional casting and forging.
Soumya Nag, Mayeur’s colleague at ORNL, works in the Materials Science and Technology Division, applying his own two decades of research experience in materials and manufacturing. Nag is a metallurgist with expertise in evaluating lightweight, high-temperature structural alloys fabricated via conventional and advanced manufacturing techniques.
“Jason is an expert in predictive modeling of deformation characteristics of Hot Isostatic Pressing canisters. I am more involved in the experimental side of things. Jason and I complement each other, and really, our two efforts are very much intertwined and critical toward the overall success of the task,” Nag said.
Nag’s research centers on the processing and materials science of HIP capsule fabrication, using various additive manufacturing techniques and assessing the quality of the resulting component parts.
“Additive Manufacturing offers unique design flexibility, which, combined with the reliability of PM-HIP, can pave the path toward precise manufacturing of large-scale, custom and complex, energy-related parts while also taking advantage of multi-material builds,” he explained.
Nag collaborates with Mayeur to design and perform experiments that characterize the metal powder material’s behavior and its mechanical properties in pursuit of a better, more accurate build while providing the necessary material property inputs for Mayeur’s computational models.
Mayeur’s work targets many technological challenges posed by the PM-HIP process, striving for quality and consistency in geometry to achieve dimensional accuracy at a very large scale. One challenge is shrinkage. During PM-HIP, the volume of metal powder within the can shrinks by approximately 30%, but not uniformly.
To address these inconsistencies, Mayeur’s computational models work to predict how the shrinkage occurs for different part geometries and capsule designs. This is an iterative process that occurs after initial capsule design, using the simulation results as a guide to modify the final design.
For more information: Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL)
Image: This additively manufactured PM-HIP will be used to create an impeller for a hydropower impeller, demonstrating a new approach for creating large-scale clean energy components. (Courtesy Carlos Jones/ORNL, US DoE)
After 12 years as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Thermal Spray Technology, Dr. Christian Moreau has transferred his responsibilities to Dr. Armelle Vardelle, who has been Lead Editor since 2013; she will be succeeded as Lead Editor by Dr. André McDonald.
Continue readingAn article by one of the leading authorities on titanium brazing – vetted and accepted for publication in the peer-reviewed ASM Handbook, Volume 6, Welding, Brazing, and Soldering – is now available online in digital form. “Brazing of Conventional Titanium Alloys,” a comprehensive, fact-filled survey by industry expert Alexander E. Shapiro, Ph.D., Titanium Brazing Inc., offers in-depth analysis and practical advice on how to braze commercially pure and alloyed titanium with itself as well as with other materials such as copper, stainless steel, carbon steel, ceramics, graphite, and titanium aluminide.
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The December issue of Metallography, Microstructure, and Analysis features the classic article, “Grain Shapes and Other Metallurgical Applications of Topology” by Cyril Stanley Smith.
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Liebherr-Aerospace Saline, Inc., Saline, Mich., has celebrated the groundbreaking of a new 33,000 ft² building at its Michigan campus, set to enhance testing, repair, overhaul, and reconditioning capacities for its OEM heat transfer equipment, with operations expected to commence in late 2025.
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NEOTech, Chatsworth, Calif., a leading provider of electronic manufacturing services, design engineering, and supply chain solutions in the high-tech industrial, medical device, and aerospace/defense markets, announced a significant investment in and acquisition of state-of-the-art three-dimensional Computed Tomography scan equipment for its engineering laboratory.
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In the iconic sci-fi saga Dune, the inhabitants of the parched world of Arrakis don unique garments known as stillsuits to reclaim their body’s water. Drawing inspiration from this concept, engineers have developed an innovative prototype spacesuit that transforms astronauts’ urine into potable water.
Presently, astronauts don a maximum absorbency garment, akin to a sophisticated diaper with layers of super-absorbent polymers, to manage bodily waste while in their spacesuits. This solution, however, has been criticized for discomfort, leakage, and the potential to cause urinary tract infections.
“I’ve been a fan of the Dune series for as long as I can remember,” says Sofia Etlin, a space medicine and policy researcher at Cornell University. “Building a real life stillsuit was always a bit of a dream.”
Current spacesuit designs also incorporate an in-suit drinking bag, or IDB, that carries less than a liter of water. Astronauts can sometimes go for eight- to 12-hour spacewalks, which often includes enormous amounts of physical exertion, Etlin says. NASA’s future Artemis missions on the moon will probably see explorers spending at least as much time or longer on the lunar surface, though current plans have them carrying IDBs of the same size, she says.
Etlin and her colleagues designed and built a new type of undergarment with a collection cup that goes over an astronaut’s private parts. Urine is routed into a filtration system that first removes salty water from the urine and then uses a pump to take the salt out from that water. The filtered water is enriched with electrolytes and then sent into the IDB.
A fictional Fremen’s stillsuit is powered by body movement, but astronauts will have to carry a 20.5-volt battery as part of this new design. The total system, including pumps, sensors and display screen, weighs around 8 kilograms and can purify half a liter of water in five minutes.
Sweat — which fictional stillsuits also collect — would be easier to filter than urine, Etlin says. But she and her colleagues decided to focus on a single waste product for their first prototype. “One step at a time,” she says.
The team hopes to further test its system during simulated moon and Mars missions here on Earth and eventually during real spacewalks.
It “would be amazing for us,” says Julio Rezende of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte in Natal, Brazil, who leads Habitat Marte, a Mars analog mission in Brazil. “I believe this technology would bring a lot of benefits.”
Rezende sees potential terrestrial spin-offs, too, such as a similar system that could be used for firefighters combating forest fires or hikers on long trails.
For more information: Frontiers in Space Technology
Image: The new spacesuit design (illustrated) that collects urine and recycles it into drinking water weighs around 8 kilograms and can purify half a liter of water in five minutes. FREMAN SPACE TEAM (ILLUSTRATION), NASA
Liebherr-Aerospace Lindenberg GmbH, Germany, has started operations in its new center of excellence where it will develop and implement more sustainable surface treatment technologies of the future.
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