Minnesota iron ore could be key to sustainable and lower-cost semiconductor

Researchers at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities have, for the first time, demonstrated that Minnesota’s abundant low-grade iron ore can be converted into semiconductor-quality pyrite, also known as iron sulfide or “fool’s gold.” The breakthrough could open the door to more cost-effective and sustainable electronic devices by transforming a widely available natural resource into a valuable semiconductor material. Because pyrite is inexpensive, non-toxic and highly effective at absorbing light, it has significant potential for future technologies, and this research shows that Minnesota’s iron ore resources may provide a viable pathway for producing high-quality semiconductor materials despite the challenges posed by impurities and defects.

Rice researchers unlock new way to manufacture diamond composites, reveal dramatic response to impact

Rice University researchers have developed a method to keep diamond stable during high-temperature, low-pressure processing, enabling the creation of a durable bulk composite material. Their research also revealed that high-speed impacts can quickly transform diamond into graphite, providing new insight into how diamond absorbs energy and changes under extreme stress. Because diamond combines exceptional hardness with high thermal conductivity, these findings could help scientists design stronger, more resilient materials for aerospace, defense and other high-performance applications.

Small diamond particles are relatively inexpensive and easy to produce, but turning them into larger diamond structures has proved difficult, Ajayan said.

One way to join those particles into a larger structure is through sintering, a process that uses heat and pressure to form a solid. With diamond, however, the high temperatures can turn it into graphite. High-pressure, high-temperature methods can produce polycrystalline diamond, but they require extreme pressure and limit the size of the samples produced.

To keep diamond stable during processing, the researchers mixed microscopic diamond grains with cubic boron nitride, a material with properties similar to diamond, and cobalt to bind and stabilize the mixture.

They used spark plasma sintering, a rapid process that applies heat and pressure to turn powders into a solid. The process produced an extremely strong composite with diamond particles embedded in the boron nitride matrix and cobalt distributed throughout.

“The composite made by this process is almost nonmachinable and tough due to the presence of dispersed diamond particles and could help researchers design tougher materials for aerospace, defense and other technologies that face extreme conditions,” said Abhijit Biswas, first author and research scientist in Rice’s materials science and nanoengineering department.

The researchers then subjected the composite to high-speed collisions to study how it behaved under extreme force.

Researchers fired tiny metal projectiles measuring 1-4 millimeters across at the composite at hypersonic speeds, and the material held together when struck by one of the projectiles traveling at more than seven times the speed of sound. A larger projectile traveling even faster caused the composite to break apart.

During the collision, nearly all the diamonds involved in the transformation became graphite within microseconds.

Diamond and graphite are both made of carbon, but their atoms are arranged differently. That difference makes diamond hard and graphite much softer.

“We found that extreme impact can drive diamond to graphite within microseconds, rather than through the slower heat-driven process we normally associate with this transformation,” Biswas said. “That gives us a new view of how diamonds behave under some of the most demanding mechanical conditions.”

The researchers examined the fractured composite and used molecular dynamics simulations, computer models that track how atoms move and rearrange. Their analysis revealed areas where diamond and graphite met, providing clues to how the transformation occurred.

The study attributes the change to energy from the shock and structural rearrangements that turn diamond into graphite.

The researchers also found that the conversion to graphite helped absorb some of the energy from the collision as the diamond’s atomic structure changed.

The findings offer a closer look at how internal transformations can help toughen materials under severe conditions.

“Understanding how materials change their structure and phase under force, along with their strength and hardness, could help guide the design of future protective materials,” Biswas said.

For more information: Materials Today

Image: Pulickel Ajayan, left, and Abhijit Biswas, right. Photo by Jorge Vidal.

Beyond silicon: Modeling the materials behind the future of electronics

As technology advances beyond traditional silicon-based electronics, organic semiconductors are emerging as a key material for innovations such as wearable sensors, implantable devices and foldable screens. Toulik Maitra, a Ph.D. student in chemical engineering at the University of California, Davis, is helping advance this field through computational modeling that explores how these materials behave at the molecular level. His research recently expanded through a collaboration with Germany’s Max Planck Institute, a world-renowned leader in polymer and organic electronics research, bringing the future of flexible and next-generation electronics one step closer to reality.

Silicon is an excellent semiconductor, capable of switching between conducting and blocking electricity. However, silicon atoms are locked together by covalent bonds, making them strong but also rigid. 

Organic semiconductors, on the other hand, are carbon-based materials that can perform the same electronic functions as silicon but are more flexible because their molecules are held together by weak attractions called van der Waals forces. 

“It’s the same force that lets a gecko stick to a smooth wall without any glue,” Maitra says. 

That flexibility also makes the materials much more difficult to model accurately.

“Due to van der Waals forces, at room temperature, the molecules vibrate, causing each electron cloud to shift in response to its neighbors, or polarization,” Maitra said. “It has a large effect on how charges move through the material and interact with light.” 

Capturing this behavior accurately in computer simulations is difficult, slowing the design of new organic semiconductor materials. Maitra’s goal is to computationally model the molecular behavior to design better materials before anyone steps into a lab. 

During a six-month appointment as a visiting fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research in Mainz, Germany, Maitra and his collaborators set out to capture how shifts in polarization affect charge transport and light interactions. 

The international team developed a new computational framework that predicts how individual atoms respond to their molecular surroundings, enabling simulations to more accurately reflect the behavior of organic semiconductors in the real world.

The framework accounts for the unique environment surrounding each atom. It has proven more accurate than conventional methods, which assign the same electronic properties to broad categories of atoms. 

It also accurately models molecules in their neutral, charged and excited states — the same conditions they experience inside a working electronic device. When combined with machine learning, the framework can quickly predict these properties for new molecules, enabling researchers to identify promising materials before synthesizing them in the laboratory.

Maitra is already applying these improved modeling techniques to his doctoral research in the laboratory of Adam Moulé, professor of chemical engineering at UC Davis. There, he studies organic semiconductor materials for organic light-emitting diodes, or OLEDs, with a particular focus on thermally activated delayed fluorescence, or TADF, emitters and high-mobility molecules.

Currently, the highest-efficiency OLED displays often rely on rare metals such as iridium and platinum to produce bright, energy-efficient light. TADF materials offer a promising alternative, achieving similar performance with entirely organic molecules. 

By more accurately predicting how those molecules will behave before they are synthesized, Maitra hopes to help researchers accelerate the search for efficient OLED materials that reduce dependence on expensive, rare-earth materials.

“I am always excited to move the field forward,” Maitra said. “If this method works, then the next thing you want to model — device performance or vibration analysis — can be done in a better way.”

Maitra will be able to continue his collaboration with the Max Planck Institute at UC Davis in the Moulé Lab thanks to a UC Davis Dissertation Fellowship, which is awarded by UC Davis Graduate Studies to support a Ph.D. student for a year toward the end of their academic career.  

The fellowship gives Maitra the time to focus on publishing his research, completing his dissertation and preparing for a career advancing organic semiconductor technologies.

“I believe in this field,” Maitra said. “Working with organic semiconductors will make a better future.”

Northeast Ohio lands massive $160M federal award to transform the region’s manufacturing future

Northeast Ohio has been selected as one of 12 National Science Foundation Regional Innovation Engines, making the region eligible for up to $160 million in funding over the next decade to advance manufacturing through materials research, artificial intelligence and workforce development. Led by Case Western Reserve University, the NEO-SMART coalition includes more than 70 partners from industry, academia, philanthropy and government and emerged from a highly competitive national process involving hundreds of proposals. ASM International is proud to be a partner in the NEO-SMART coalition.

The federal investment over 10 years will be subject to meeting performance milestones along the way. It begins with $7.5 million in each of the first two years, followed by $15 million annually for three years and $20 million annually during the final five years.

Partners have committed another $120 million during the first two years of the effort and hope to attract more than $500 million in combined public, private and philanthropic investment.

“This is great news for Northeast Ohio and for the entire state of Ohio,” Gov. Mike DeWine said in a statement accompanying the announcement.

“When federal dollars come to our state to strengthen manufacturing and build up our workforce, every Ohioan benefits. And I am grateful for the extensive partnership effort that made this award possible.”

The initiative, known as NEO-SMART — Northeast Ohio Strengthening Manufacturing for American Resilience through Technology — aims to capitalize on the region’s strengths in metals, polymers, chemicals and coatings.

Organizers envision Northeast Ohio becoming a national hub for advanced manufacturing by accelerating research discoveries from laboratories into commercial products while training workers needed to support that growth.

Julie Edgar, Lubrizol’s chief technology officer and a NEO-SMART governing board member, said Northeast Ohio’s concentration of technical talent gives companies an advantage in global competition.

“We compete globally every day, and the depth of technical and scientific talent in this region helps us continue to compete and grow,” Edgar said. “We must actively develop the next generation of chemists, engineers and advanced manufacturing technicians. This funding creates the opportunity to do that at scale.”

Among the coalition’s goals over the next decade are creating or retaining 20,000 jobs across an 18-county region, training 12,000 workers for advanced manufacturing careers, increasing corporate research and development by 50%, supporting 150 research and development projects, helping launch 1,000 new ventures and providing more than 250 seed investments for startup companies.

The effort also seeks to strengthen domestic supply chains serving multiple industries, including automotive, aerospace, defense and medical devices.

“The manufacturing challenges of the next decade will be solved by academic researchers, industry partners and factory floor teams who work in collaboration to turn scientific insight into commercial reality,” Case Western Reserve University President Eric Kaler said.

“Together, we will advance the region’s growth and prosperity.”

The National Science Foundation established its Regional Innovation Engines program in 2022 to strengthen American competitiveness of technologies considered critical to the nation’s economic and national security interests.

This is the second round of awards.

From an original pool of 71 applicants, NEO-SMART was named one of 29 semifinalists last July before advancing in September to the final round of 15.

A seven-member Science Foundation team visited Cleveland in January for presentations and breakout sessions with about 100 leaders, including executives from Sherwin-Williams and Lubrizol, the mayors of Akron and Cleveland, and Gov. DeWine.

The NEO-SMART coalition grew on the premise that Northeast Ohio already possesses many of the ingredients needed for an advanced manufacturing ecosystem, including major industrial employers, research universities, community colleges and specialized expertise in materials science.

Image: Johnny Vanderford, program coordinator in Mechatronics at Lorain County Community College, shows a microscopic image of a semiconductor. 

New insights could help improve quality of 3D-printed aluminium components

Researchers at The University of Manchester found that small temperature variations during molten metal deposition, a metal 3D-printing process, can have a significant impact on the quality of aluminum components. The study showed that carefully controlling thermal conditions during printing can reduce microscopic defects and improve the material’s grain structure, helping produce stronger, higher-quality parts while maintaining the process’s potential for lower energy use and more efficient manufacturing of complex components.

Dr Fan Wu and Dr Wajira Mirihanage, co-authors from the Department of Materials at The University of Manchester said: “Understanding how processing conditions affect the internal structure of a printed component is essential if additive manufacturing technologies are to be used more widely in demanding industrial applications. Our study shows that relatively small adjustments in manufacturing temperatures can have a major impact on defect formation and microstructural development.”

Metal additive manufacturing is attracting increasing attention because it can create complex geometries while reducing material waste. However, many existing techniques involve extremely rapid heating and cooling, which can introduce defects, residual stresses and distortions into the finished part. MMD offers a different approach by depositing aluminium that has already been melted, reducing the intensity of thermal cycling experienced during manufacture.

To understand how the process influences material quality, the team produced aluminium alloy samples using different nozzle and substrate temperatures. They then used advanced microscopy techniques to investigate grain structure, crystallographic orientation and the distribution of microscopic pores inside the printed components. Mechanical testing was also carried out to assess performance.

The researchers found that higher nozzle and substrate temperatures slowed cooling during printing. This led to larger grain structures and increased levels of porosity, tiny voids within the material that can affect performance. In contrast, lower processing temperatures promoted faster cooling, resulting in finer grain structures and fewer defects.

The study also revealed that defect levels and grain size generally decreased as printing progressed through successive layers of a component. This suggests that thermal conditions evolve throughout the build process, influencing how the material solidifies over time. The team identified a strong relationship between grain size and porosity, providing valuable insight into how manufacturing parameters shape material quality.

Despite the presence of some defects, the mechanical properties of the printed components were found to be comparable with those achieved using conventional manufacturing routes. The researchers reported hardness and elastic modulus values that fall within the expected range for aluminium alloy 4043, highlighting the practical potential of the technology.

Dr Fan Wu and Dr Wajira Mirihanage added: “Molten metal deposition is still a relatively new manufacturing technology, and there is currently limited understanding of how processing conditions affect the final material. By establishing clear links between processing parameters, microstructure and defect formation, this work provides a foundation for optimising future manufacturing strategies and improving the reliability of aluminium components produced using MMD.”

The researchers believe the findings will help accelerate the development of molten metal deposition for industrial applications where component quality, consistency and efficiency are critical.

MMD has been developed by ValCUN BV, a Belgium based manufacturer focused on developing deployable and affordable metal additive manufacturing.

For more information: Materials & Design

Image: Visualization of the EBSD scan region on the 2D model. Credit: Dr Fan Wu and Dr Wajira Mirihanage, co-authors from the Department of Materials at The University of Manchester

ProtoFund Powered: Students design fast, efficient system to research new materials

Colorado School of Mines students Austin Arvidson and his team developed the Floating Ultrasonic Synthesis Environment, or FUSE, a system that uses acoustic levitation, or sound waves, to suspend materials in a contact-free environment during synthesis. Designed to accelerate the development of new materials while reducing contamination and errors, the project was supported by the Labriola InnoHub E&I Prototyping Fund, which provides funding, mentorship and resources to help students turn innovative ideas into working prototypes.

“If you look up acoustic levitation, or a lot of stuff similar to what we’re trying to do, there’s really not a whole lot of other scientific literature on it, especially in materials science. There’s sort of that aspect of, I don’t know a whole lot, but also it seems like science also doesn’t know a whole lot,” said Austin Arvidson. “It forces you to learn. You could give up, but why don’t you learn something new?”

Arvidson and his co-inventor, John-Austin Little, met while working together on a vertically-integrated research project focused on studying quantum materials. Their concept is novel: An open-sided container about the size of a 3D printer that could be used as a contactless way to synthesize materials. Instead of using an ampoule or another standard container — which runs the risk of having the samples react with the container material — the open-concept system reduces the risk of contamination. One of the biggest advantages to FUSE is speed. Materials synthesis is a common lab practice, but it usually involves multiple people and a lot of time. FUSE could produce the same results, much faster. Little estimates that one FUSE system could process up to 40 samples a day; when using standard lab practices, the same number of samples could take a fully staffed lab about a week.

All year, Little and Arvidson have been working on their prototype, refining the system and testing it with different materials. Their academic backgrounds are nicely complementary for this project – Little is majoring in engineering physics and Arvidson in metallurgical and materials engineering. And while Little understands how the physics of their system supports material synthesis, Arvidson understands materials and the electronics of the system and works on that aspect.

“We always joke that he’s an MME trying to be a physicist and I’m a physicist trying to be an MME. But it does really make for an awesome team,” Little said.

Both admit they’re not experts on acoustic levitation, but figuring out the challenges of the unknown has been fulfilling. Possibly being the researchers to break new ground is an exciting prospect.

“We’re doing old school science, which means we actually have to discover something by just sort of thinking about it and then messing around and seeing how it goes. It’s fun,” Little said.

What kind of materials would work best in FUSE? Little said anything that requires a heating process can be synthesized in FUSE.

“Really anything in any industry that requires some novel material, whether it’s the computer chips in your laptop and the metal in your car, all of those are sort of open playing fields,” Little said. “Anything that we can either melt or heat and get something useful out is a potential candidate for the system.”

Aerospace is a prime example. Alloys used in that industry need to withstand extreme amounts of heat because of the high temperatures jet fuel can reach. FUSE could be used to combine different materials to create custom alloys that work well under extreme heat without expanding or contracting. Little said he could also see the system being used in the energy industry, creating nuclear fuels or battery materials. The list of possibilities is long.

“No one has really been able to float anywhere near as much weight as we’re theorizing that we can with our models and simulations. They’ve all just been much smaller amounts, like a little small drop of water, or other things like that,” Arvidson said. “How you scale this up to float more mass is still an unanswered question,” Arvidson said.

Little and Arvidson still have time to work on the project while at Mines – both are about to complete their first year of undergraduate studies. They plan on continuing to study acoustic levitation and work further on getting scales they created for FUSE into a standalone product, while also refining and iterating the FUSE system.

Because of the ProtoFund and other E&I resources and support at Mines, they’re off to a strong start. Check-ins with ProtoFund mentors have helped them consider possible uses for FUSE they hadn’t before. The McNeil Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation provided advice on the business aspect of their project and arranged for Little and Arvidson to present their ideas to Mines President Paul C. Johnson and Provost Stefanie Tompkins, as well as other experts.

“It would be impossible to do this without the resources provided by the ProtoFund and the Labriola Innovation Hub,” Little said. “Pull yourself up by your bootstraps is fine, but someone has to show you the bootstrap, and a lot of people have been helping us find those bootstraps. Otherwise, hours and hours of hard work really would just be us banging our head on the wall, and there wouldn’t be all of the eureka moments and the progress.”

For more information: Labriola InnoHub E&I Prototyping Fund

Image: John-Austin Little, left, and Austin Arvidson work on FUSE, a system they created that uses acoustic levitation to synthesize materials.

New method scales up twist-engineered oxide materials for future electronics

Researchers have expanded the field of twistronics by developing a method to manufacture oxide twistronic materials at much larger scales while precisely controlling the twist angles between layered materials. Twistronics focuses on how the alignment of two-dimensional materials influences their structural and electronic properties, and this new technique could help advance research and practical applications by making these materials easier to produce and study.

From weak forces to oxides

“The field of twistronics was developed using 2D materials that are bonded by weak van der Waals forces,” says Ruijuan Xu, corresponding author of a paper on the work and an assistant professor of materials science and engineering at North Carolina State University. “Our work here demonstrates it is possible to use layers of oxide materials that are connected by strong chemical bonds—while precisely controlling the twist angle between crystalline oxide membranes.

“The strong interlayer bonding we found between oxide layers suggests there may be entirely new interfacial phenomena to explore,” adds Xu. “We’ve demonstrated the ability to control many of the materials’ characteristics—including phase structure and domain configuration—in ways that offer new routes for designing materials and devices tailored to specific applications.”

Building large-area twisted membranes

For this work, the researchers synthesized crystalline sodium niobate (NaNbO3) membranes and used photolithography to create a set of visual markers along the perimeter of each membrane. One NaNbO3 membrane was then lifted and placed on top of another NaNbO3 membrane. The researchers monitored the alignment of the visual markers during assembly to precisely control the relative twist angle between the two layers. Once they established the desired angle, they performed a material-specific annealing process to establish strong chemical bonding between the layers.

“Scale matters for devices,” says Xu. “Because these crystalline membranes can be fabricated over large areas and transferred onto different supports, this approach provides a practical path toward twist-engineered oxide electronics.”

Atomic distortions at the interface

The researchers also used synchrotron X-ray diffraction techniques to capture what is happening at the interface between the two layers.

“We found that the bonds between the two layers are so strong that they are distorting the atomic structure of the material—creating a gradual rotation of the atomic lattice at the interface between the layers,” says Xu. “We also found changes to the phase structure of the material. It remains to be seen how this will affect material properties, but that’s something we are exploring.”

Extending the method beyond sodium niobate

The researchers note that while this work was done using NaNbO3 as a model, the technique could be extended to other complex oxides.

“Our work demonstrates a technique for creating large-area oxide twistronic materials with controlled twist angles and a strong chemical bond between layers,” says Xu. “It’s an exciting time for oxide twistronics, with new opportunities to engineer complex oxide functionalities through twist.”

For more information: ACS Nano

New state-of-the-art facility provides access to advanced materials, manufacturing tools

A new facility at Arizona State University’s Tempe campus will give researchers and corporate partners access to a wide range of advanced materials and manufacturing tools, supporting work with cutting-edge technologies. The Biodesign Institute marked the opening with a ribbon-cutting ceremony and facility tours earlier this month.

Managed by the Biodesign Center for Sustainable Macromolecular Materials and Manufacturing, or SM3, the facility houses tools that support research such as scanning electron microscopy, thermal analysis, light scattering, mechanical testing, gas permeability measurements, water uptake analysis and rheological testing to better understand and optimize material performance.

The lab also features cutting-edge additive manufacturing technologies, ranging from extrusion-based systems to light-driven 3D printers.

Among its most notable additions is the Cubicure Caligma printer, the first system of its kind in the United States capable of integrating extrusion and light-based printing at the micron scale, opening new possibilities for precision manufacturing and materials development.

The new laboratory represents the transformation of the former ASU Biodesign Clinical Testing Lab — best known as the site of the university’s large-scale COVID-19 saliva testing operations — into a state-of-the-art research hub dedicated to advancing sustainable materials innovation.

The facility is already serving a growing community of researchers, with approximately 60 faculty members, students and staff from across ASU utilizing the space and its resources.

By bringing together expertise in materials science, engineering, chemistry and manufacturing, the center aims to accelerate the development of sustainable products and technologies while strengthening Arizona’s innovation ecosystem.

During the ceremony, attendees heard from Biodesign leaders and industry partners about the importance of investing in shared research infrastructure that can support both fundamental discovery and commercial translation.

“We’re focused on sustainability,” said Tim Long, director of the Biodesign Center for Sustainable Macromolecular Materials and Manufacturing. “And these days what does that mean? That means resiliency. It means supply chain. It means using our resources more effectively. It means being more competitive as a nation, more competitive with our companies and more effectively educating our students, the future generation, the future workforce.”

The new laboratory is also expected to serve as a catalyst for expanded partnerships with leading instrument manufacturers and private industry, helping drive Arizona-based product innovation and workforce development.

Industry representatives participating in the event highlighted the value of collaborative research environments that connect academic expertise with real-world challenges.

“What this expansion does in practice is reduce friction,” said Jeff Addy, an ASU alumnus and research and development manager from Cargill Bioindustrial. “It means you can move from an idea to real data faster, ask better questions and iterate more quickly. That changes the kind of work you can do, not just how fast you can do it.”

Following the ribbon cutting, guests toured the laboratory and explored the technologies that will support the next generation of sustainable materials research and manufacturing at ASU.

For more information: Biodesign Center for Sustainable Macromolecular Materials and Manufacturing

Image: Industry collaborators tour the Biodesign Institute’s new shared manufacturing lab managed by the Center for Sustainable Macromolecular Materials and Manufacturing on Tuesday, June 9. The facility provides access to advanced tools that support electron microscopy, thermal analysis, light scattering, mechanical testing, gas permeability, water uptake, rheology and 3D printing. Photo by Charlie Leight/ASU News

Designing matter at the nanoscale

Toni Taylor, a Los Alamos National Laboratory fellow and physicist, recalls that early terahertz research was hindered by the lack of modulators—devices that control light’s amplitude, phase or frequency—making it difficult for this promising band to reliably carry information for communications and medical applications. Situated between microwaves and infrared light, the terahertz range is too fast for conventional electronics and too slow for traditional optics, leaving it largely unmastered compared with other parts of the electromagnetic spectrum that drove advances such as radar and photonics. Because terahertz waves pass through typical modulator materials with little absorption or reflection, scientists have had limited ability to control them, creating what is known as the “terahertz gap” and leaving significant technological potential untapped.

Terahertz waves oscillate trillions of times per second, hundreds of times faster than the microwave-frequency systems used in today’s wireless networks. In principle, that behavior means they could carry vastly more information than today’s fastest consumer networks. But communications is only part of the appeal. Like x-rays, terahertz radiation can penetrate many nonmetallic materials, but unlike x-rays, it doesn’t ionize atoms, meaning it doesn’t change the materials’ structure. In theory, that makes terahertz radiation well-suited to nondestructive probing of delicate materials, from biological tissue to concealed explosives. “There just weren’t good photonics devices there,” Taylor says. “At the time, neither naturally occurring materials nor manmade alloys interacted strongly enough in that band to control it.”

By the early 2000s, when Taylor and coworkers began working in the terahertz band, the computer revolution had pushed technology to an inflection point. Moore’s Law was still busy shrinking transistors, but devices had reached dimensions small enough that quantum effects shaped performance. Advances could no longer come from simply making components smaller. To keep accelerating computation, materials had to be designed down to the level of their very atoms.

For the first time, nanoscale engineering, working at dimensions of billionths of a meter, where materials behave in fundamentally new ways, was becoming practical. Long before nano products were built, scientists could model them on supercomputers that predicted how electrons and electromagnetic waves would behave in such tiny structures. Cleanroom fabrication techniques refined by the microelectronics industry were building structures smaller than one hundred nanometers with remarkable precision, while scanning tunneling microscopes and atomic force microscopes made it possible not only to image the placements of individual atoms but, in some cases, to nudge them deliberately into place.

All of these technological factors, plus the promise of the capabilities they enabled, led the Department of Energy’s Office of Science to create the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies, a centerpiece facility among a national network of nanoscale research centers. Opened in 2004 and jointly operated by Los Alamos and Sandia national laboratories, CINT was built as a user facility, a place where scientists from around the world could propose ideas and gain access to specialized tools and expertise. Housed within this tightly integrated environment, researchers could move from theory to synthesis to fabrication to characterization—all at the nanoscale.

For researchers like Taylor, CINT turned the terahertz gap from an abstract limitation into an engineering problem. “All of the tools needed to develop the modulators were at CINT,” Taylor says. Her team’s work on the project began in earnest in 2006, when a postdoctoral researcher named Willie Padilla arrived at Los Alamos with expertise in metamaterials: artificially structured surfaces engineered to manipulate electromagnetic waves in ways natural materials cannot.

The way a material traditionally absorbs or reflects light is dictated by its atomic composition—the electronic transitions and vibrational modes built into its chemistry.  Padilla’s insight was that they no longer had to rely on the electronic structure of naturally occurring materials to support a resonance at terahertz frequencies. They could engineer a material instead.

Using CINT’s modeling tools, he and his collaborators designed metallic patterns sized to resonate at terahertz frequencies: tiny, repeating loops and gaps etched into a thin film of gold. When a terahertz wave struck the patterned surface, its oscillating electric field drove the metal’s free electrons back and forth. If the geometry was right—if the loops and gaps were sized precisely for that frequency—the electrons would move in sync with the incoming wave. The energy in the terahertz waves that would otherwise have passed quietly through the material was briefly captured, scattered, or absorbed. Like radio antennas tuned to a single station, the gold resonators responded strongly only at the frequency dictated by their shape.

But this was still a passive response, like a filter or detector. The resonator device could isolate or suppress an individual frequency, but couldn’t change that frequency in real time. Without time-dependent control, it wasn’t yet useful for information transmission. To do that, Padilla, along with his coworkers Hou-Tong Chen, Richard Averitt, and Taylor had to find a way to modulate the signal itself.

The solution lay in setting the patterned metal resonator atop a semiconductor substrate. By injecting charge into that substrate—electrically or with an ultrafast optical pulse—the team temporarily increased its conductivity. That shift altered how freely the electrons in the resonators could oscillate. When the substrate became more conductive, the oscillations dissipated energy more quickly and the response weakened; when it was less conductive, the resonance sharpened. In practical terms, a static surface had become a controllable gate. A region of the spectrum long considered technologically awkward could now be modulated in real time. The work culminated in a 2006 paper demonstrating active control of terahertz radiation.

What followed was not just a device, but a new way of thinking about matter: that it could be modified at the nanoscale to realize ideas once confined to theory. Taylor’s group went on to pursue higher-speed modulators, tunable filters, polarization rotators, and broadband converters. They extended the same nanoscale design principles to problems across national security and optical communications. More recently, collaborators demonstrated structures that can generate and steer terahertz radiation with unprecedented control. That approach has contributed to advances in security imaging seen at airports, materials diagnostics, and next-generation wireless research. Recent experimental terahertz systems achieved data rates exceeding 100 gigabits per second, far beyond typical consumer wireless speeds.

Terahertz modulation is only one expression of CINT’s broader vision. Across the Center, researchers have applied the same integration of modeling, fabrication, and measurement to problems ranging from quantum dots to structural materials. Victor Klimov and Jennifer Hollingsworth engineered quantum dots whose optical gain and emission can be tuned with atomic precision, advancing solar technologies, microelectronics, and quantum information science. Other Los Alamos teams designed nanoscale defect architectures to strengthen materials and built atom-scale emitters matched to fiber-optic telecommunications bands. Each effort differs in application, but they share a methodology enabled by CINT: design at the nanoscale, fabricate precisely, measure rigorously, iterate quickly.

“We wanted to understand the materials and then design them to do the thing that we wanted them to do,” Taylor says. The science has advanced since the early days of terahertz modulators. The ambition remains the same: to design matter itself.

For more information: Los Alamos National Laboratory 

Nikhil Bajaj’s $649K NSF CAREER Award reverses the design process for devices from microsensors to aircraft wings

Nikhil Bajaj, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering and materials science at the University of Pittsburgh’s Swanson School of Engineering, studies nonlinear systems that shift behavior once a threshold is crossed—phenomena seen across disciplines in devices that rely on bifurcation to enhance sensitivity and performance. He has received a $649,684 National Science Foundation CAREER Award to rethink how these systems are designed, moving away from trial-and-error tuning toward an approach that starts with a desired behavior and engineers backward. His framework targets applications such as micro-electro-mechanical systems, including ultrasensitive gas leak detectors capable of identifying hazardous compounds at parts-per-billion levels, as well as energy harvesters and aerospace structures.

In a system with bifurcations, a quantitative change produces a qualitative one: a change in the value of the input changes the type of outcome. Once a certain threshold is met, the system doesn’t do more of what it was doing; it instead does something different. For example, a somewhat flexible column loaded with heavier and heavier weights will compress more and more, but once a specific load is placed on it, it will move in a different way, bulging out to one side or buckling.

Today, researchers can characterize these kinds of systems using a lot of trial and error and analogies to previous systems. “Say I’m building a car, and I want it to have 400 horsepower,” Bajaj said. If he didn’t know how to hit that number, he might take any engine and keep tweaking it, tightening something here, disconnecting a part there, until it worked. And horsepower is an easy case, a smooth dial you can turn up or down. The challenge multiplies when the goal is a threshold behavior: getting a system to switch into a new kind of motion at exactly the right input, and not a moment before.

“Designing in bifurcation behavior can feel a bit like working in the dark,” Bajaj said. Even so, the field has made remarkable progress. Across nonlinear systems, libraries of relationships have accumulated for many decades as researchers test inputs and observe outputs via theory and experiment. They’ve found that systems with bifurcations of all kinds (a wing vibrating erratically at speed, a material buckling under pressure, a neuron firing in the brain) seem to be governed by similar principles. The equations aren’t identical, but when systems engineers compare notes, they find meaningful similarities behind the different variables and outputs.

“We play the same mathematical games, just on different fields,” Bajaj said. At a nonlinear dynamics conference, he might have a specific engineering question on his mind. “But then I could run into someone doing the same thing on a biological system and I think, ‘I can use their method to apply to my problem.’”

The award also supports an education plan that spans the length of the pipeline. Bajaj will carry the science of nonlinear behavior (the buckling and the sudden shifts that turn up everywhere from bridges to neurons) to K–12 students and the public through science center and library exhibits, and will fold the same design methods into undergraduate and graduate coursework. A layered mentorship model reaching students at different stages aims to broaden participation in STEM, giving newcomers both a way in and a reason to stay.

Bajaj will use his CAREER Award to develop a unified computational framework for designing nonlinear systems from a desired behavior, rather than discovering their behavior through trial and error. “I want to pick all my parameters, all the knobs I can turn, so that it does the things I want it to do and not necessarily the things that are undesirable.” The framework is intentionally general; he will demonstrate the approaches on small and large scales, from MEMS gas sensors at the micrometer scale to flutter in aircraft wings.

For more information: U.S. National Science Foundation

UCLA researchers refine use of graphene oxide for stronger, more durable concrete

A UCLA-led study shows that adding graphene oxide, a carbon-based nanomaterial, to cement mixtures can produce stronger, more durable concrete, with performance driven more by even distribution than by quantity. Researchers found that ultrasonic treatment improves dispersion and delivers early strength gains at lower dosages, while controlled use of polymer surfactants helps enhance long-term strength by refining pore structures and reducing microcracks. The findings suggest practical ways to use less cement and lower carbon dioxide emissions tied to cement production.

Concrete is the world’s most widely used building material. Cement, the binding ingredient in concrete, accounts for about 8% of global carbon dioxide emissions. Enhancing the efficiency of cement use is therefore essential, as it would reduce the amount needed to build infrastructure — including buildings, roads and bridges — and help lower overall emissions. Graphene-enhanced concrete could last longer and require fewer repairs because stronger concrete cracks less easily and better resists water intrusion and corrosion, which in turn can increase its service life.

Researchers have known for more than a decade that adding graphene oxide to cementitious mixtures can increase concrete’s mechanical performance. However, earlier approaches produced inconsistent results, limiting suitability for commercial use.

To address this challenge, the UCLA team first dispersed graphene oxide powder in water and used ultrasound — the same type of technology found in inexpensive jewelry cleaners — to break up clumps and create a uniform mixture. They then added a moderate amount of polycarboxylate ether, or PCE, a common polymer additive that improves the mixture’s fluidity without adding extra water. This optimized sequence controls the exposed surface area of graphene oxide, thereby delivering strength gains at very low dosages, as little as 0.01% by mass of cement.

Graphene oxide is a nanomaterial derived from graphite and composed of carbon sheets one atom thick. In laboratory tests, adding graphene oxide to cementitious formulations using the optimized process improved the compressive strength by up to 25% after 28 days. The porosity was also significantly reduced by up to 50% as graphene oxide bridged microcracks, resulting in a denser structure.

“This study provides a comprehensive mechanistic framework to combine ultrasound processing, particle dispersants and small additions of graphene oxide to improve the performance of concrete,” said study co-corresponding author Gaurav Sant, a professor of civil and environmental engineering and the Pritzker Professor of Sustainability at the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering. The breakthrough builds on a long-term collaboration between Sant and co-corresponding author Richard Kaner, a distinguished professor of chemistry and biochemistry, through UCLA’s Institute for Carbon Management.

“Our group has spent nearly 20 years refining the synthesis and processing of graphene oxide, and more than a decade working with industry partners to scale production with consistently high quality,” said Maher El-Kady, a researcher working with Kaner. “It’s exciting to see that long-term effort culminate in a study with such clear societal relevance.”

The study’s first author is UCLA postdoctoral researcher Zhi Wan. The other co-corresponding authors are Torben Gädt, chair for the chemistry of construction materials at the Technical University of Munich, and Samanvaya Srivastava, a UCLA associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering. Additional UCLA authors include postdoctoral scholar Rui Xiao and chemical and biomolecular engineering graduate student Vihar Trada. Arizona State University researchers Sahil Surehali, a postdoctoral scientist, and Narayanan Neithalath, a professor of sustainable engineering, are also authors on the study.

At UCLA, Kaner holds the Dr. Myung Ki Hong Endowed Chair in Materials Innovation and has a joint appointment in materials science and engineering at UCLA Samueli. Sant is the director of the Institute for Carbon Management and holds a joint appointment in materials science and engineering. Both are faculty members with the California NanoSystems Institute.

For more information:  ACS Applied Engineering Materials

Image: Cement test samples (3-centimeter cubes) containing graphene oxide.

USC researchers develop 3D-printable MRI coils for low-cost, improved dynamic imaging

Diseases affecting moving organs such as the heart and lungs require dynamic imaging rather than static scans, yet limitations in current MRI technology often hinder early detection and diagnosis. Traditional MRI sensors are costly, rigid, and unable to conform closely to the body, reducing image quality and flexibility. To address this, researchers at the University of Southern California developed a low-cost, silver-ink MRI coil that can be 3D printed in under 10 minutes for patient-specific use. The coil costs about $30 in materials — significantly less than traditional models — and delivers up to four times higher image resolution, improving access to more reliable dynamic imaging.

USC researchers, Yasser Khan and Krishna Nayak teamed up to develop a new silver-ink based MRI coil that costs about $30 in consumable materials, compared with at least thousands of dollars for industry-standard coils, and delivers up to four times higher image resolution. The coils can also be 3D printed in real time in under 10 minutes, enabling patient-specific customization.

The study has removed key barriers in dynamic imaging and represents a major breakthrough in MRI technology, with broad applications in clinical settings such as pediatrics and cardiology.

The work was made possible by bringing together two researchers from USC Viterbi School of Engineering and USC Mark and Mary Stevens School of Computing with expertise in wearable sensors for precision health and MRI imaging: Khan, an assistant professor in the Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and with joint appointments in the Alfred E. Mann Department of Biomedical Engineering, who leads Khan Lab; and Nayak, a professor of electrical and computer engineering, also with a joint appointment in biomedical engineering, who leads the Dynamic Imaging Science Center (DISC). The research was also spearheaded by Félix Muñoz, a student they co-advised, as well as Ye Tian, a research assistant professor in the Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. The team also included Prof. Min-gu Kim, an assistant professor of medical engineering at Yonsei University in Korea.

John Wood, a close collaborator from the Keck School of Medicine of USC and the Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, emphasized that this is a game-changer, noting that MRI screening is a platform technology essential for detecting undiagnosed conditions in patients, including children and infants. He added that coil sensors play a critical role in diagnostic accuracy and clinical decision-making.

Expensive and Low-resolution MRI Scanners

Like cameras that detect light waves to form images, MRI scanners process and create images or videos using radiofrequency (RF) signals.

The visual data is made possible with MRI “coils,” which are specialized antennas placed close to the bohiiidy part being imaged to detect weak radiofrequency signals emitted by tissues, acting as the receiver for producing high-resolution images.

In the MRI world, the equivalent of camera resolution is called signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). To capture motion in MRI scans, specialized low-field MRI (0.55T) is used to enable dynamic, real-time imaging of motion-intensive processes by leveraging reduced susceptibility artifacts and faster data acquisition.

However, capturing video is particularly difficult at low magnetic field strengths (0.55T) because the signal is inherently weaker, which leads to lower SNR, and consequently lower resolution. Low SNR reduces image quality, making it more difficult for physicians to make accurate clinical assessments.

Today’s standard commercialized coils face many challenges, with low comformity being the biggest limitation. Current coils, typically made of copper, are rigid and follow a one-size-fits-all design. They cannot maintain the close contact required to recover enough signal for high-quality, video-rate imaging. The closer the sensors are to the signal source, the clearer the “picture,” and the closer a coil is to the anatomy, the better the resolution because proximity increases signal strength.

Existing MRI coil arrays are also expensive, priced between $10,000 and $50,000 each.

These high costs are driven by complex manufacturing processes, proprietary markups and rigid, specialized construction that can take significant time to produce. This cost and manufacturing complexity reinforce rigid designs as the commercial standard, making personalization difficult and continuing to limit imaging accuracy.

The limitations of current MRI technologies heavily affect babies and children, as Wood explained that existing coils are designed for adults and then scaled down for children, a process that often fails to accommodate the rapid anatomical changes in growing infants. This sizing mismatch makes MRI screening less accurate in pediatric patients. He also noted that “an infant’s heart can be as small as a walnut,” requiring a coil that is equally small and well-fitted to produce accurate results—something that current, non-customizable coil designs cannot adequately provide.

Silver-based MRI coils as solution: Flexible as human skin and engineered for higher SNR

In the study, Khan’s team aims to tackle the low SNR problem by designing coils that better fit the skin, allowing sensors to be closer to the body.

The lab first experimented with innovative materials that could maintain strong signal performance while being flexible enough to conform to the body like human skin—a longstanding challenge in MRIs for dynamic imaging.

A major limitation with flexible or printed conductors is that they typically have lower conductivity than solid copper, which introduces resistive losses and reduces signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). On the other hand, current industry-standard copper coils lack the flexibility needed to maintain close contact with the body. As high conductivity is key for strong SNR, most flexible materials have historically failed to deliver imaging performance comparable to copper.

Khan’s lab identified silver as an optimal material as it offers conductivity comparable to copper while enabling flexibility when printed onto soft, rubber-like substrates such as thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU). The researchers tested various silver inks and selected one formulation, FS0142, that achieved approximately 95% of the signal efficiency of a standard solid copper coil—the first time researchers are able to successfully address the conductivity challenge while maintaining flexibility for dynamic imaging at lower field.

The silver ink is combined with a specialized binder that makes it stretchable, allowing the printed coil to stretch between 5% and 10%, closely matching the natural stretchability of human skin. This enables the coils to wrap tightly around complex anatomical structures, such as the wrist, while maintaining consistent contact.

These new coils, which are as soft and stretchable as human skin, overcome the longstanding tradeoff between rigidity and conductivity. By ensuring a conformal interface where the coil remains in constant contact with the body, the design can effectively replace traditional copper coils while significantly improving imaging performance.

The $30 Breakthrough: 3D-Printed Coils That Are Customizable in Under 10 Minutes

The new coils are also drastically cheaper in both material cost and manufacturing, dropping the price of a standard coil from as much as $50,000 to about $120 per coil.

Muñoz explained that this is partly because the quantity of material needed per coil in his team’s study is extremely small, bringing the consumable cost to roughly $30 per element, despite silver being an expensive and precious metal.

The other key aspect contributing to the low cost is the lab’s automated workflow, which enables coils to be completely 3D printed. Unlike traditional coil manufacturing, which requires complex machinery, proprietary processes and intricate assembly steps that are costly, labor-intensive, the new coils introduced in the study can be produced in as little as eight minutes per element.

These coils are designed using standard Gerber files—the same format used to manufacture circuit boards—allowing for a fully digital workflow. By using automated tools such as the Voltera NOVA printer, a direct-ink-write system, the need for manual routing or complex housing assembly is eliminated, enabling rapid digital fabrication.

This innovation not only reduces cost but also expands the potential for MRI to become more accessible, instead of a limited, high-cost resource. The simple, low-cost, real-time production of these coils allows for on-demand manufacturing tailored to specific patients or body parts, further addressing the longstanding challenge in customization. This makes it possible to create coils of varying sizes, including those small enough for infants.

Because the coils are inexpensive and can be analyzed using low-cost, portable tools, the technology could expand access to high-quality MRI in rural or resource-limited settings worldwide.

At USC, New Coils Meet the World’s Only Low-Field High-Performance MRI System

This work was made possible through a unique collaboration at the University of Southern California, where the newly developed coils could be directly tested on a rare high-performance low-field MRI system—creating an environment that enables proprietary research, innovation and cross-disciplinary collaboration.

A key advantage is the close partnership between Yasser Khan’s lab, which developed the coils, and the Dynamic Imaging Science Center. The center houses a highly specialized MRI scanner: a 0.55 T low-field prototype, a modified 1.5 T Siemens MAGNETOM Aera system, that is now the only one of its kind still operating in the world.

The scanner at DISC offers several technical advantages that make it an ideal match for the new flexible coil technology. Its advanced gradient system enables extremely fast scans, which are essential for capturing high-quality, video-rate dynamic imaging. At the same time, like most low-field MRI systems, the scanner at DISC suffers from lower signal. The flexible coils developed in this study address that limitation by improving signal capture and image quality.

What’s Next: Clinical Use and Patient Testing

The study’s MRI coils have generated strong interest among physicians. Khan said the team’s goal is to move the coils from the lab into clinical settings, with patient testing as a key next step.

Nayak identified pediatric lung imaging as a likely first clinical application to be tested, with John Wood expressing strong interest in eventually adopting the technology for patient care.

“It starts with a signal,” Wood emphasized, noting that regardless of the medical condition, the diagnostic process begins with signal and image quality. He said the study introduces significantly improved signal strength, which could enhance MRI as a platform technology across many diseases and help physicians make more accurate clinical judgments.

Wood emphasized that the technology could be especially impactful for the smallest and most fragile patients, including premature infants. An infant’s heart is extremely small and beats rapidly, making it traditionally difficult to image. Improving signal by bringing the “lens”—the coil—closer to the body allows for clearer visualization of these tiny, fast-moving structures. Screening is a critical first step in identifying conditions in infants, who are more vulnerable to heart and lung diseases or structural abnormalities that require accurate imaging.

Wood also envisions new diagnostic pathways for common infant conditions, including monitoring lung development in bronchopulmonary dysplasia, evaluating swallowing function to prevent aspiration, and studying gastrointestinal malformations.

Muñoz also highlighted applications in wrist injuries, which require clear dynamic imaging of moving joints to identify conditions. In testing, the team’s wrist coil arrays achieved four times higher contrast and five times greater sharpness than commercial coils, allowing clinicians to resolve fine structures such as carpal ligaments that were previously difficult to see.

While the coils were developed to address challenges in dynamic imaging, Wood sees broader applications in standard, still-image MRI scans across a range of clinical settings.

For more information: Nature Communications

Image: The study’s new MRI coils. (Photo Credit: USC Khan Lab)

Researchers measure giant light-conversion effect in chiral carbon nanotubes

A sheet of twisted carbon nanotubes has revealed a long-suspected but previously unmeasured capability, as researchers at Rice University created highly ordered films of chiral nanotubes — carbon cylinders with left- or right-handed twists — that can convert the color of light at rates two to three orders of magnitude greater than conventional materials. The findings confirm decades-old theoretical predictions and suggest ultrathin nanotube films could advance faster optical communications, flexible photonic chips and light-based computing systems that largely remain in early stages.

Since their discovery in the 1990s, carbon nanotubes have been touted as carriers of enormous technological potential due to their tunable conductivity, high mechanical strength, flexibility and ultralow weight. However, they are also difficult to purify and align into larger material architectures.

This holds true for chiral CNTs, whose “handedness” makes them especially difficult to work with.

“Typically, when we have a macroscopic ensemble of carbon nanotubes, half of them are right-handed and the other half are left-handed,” said Junichiro Kono, a senior researcher on the study. “So, their chiral properties cancel each other out.”

That cancellation effect has prevented researchers from measuring one of the material’s most anticipated properties, second harmonic generation (SHG), which occurs when two light waves pass through a material and combine into one new wave with twice the frequency and half the wavelength. For example, due to SHG, two infrared light waves invisible to the human eye can be converted into visible light.

“Theory predicts chiral CNT should be particularly good at such conversion,” said Hanyu Zhu, a Rice materials scientist who led the study alongside Kono. “However, no one was able to quantify this ability because it requires high-quality, pure chiral CNT crystal.”

The Rice-led team solved that challenge by isolating nanotubes with a single handedness – a step carried out by the group of Kazuhiro Yanagi at Tokyo Metropolitan University – aligning them in the same direction and assembling them into thin films spanning several centimeters.

“We successfully made a wafer of film packed closely with chiral CNTs that showed uniform optical properties,” said Kono, director of the Smalley-Curl Institute at Rice and Karl F. Hasselmann Professor in Engineering, professor of electrical and computer engineering and materials science and nanoengineering, and physics and astronomy.

When illuminated with laser pulses, the chiral CNT films produced a “giant” SHG response thanks to their one-dimensional structure, where “one-dimensional” describes materials with two dimensions on the order of a nanometer and a third, much larger, dimension that gives rise to wire- or tubelike architectures.

This structure intensifies interactions between light and matter, particularly through coupled electron-hole states known as excitons. The importance of excitons in the SHG process was theorized by two team members, Vasili Perebeinos at the University at Buffalo and Riichiro Saito at Tohoku University.

“For the first time, we were able to make a more accurate prediction of one-dimensional second-order nonlinear optical response and experimentally demonstrated it,” said Zhu, associate chair and professor of materials science and nanoengineering.

SHG already plays an important role in laser technology and optoelectronic systems. The stronger the SHG effect is, the smaller the devices can be to control and convert light for technology. Chiral CNTs not only outperform materials currently in use in terms of SHG, but they are also flexible, widening the range of applications they could serve.

“CNT is a promising flexible semiconductor for electronics and photonics,” Zhu said. “The film may be easily integrated with silicon photonics for optical information processing and communication.”

For more information: ACS Nano

Image: Hanyu Zhu is the William Marsh Rice Chair and associate professor of materials science and nanoengineering at Rice University. (Photo by Jeff Fitlow/Rice University)

Steel developed at MIT is key to Formula One

A high-performance steel developed at MIT has come full circle, moving from success in Formula One and Baja 1000 race cars to its latest use in the 2026 electric race car built by the student-run MIT Motorsports team. The computationally designed material is now part of the university’s entry in the Formula SAE Electric competition, where the car is set to compete against teams from other universities in June.

Designing materials

Gregory B. Olson, professor of the practice in the MIT Department of Materials Science and Engineering, founded the MIT Steel Research Group (SRG) in 1985 with the goal of using computers to accelerate the hunt for new materials by plumbing databases of those materials’ fundamental properties. It was the beginning of a new field — computational materials design — that would eventually lead to the Materials Genome Initiative, a national program announced by President Barack Obama in 2011.

In 1985, however, “nobody knew whether we could really do this,” says Olson. Olson and colleagues eventually showed that the approach worked, and around 1990 the Army Research Office funded an SRG project aimed at developing high-performance steels for the gears in helicopters. That work came to the attention of producers at “Infinite Voyage,” a science documentary that ran on the Public Broadcasting System.

“When “Infinite Voyage” came to see me about the helicopter gear steels,” Olson remembers, “we got into a discussion about my interest in race cars” and whether the steels might have an application there.

The answer was yes, and Olson found himself connecting with the Newman/Haas racing team that Michael and Mario Andretti were driving for. Newman/Haas was also featured in the “Infinite Voyage” program, so “my first discussion with their chief engineer was on live television,” says Olson, who is also affiliated with the MIT Materials Research Laboratory.

He and colleagues went on to design a novel gear steel that could withstand the extreme conditions associated with a race car. They did the work over a weekend. “The surface hardness was the same as for a conventional gear steel, but we gave it the core properties of an armor steel,” Olson says.

Introducing Ferrium C61

That steel, which became known as Ferrium C61, was commercialized through QuesTek Innovations, the materials-design company Olson co-founded. It became the company’s first product.

Although it was never used in Newman/Haas cars, QuesTek pitched it to Baja 1000 off-road racers.

“We particularly focused on the 1600 class of those racing dune buggies. They would go flying over a sand dune with the wheels spinning in the air. And when they land, there would be a tremendous jolt to the drive gears,” Olson says. The result: The racers’ gears made with conventional steel regularly failed.

“The average life for conventional drive gears was point-six race,” says Olson (meaning on average they lasted for only 60 percent of a race). “With Ferrium C61, we changed it from point-six to six races.” The gears could now complete an average six races before failing.

QuesTek brought that data to meetings with different Formula One teams “to try to get C61 into other racing classes,” Olson says.

Enter Red Bull, the British-licensed Formula One team. “The leading mechanical failure in Formula One racing is gearbox failures,” Olsen says. The gearbox houses the gearset, or collection of gears, in a car’s engine. “Once Red Bull adopted our steel for the gearset, they never had any gearbox failures, and they were world champions four times in the last decade.”

MIT Motorsports heard of this history and within the past year approached Olson about getting a sample of C61. “QuesTek had some stock available, and sold it at a high discount to the MIT team with, of course, instructions on how to heat-treat it,” Olson says.

Because, of course, the students, who are mostly undergraduates, made the gears — and the car — themselves.

For more information: MIT

Image: Gearset for the 2026 race car made by the MIT Motorsports team. It is made of a high-performance steel with MIT origins. CreditsPhoto courtesy of MIT Motorsports.

One Minute Mentor: Austenitizing of Water-Hardening Tool Steels

Austenitizing temperatures for water-hardening tool steels normally vary from 760 to 845 °C (1400 to 1550 °F), as indicated in Table 2. Higher temperatures are sometimes used for special purposes (Fig. 2). Hardenability increases as austenitizing temperature increases. The optimum time at austenitizing temperature is from 10 to 30 min. Preheating is unusual except for very large tools or those with intricate cross sections. It is particularly important to protect shallow-hardening steels against scaling and decarburization. Severe scaling can interfere with heat transfer during quenching and slow the required high rate of cooling. Decarburization will produce a soft surface on any tool steel, but in a deep-hardening steel it can be ground off until the underlying hard high-carbon area is reached. Grinding a shallow-hardening steel will frequently expose the soft core.

For more information, click on the link below (subscription required). Then scroll to Figure 2.

Rafael Agnelli Mesquita; Reinhold Schneider; Cristiane Sales Gonçalves, Heat Treating of Cold-Work Tool Steels — Low- and Un-Alloyed Water and Oil Hardening Steels, ASM International, 2014. https://doi.org/10.31399/asm.hb.v04d.a0005972