Materials Science & Engineering

BITS Pilani
Pilani Campus

Dr. Subrata Bandhu Ghosh

Department of Mechanical Engg.

Welcome to the fascinating and

exceedingly interesting world of
Engineering Materials!

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

TODAYS LECTURE
Aims and Scopes
Classification to Materials
Recommended Text and Reference Books

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

What will you learn?

Introduction to diverse kinds of engineering materials
Overview of what determines the properties of
materials and how we engineer them
Structure of materials and various length scales
Properties of materials: elasticity, plasticity, fracture
Processing of materials: metals, ceramics, polymers
& composites
Selection of materials and design of engineering
components
Destructive and nondestructive testing techniques
BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Classes of Materials
Metallic Materials
Glass and Ceramic Materials

Three main
types of
materials

Polymeric Materials
Composite Materials
Electronic Materials
Natural materials

Other types
for modern
engineering
technology

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Advanced Materials
Smart Materials
Nanomaterials

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Metallic Materials
These materials are inorganic substances that are composed of
one or more metallic elements and may also contain some
nonmetallic elements.
Metallic elements: Fe, Cu, Al, Ni and Ti
Nonmetallic elements: C, N, O

Metals have a crystalline structure in which the atoms are

arranged in an orderly manner. Structurally, atoms in metals
normally adopt one of three common arrangements:
hexagonal close-packed (hcp), cubic close-packed (fcc) or
body centred cubic (bcc).

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Metallic Materials
The valence electrons occupy a conduction band, which
means that they are delocalised throughout the structure
(accounting for the high thermal and electrical
conductivity of metals).
Metallic bonding is strong.

Metals in general are good thermal and electrical conductors.

Many metals are relatively strong and ductile at room
temperature, and many maintain good strength even at
high temperature.
Metals in their alloyed and pure forms are used in numerous
industries including aerospace, biomedical, semiconductor,
electronic, energy, civil structural and transport.

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Glass and Ceramic Materials

Glasses and Ceramics are inorganic compounds that are non
metallic. Ceramics are crystalline, and so have a regular
repeating unit throughout their structure, while glasses are
non-crystalline (normally termed amorphous).
Structurally ceramics and glasses may be formed from either
ionic or covalent bonds and so have strong bonds between
atoms.
Most ceramic materials have high hardness and high
temperature strength but tend to be brittle (little or no
deformation prior to fracture).
Advantages of ceramic materials for engineering applications
include light weight, high strength and hardness, good heat
and wear resistance, reduced friction and insulative
properties.

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Glass and Ceramic Materials

Traditional ceramic materials include clay and stone.
Glasses and Ceramics include cements and concretes
as well as a range of compounds that are becoming
increasingly used for high-technology applications
such as diamond, alumina (e.g. sapphire),
magnesia, silica glasses and silicates, silicon
carbide and silicon nitride.
These new generation ceramic materials are called
engineering ceramics, structural ceramics or
advanced ceramics. They have higher strength,
better wear and corrosion resistance and
enhanced thermal shock resistance.

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Glass and Ceramic Materials

Ceramic materials can be applied to aerospace, metal
manufacturing, biomedical, automobile and numerous
other industries.

The two main drawbacks for this class of materials are that
they are (1) difficult to process into finished products and
are therefore expensive and (2) brittle and have low
fracture toughness compared to metals.
If techniques for developing high toughness ceramics are
developed further, these materials could show a
tremendous upsurge for engineering applications.

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Polymeric Materials
Polymers are built up from (normally organic) monomeric
building units. The bonding within the polymer chain
consists of strong covalent bonds. However, the bonding
between chains is far weaker (Van der Waals type).
The long-flexible chains may be arranged completely randomly
(giving an amorphous polymer) or in a regular chain-folding
pattern (leading to crystalline regions within the polymer).
The detailed properties of a particular polymer will depend on
factors such as chain length, crystallinity and the presence of
any cross-linking between the chains.
The strength and ductility of polymeric materials vary greatly.
Because of the nature of their internal structure, most
polymeric materials are good insulators and are used for
electrical insulative applications.

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Polymeric Materials
Polymeric materials have low densities and relatively low
softening or decomposition temperatures.
Examples of important polymers are polyethylene (PE),
polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA, perspex), nylon,
polystyrene (PS), polyurethane (PU) and polyvinylchloride
(PVC)

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Composite Materials
A composite material may be defined as two or more
materials(phases or constituents) integrated to
form a new one.
The constituents keep their properties and the
overall composite will have properties different
than each of them.
Most composite materials consist of a selected filler
or reinforcing material and a compatible matrix or
resin binder to obtain the specific characteristics
and properties desired.

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Composite Materials
Composites include glass-fibre reinforced polymers
(denoted GFRP, such as fibreglass), carbon-fibre
reinforced polymers (CFRP), filled polymers and a
few composites of ceramics and metals (cermets).

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Electronic Materials
Electronic materials are not a major type of material by
production volume but are an extremely important type of
material for advanced engineering technology.
Eletronic material: Silicon, Germanium

Microelectronic devices have made possible such new

products as communication satellites, advanced
computers, handheld calculators, digital watches and
robots.
Electronic materials will play a vital role in the factories of
the future in which almost all manufacturing may be done
by robots assisted by computer-controlled machine tools.
BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Natural Materials
These are often classed as a separate category, but all
natural materials really fit into one of the others.
Examples of natural materials are wood, stone, bone,
leather and cotton.

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Smart Materials
Smart materials have the ability to sense external
environmental stimuli (temperature, stress, light,
humidity, and electric and magnetic fields) and
respond to them by changing their
properties(mechanical, electrical or appearance),
structure or functions.
Smart materials consists of sensors and actuators.
The sensory component detects a change in the
environment, and the actuator component
performs a specific function or a response.
BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Smart Materials
For instance, some smart materials change or produce colour
when exposed to changes in temperatures, light intensity,
or an electric current.
Some smart materials that can function as actuators are
shape-memory alloys and piezoelectric ceramics.
Shape-memory alloys are metal alloys that, once strained,
revert back to their original shape upon an increase in
temperature above a critical transformation temperature.
The change in shape back to the original is due to a change in
the crystal structure above the transformation
temperature.
BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Nanomaterials
Nanomaterials are generally defined as those
materials that have a characteristic length
scale(that is, particle diameter, grain size, layer
thickness etc) smaller than 100 nm. Nanomaterials
can be metallic, polymeric, ceramic, electronic, or
composite.

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Recommended Textbook

William F. Smith, Javed Hashemi and Ravi

Prakash, Materials Science and Engineering
In SI Units, McGraw-Hill Companies, New Delhi
Fourth Edition, Special Indian Edition, 2008

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

Basic References
William
D CalisterJr. Materials Science
and
R1
Engineering: An Introduction,
John Wiley & Sons,
Singapore, Sixth Edition, (2003)
E Paul Degarmo, J T Black, Ronald A Kohser, Materials
and Processes in Manufacturing, John Wiley & Sons,
Singapore, Ninth Edition, (2004)

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus