Overview

David R. Howell and Richard Silberglitt

Seventeen years ago, a landmark study of materials science and engineering documented the scientific breadth of this field, as well as its application to diverse industries such as energy, chemicals, telecommunications, aerospace, and biomedicine, and recommended an increased emphasis on materials synthesis and processing (and its effects on performance) and on computer-based analysis and modeling. ^[401] The intervening years have seen tremendous growth in the interdisciplinary nature of materials research, the sophistication with which modeling and simulation is applied to materials design and analysis, and the capability to control materials synthesis and processing. The emergence and development of tools to observe, characterize, and manipulate materials at the atomic and molecular levels have fueled a substantial portion of this growth and continue to enable new materials research and development options. ^[402]

Materials science and engineering today encompasses active research on nanomaterials (i.e., materials with a component or dimension approaching 100 nanometers ^[403]) and biomaterials, as well as combinations of the two. Examples of applications enabled by the integration of research in traditional materials fields (such as metallurgy, ceramics, polymers, and solid state physics and chemistry) with developments in nanomaterials and biomaterials, include nanoparticle metals for high-energy propellants and fuel cells, ^[404] tooth repair via in situ growth of nanocrystalline enamel, ^[405] degradable polymeric microchips for time-release drug delivery, ^[406] and highly selective and sensitive miniature chemical sensors. ^[407]

Over the next 15 years, one can reasonably expect that the...