Titanium aluminum nitrides (TiAlN) are currently the most versatile coatings in terms of performance with various applications in industry: as wear-resistant coatings for cutting tools; for increasing productivity in die casting, reducing soldering and retarding fire cracks; for plastic processing,

Current trends to reduce weight, energy consumption and improve functionality are leading to new materials with complex microstructures, whose behavior can only be understood from the synergetic contribution of processes occurring at multiple length scales (from nm to m). Examples of these

IMDEA Materials has developed technologies to manufacture scaffolds made of biodegradable polymers (PCL, PLA, PLGA, etc), biodegradable metals (Mg and Zn) and their composites for tissue engineering (see Fig. 1 below). The main advantage of this technology is that it allows designing scaffolds with

IMDEA Materials has developed a physical simulation tool to predict joinability of dissimilar metallic materials with different melting points. Very small samples of the actual dissimilar materials are subjected to the same thermal and mechanical profiles in a thermo-mechanical simulator (GLEEBLE

IMDEA Materials has developed technologies for ultrafast processing of advanced metallic materials in a thermo-mechanical simulator (GLEEBLE 3800). They allow to precisely control the thermo-mechanical processing at high heating/cooling rates, as well as at high strain rate plastic deformation.

Europe’s commitment to reach carbon neutrality by 2050 is strongly pushing renewable energy sources and hydrogen has emerged as a versatile and environmentally friendly mean to store and transport clean energy. The large-scale usage of hydrogen has prompted new challenges in the core

IMDEA Materials is working on new battery materials that combine electrochemical integrity and enhanced fire safety. Fig. 1 below shows a fully solid-state battery based on a HKUST-1 MOF modified electrolyte with simultaneously improved electrochemical performance and fire safety was

IMDEA Materials can design and prepare novel Phase Change Materials (PCMs) for thermal energy storage applications that: are prepared in an easy and green pathway and, at the same time, have high mechanical performance, fire safety, form stability, phase transition enthalpy, and thermal

Due to the rapid growth in the use of composite materials, environmental concerns have become an increasingly influential topic, making recyclability of composite materials a key issue. Furthermore, several related EU laws have been passed to minimize the environmental impact of composite structures

As part of its strategic initiative on damage-tolerant additive manufacturing, IMDEA Materials develops a suite of physics-based computational models and simulation tools aimed at linking processing, microstructures and properties, in order to accelerate the discovery and deployment of new alloys

Manufacturing in the EU is crucial, given that it is one of the main drivers in innovation, job creation and sustainable growth. It involves almost 2,000,000 companies that provide approximately 28.5 million jobs. Therefore, its impact is significant in terms of economic share, with it being ~18% of

The doctoral thesis of Jingya Wang, entitled “High throughput investigation of diffusion and solid solution hardening of HCP Mg alloys”, has obtained the Award of the Technical University of Madrid to the best doctoral thesis. The thesis was advised by Prof. J. LLorca and Prof. Y. Cui and it was

The project ENTENTE (European Database for Multiscale Modelling of Radiation Damage) has started on the 1st of September 2020 and it will last 48 months. The aim of this project is to design a new European experimental/modelling materials database to collect and store highly-relevant data on

The current design of composite materials follows a trial and error approach based on an expensive and time consuming testing pyramid that costs industry millions of euros and years of development each time a new composite material is introduced in an aircraft. In this video, you can watch how we

There is an ever-increasing interest in new materials that can extend the current performance of battery electrodes materials in terms of longer cyclability, higher energy density and higher power density. Our research groups have established a route for the fabrication of highperformance anodes for

Flame retardant (FR) additives are commonly used to improve fire-safety of synthetic polymers, which are widely employed in manufactured consumer goods. The incorporation of a FR in a polymer typically leads to deterioration of its mechanical properties. It also manifests itself in a non-negligible

The use of polymer-based composite materials in aircraft structures has increased consistently in the last decades and today they represent up to 50% in weight for wings, fuselage sections and tail surfaces in the latest generation of commercial aircrafts. However, the use of such composites in

One of the current scientific and technological trends in structural composites is the incorporation of new functionalities as thermal/electrical conductivity or energy harvesting capacities to classical laminates. However, the inclusion of any internal conductive layer with capacitive storage will

Mg is a biocompatible and biodegradable metal with osteopromotive capabilities that is beginning to be used for bone repair and fixation in biomedical applications. Mg elastic modulus and density are closer to bone than those of other metallic alloys used in  biomedical applications (stainless

Magnesium has a large potential for more sustainable transport applications due to its low density. However, its poor strength and ductility limits its widespread application. The main fundamental problem arises from the low critical resolved shear stress (CRSS) for basal slip in Mg, which induces

There are situations in which the mechanical response of a material is coupled with relevant physical phenomena occurring in parallel. Some examples are chemomechanical problems in which mechanical fields interact with the evolution of the local composition, as it happens during the deformation

The fatigue performance of a metallic alloy is strongly influenced by its microstructure, especially in the crack nucleation regime. Micromechanics based fatigue modeling [1] is the appropriate tool to account for this influence. In this framework, fatigue life is obtained from a fatigue indicator

Fibre-reinforced polymers are extensively used in the automotive, aerospace and energy industries for structural applications. The interest in Liquid Composite Molding (LCM) processes, for the production of composite materials has grown in the last years, especially in the vacuum assisted resin

The aim of the DELIGHTED project is to gain fundamental understanding of principles of microstructural design for engineering of perspective austenitic lightweight steels to reach the combination of mechanical and performance properties suitable for applications. To read more about the scientific

It has been shown that InP semiconductor nanowires carry charge and excitons efficiently and also exhibit very high optical efficiency. Their mechanical properties are extremely important, as mechanical strain strongly influences the electric, optical and magnetic properties. However, this

The Multi-FAM project proposes the combination of materials with different functionalities, the additive manufacturing process by direct laser deposition (DED) and thermodynamic and process simulation, as enabling technologies to obtain multi-material and multifunctional 3D parts for direct

We are helping ITP Aero to produce the IPT (Intermediate Pressure Turbine) casing for the future Rolls-Royce UltraFan engine. So far, we have carried out the characterisation of the behaviour of the astroloy at containment and impact. Read more here.

Our colleague María Teresa Pérez Prado has been appointed as a member of the International Advisory Board of the European Space Agency (ESA). She will support the Agency as part of the Physical Sciences Working Group, particularly concerning their activities on micro-gravity research

What will happen to “I+D+I” when the pandemic ends? Find out in the 9 #reflexionesciencia webinars that begin on April 30! https://sites.google.com/view/reflexiones-transversales/