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MIT Technique Could Lead to Better Titanium Alloys
2024-07-22
Researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) say a newly developed approach to crafting titanium alloys could improve materials for aerospace manufacturing and other industrial sectors.
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The Importance of Titanium
Titanium alloys can be stronger, lighter, and more resistant to corrosion than steel, making them vital materials in aerospace structures, medical equipment, energy infrastructure, and other industries.
- From spaceships to prosthetics, titanium has been at the forefront of material science for the past couple of decades. You can find it mentioned everywhere: in science fiction books, in Marvel comics and movies, in high-performance cars, in the aerospace industry, and so on and so forth. In the minds of most people, titanium is associated with high-tech and expensive gadgets and bears a futuristic zing to its name.
Sacrificing Deformability for Strength
Different alloys can be crafted to be particularly strong, but like many metals, they tend to be less deformable as they get stronger, limiting their use in some capacities.
Engineers wrote in the journal Advanced Materials that the MIT approach, however, could enable both high strength and high ductility in the alloys.
A Novel Combination
By adjusting both the structure and chemical composition of the alloy, scientists sought to optimize materials for specific applications. They also examined how the structures responded to mechanical processing to evaluate how alloys could be produced at industrial scales.
In one specific combination of composition, structure, and a processing technique known as “cross-rolling,” the alloy essentially deformed “in harmony” — retaining strength without the tendency to crack.
How Aerospace Could Benefit
MIT materials scientist and engineer Cem Tasan told MIT News that although the method still has room for improvement, its potential applications could be widespread, particularly for aerospace — anything where “an improved combination of strength and ductility is
useful.”