Richard Vaia
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Richard Vaia A long-term advocate of materials science and engineering By Humaira Taz
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hen I think of materials science and engineering (MS&E), I think of it as a relatively new discipline—never quite sure if it is more physics, chemistry, math, or engineering. Truth be told, it is a combination of all of these diverse fields and many more. It touches all parts of 21st century life, from clean energy, telecommunications, and information, to health care, transportation, and defense. Also, it is not as new as I thought—people have been studying MS&E since the early 1960s, and the discovery, use, and manufacture of new materials are arguably as old as human civilization, providing the foundation to the Stone, Bronze, and Iron Ages! Richard Vaia, the US Air Force Senior Scientist for Emergent Materials, is one of MS&E’s pioneers. Vaia completed his bachelor’s education in materials in 1991 at Cornell University, after selecting the school based on its MS&E program. “The department had a feeling of excitement. It seemed that everything depended on materials; technologies were limited by materials and processing; and future innovations were going to come from new materials. This spanned from electronics, to aerospace, to the chemical industry, polymers, and medicine,” said Rich. Rich’s interest in MS&E came from a combination of his father’s work as a metallurgist for Westinghouse and his fascination with math and science classes throughout high school. His career at the US Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) is a direct result of his passion for new materials and their applications in cutting-edge technologies. “It works at the intersection of all types of materials, all types of aerospace systems, and problems that span from fundamental research to challenges to our current systems. Daily we interface and collaborate with global leaders, from academia, industry, and our Nation’s warfighters,” he said. Regarding the evolution of MS&E during the last two decades, materials are the “stuff” that enable new components for future technology. “It is these new abilities in the innovator’s tool box that expand creativity and create new markets and technologies—it is what enables science fiction to become everyday fact.” MS&E’s scientific core, and what it brings to materials R&D, is a fundamental understanding of the interrelationships among composition, processing, and structure and how these affect properties, performance, and manufacturability. The biggest change to MS&E is the infusion of tools from different disciplines. “Activities and practices, such as big data, analytics, robotics, autonomy, artificial intelligence, and biotechnology will move to the center of MS&E. The “how” MS&E is done today, and will be done in even two years, is drastically different from 10 or even five years ago,” Rich concluded. While the change in “how” MS&E is done is a positive step, it can simultaneously be a challenge. “The field must ensure its future leaders not only understand the fundamentals of structure–
processing–composition relation
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