Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) have outgrown their traditional perception as being only porous molecular sponges to becoming a versatile platform for electronics and photonics applications. The November issue of MRS Bulletin highlights the state of the art of the rapidly growing field of MOFs applied to electronics and photonics, far beyond conventional gas storage and gas separation applications. Computational modeling of these structures will prove critical for guiding the rapid development of this field.

Talks:

Intrinsically Conducting MOFs
Deanna D’Alessandro | The University of Sydney

Guest@MOF: Achieving Emergent Properties for Electronic and Energy Conversion Device Applications
Alec Talin | Sandia National Laboratories

Many materials researchers strive to contribute to technologies that are more “sustainable” than ones we use today. Often, these efforts focus on improving resource efficiency by creating materials and devices that are less energy, water, and material intensive. But for more sustainable technologies to be commercially viable and have a global impact, there are additional considerations, including raw material availability, product lifetime, social and economic dimensions, and how best to balance adverse short-term impacts with potential long-term gains. Instructors Tatiana Vakhitova and Alan Rae show how to incorporate sustainability principles into your research in a more comprehensive way while considering the real-world application of these principles to product design and manufacture. This webinar is aimed at materials researchers of all career stages, from students and postdocs to faculty and industry researchers.

Materials with hierarchical structures represent a promising approach to enhance performance far beyond what can be achieved using composite structures, to add new functionalities and to adapt to special requirements. The September issue of MRS Bulletin, “Hierarchical materials,” provides an overview of aspects related to the analysis and development of hierarchical materials. Using biomaterials and multiscale modeling as starting point, the authors seek to enhance the performance and add new functionalities to hierarchical materials for lightweight structural and energy applications, catalysis, and machining of materials.

Materials enable technologies and infrastructure that play a crucial role in worldwide development and that increasingly impact the earth’s climate, water, and resources. To identify pathways towards sustainable development, students and researchers must appreciate the multiple factors involved using a systems perspective. What is the balance sheet of impacts considering material sourcing, manufacturing, operation and end of life? What are the direct, indirect and unintended consequences? Understanding these issues requires insights across disciplines and effective means to engage participants in topics that are often outside their “comfort zone” of knowledge. This webinar presents effective means to teach these approaches, and should appeal to today’s materials scientists, engineers, and technology managers who seek to identify, articulate, and implement changes that improve sustainability.

Synchrotron radiation has evolved tremendously in recent decades in terms of sources, instrumentation, and applications in materials studies. The June 2016 issue of MRS Bulletin provides an overview of the state-of-the-art of synchrotron research as it relates to materials research. The articles in the issue focus on evolving and new techniques as well as applications including Laue microdiffraction, high-energy x-ray diffraction on battery materials, synchrotron radiation in high-pressure research, x-ray dark-field microscopy, and x-ray absorption spectroscopy applied to energy research. The talks in this webinar will complement the articles in the MRS Bulletin.

Talks will include:

Revealing what Lies Beneath: Microstructural Imaging using High-Energy X-rays
Jonathan D. Almer, Argonne National Laboratory

Multitiscale 3D characterization with dark-field x-ray microscopy
Hugh Simons, Technical University of Denmark

Nucleation is the first step in the formation of most materials, simple and complex. The simple picture of nucleation, the classical nucleation theory that has prevailed for more than a century, does not account for complex multistep nucleation pathways observed in recent years in experiments and simulations. Much of what scientists thought they knew in the last century has been called into question thanks to the in situ experimental and computational tools available today. The articles in the May, 2016 MRS Bulletin illustrate and describe the many complex nucleation pathways seen across a range of material systems. Understanding the full range of this behavior is important for fundamental science, but will ultimately benefit a wide range of technologies by enabling the synthesis of new, functional materials. The presentations in this webinar will complement the articles in the MRS Bulletin.

Talks will include:

An In Situ View of Direct and Two-Step Nucleation Dynamics
Jim De Yoreo, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Simulations of Calcite Crystaliization on Self-Assembled Monolayers
Dorothy Duffy, University College London

First-principles Studies of Li Nucleation on Graphene
Mingjie Liu, Rice University

Sponsored By:

Talks will include:

Atomistic Study of Twinning-Associated Boundaries in HCP Metals
Jian Wang, University of Nebraska-Lincoln

Strengthening Mechanisms of Highly Textured Cu/Co and Ag/Al Nanolayers with High Density Twins and Stacking Faults
Xinghang Zhang, Texas A&M University