MSE Colloquium September 23: Matthew Daly, Tracking Deformation Over Microstructural Length Scales: Looking Beyond Incipient Events

Abstract

Despite considerable progress in the scientific understanding of deformation processes, the mechanical properties of engineered materials remain limited to fractions of their theoretical values. One of the persistent barriers impeding new breakthroughs in mechanical property offerings is the problem of scaling. That is, while materials often exhibit near-theoretical properties at the nanoscale, the preservation of these exceptional characteristics over bulk length-scales remains a pervasive challenge. In response to this issue, my group focuses on understanding the evolution of deformation mechanisms, with a specific emphasis on examining the emergence of mesoscale defect structures from incipient deformation events. These efforts are supported by a complementary combination of experimental and computational techniques such as small-scale in situ mechanical testing and targeted mesoscale simulations. This suite of tools is specifically designed to capture the essential physics of deformation processes and then pass that information up the relevant length scales of microstructure. This focus on scaling rules and the aggregate effects of deformation processes underpins the broader objective of my work, which is to develop microstructures with new structure-property relationships that overcome traditional strength-ductility trade-offs.

Bio

Dr. Matthew Daly is currently an Assistant Professor of Materials Engineering at the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC). Prior to this appointment, he completed his postdoctoral work at Northwestern University through a fellowship from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. He received his Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of Toronto in 2017, and his Bachelor’s and Master’s of Applied Science degrees in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Waterloo. His research interests include: the mechanics of nanostructured materials; advanced materials and microstructure design; in situ characterization techniques; mechanical metallurgy and atomistic modeling. Dr. Daly earned the Governor General of Canada Gold Medal for his research in 2012, and more recently is the recipient of a 2022 NSF CAREER Award. He is an active member of the TMS and SES professional societies. Additionally, he has won several awards for his teaching at UIC, such as the Edmund Burke Faculty Award for teaching excellence in 2019. Further details on Dr. Daly’s research and his group’s activities (The Advanced Materials and Microstructures Lab) are available at amml.lab.uic.edu.

Zoom link
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