It's a Material World | Materials Science Podcast

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Episodes

The show that uncovers why materials science will change the world.

Episodes

Monday Dec 25, 2023

126: Racquet Sports Equipment and Materials Testing (ft. Koki Asahina)

Monday Dec 25, 2023

Watch the full episode here:

https://youtu.be/2R3o5UMJ0SI

When you pick up a racquet at the tennis court, have you ever thought: “this feels great!” Or, “this doesn’t feel so great”? There’s a science to that!

Sports equipment companies rely on feedback from amateur players, professionals, customers, and their employees to design better products by translating subjective data into materials engineering problems. This lets them improve on pre-existing designs on sports gear.

We are joined by Koki Asahina, an MSE student from Georgia Tech who is currently a racket sports engineering intern at Wilson Sporting Goods Company, who tells us all about how the “feel” is crucial to the design and improvement of sports equipment, and the large role played by materials science in this.

🔹How feedback from players and users are used to improve racquet design

🔹How sports equipment are tested using industry-standard experiments

🔹Why simulations are useful to understand the relationship between material properties and their functions

🔹Why we need a worldwide standard of material specifications

🔹And much more!

We hope you enjoy the episode! And as always, let us know what topics you’d like us to cover next!

Learn more about our MSE Career Development Online Course, which includes more industry-specific information and advice.

https://www.mseacademy.com/courses/students-tier-2

Join our Discord community! You can meet other passionate materials scientists and engineers from around the world, discuss the latest breakthroughs in MSE, share materials-related memes, and get career advice from experts in the field.

https://discord.gg/49dCV3W4eN

Check out our MSE-themed merchandise if you want to support us or simply show off your love of materials science!

https://www.itsamaterialworldpodcast.com/shop

For shorter segments and full video podcasts, subscribe to our channel on YouTube. For bloopers, audiograms, and interesting materials science articles, follow us on Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter. Feel free to message us on our social media platforms if you have any feedback or recommendations for future episodes, or email us directly at itsamaterialworldpodcast@gmail.com. Finally, reach out to David Yeh and Punith Upadhya on LinkedIn if you'd like to chat about the latest breakthroughs in MSE!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpUXt6ui8iC5npSizlfIJ2A

https://www.instagram.com/itsamaterialworldpodcast/

http://linkedin.com/company/it-s-a-material-world-podcast/

https://twitter.com/ItsAMatWorldPod

Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed by either guests or hosts in this show are their own, and do not represent the opinions of the companies or organizations for which they are affiliated.

#SportsScience #Tennis #Materials

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Timestamps:

Teaser (0:00 – 0:41)
Intro, life updates, and episode highlights (0:41 – 4:11)
Introducing Koki Asahina (4:11 – 4:57)
Link between physiology and sports equipment (4:57 - 7:25)
Work on Parkinson's rehabilitation (7:25 - 12:16)
Developing a simulated tester at Wilson R&D (12:16 - 14:48)
Importance of ‘feel’ (14:48 - 17:11)
Improving racquets using feedback (17:11 - 25:50)
Simulations in racquet design (25:50 - 31:43)
Need for standardization for materials testing (31:43 - 36:18)
Future of materials engineering in sports equipment (36:18 - 38:41)
Conclusion (38:41 – 39:00)
MSE Academy (39:00 – 40:04)

Monday Nov 20, 2023

125: Driving Nuclear Energy: Data-Driven Materials Science (ft. David Pham)

Monday Nov 20, 2023

A resume mix-up landed a material scientist into a data scientist role. This happy accident led him to discover how data drives the design and operation of materials and experiments.

At its core, nuclear energy is all about generating electricity by converting water to steam to drive a turbine - very, very powerfully. But there’s a ton of data management that goes into its successful operation.

Our guest this week is David Pham, a senior materials engineer at TerraPower, who talks about his current projects Natrium, a Gen IV nuclear reactor, and ARMI, their in-house materials database solution. Join us as we also discuss:

🔹How data from materials, mechanical properties, chemical operations dictates the experiments and models in nuclear processes.

🔹 The importance of rigorous record keeping and data management in a sensitive field like nuclear energy.

🔹 The regulatory and auditing challenges in the nuclear industry, and how it departs from traditional sectors like oil and gas.

🔹 How data science will become more and more important for nuclear and material (and any kind of) engineers in the future.

🔹 And much more!

We hope you enjoy the episode! And as always, let us know what topics you’d like us to cover next!

Learn more about our MSE Career Development Online Course, which includes more industry-specific information and advice.

https://www.mseacademy.com/courses/students-tier-2

https://discord.gg/49dCV3W4eN

Check out our MSE-themed merchandise if you want to support us or simply show off your love of materials science!

https://www.itsamaterialworldpodcast.com/shop

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpUXt6ui8iC5npSizlfIJ2A

https://www.instagram.com/itsamaterialworldpodcast/

http://linkedin.com/company/it-s-a-material-world-podcast/

https://twitter.com/ItsAMatWorldPod

Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed by either guests or hosts in this show are their own, and do not represent the opinions of the companies or organizations for which they are affiliated.

#NuclearPower #DataScience #Materials

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamps:

Teaser (0:00 – 0:48)
Intro, life updates, and episode highlights (0:48 – 5:18)
Introducing David Pham (5:18 – 5:55)
Dispelling myths about nuclear energy (5:55 - 7:29)
Data management at TerraPower (7:29 - 8:32)
Regulations in the nuclear energy sector (8:32 - 10:06)
How data dictates design and operations (10:06 - 12:16)
Auditing the data and calculations (12:16 - 15:41)
Project Natrium and materials selection (15:41 - 24:10)
Importance of data science for materials engineers (24:10 - 28:05)
Data sources and quality management (28:05 - 41:18)
Advice to data scientists and aspiring engineers (41:10 - 52:05)
Conclusion (52:05 – 52:27)
MSE Academy (52:27 – 53:33)

Monday Nov 13, 2023

124: Shape Memory Alloys: Flexing for Safer Innovation (ft. Dr. Habib Alavi)

Monday Nov 13, 2023

We hope you enjoy the episode! And as always, let us know what topics you’d like us to cover next!

Learn more about our MSE Career Development Online Course, which includes more industry-specific information and advice.

https://www.mseacademy.com/courses/students-tier-2

https://discord.gg/49dCV3W4eN

Check out our MSE-themed merchandise if you want to support us or simply show off your love of materials science!

https://www.itsamaterialworldpodcast.com/shop

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpUXt6ui8iC5npSizlfIJ2A

https://www.instagram.com/itsamaterialworldpodcast/

http://linkedin.com/company/it-s-a-material-world-podcast/

https://twitter.com/ItsAMatWorldPod

Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed by either guests or hosts in this show are their own, and do not represent the opinions of the companies or organizations for which they are affiliated.

Monday Nov 06, 2023

123: From Biology & Industrial Design to MSE: Seamlessly Shifting Roles (ft. Aaron Nesser)

Monday Nov 06, 2023

We hope you enjoy the episode! And as always, let us know what topics you’d like us to cover next!

Learn more about our MSE Career Development Online Course, which includes more industry-specific information and advice.

https://www.mseacademy.com/courses/students-tier-2

https://discord.gg/49dCV3W4eN

Check out our MSE-themed merchandise if you want to support us or simply show off your love of materials science!

https://www.itsamaterialworldpodcast.com/shop

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpUXt6ui8iC5npSizlfIJ2A

https://www.instagram.com/itsamaterialworldpodcast/

http://linkedin.com/company/it-s-a-material-world-podcast/

https://twitter.com/ItsAMatWorldPod

Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed by either guests or hosts in this show are their own, and do not represent the opinions of the companies or organizations for which they are affiliated.

Monday Oct 30, 2023

122: Failure Analysis as a Key Metallurgical Skill (ft. Nirbhay Tandel)

Monday Oct 30, 2023

We hope you enjoy the episode! And as always, let us know what topics you’d like us to cover next!

Learn more about our MSE Career Development Online Course, which includes more industry-specific information and advice.

https://www.mseacademy.com/courses/students-tier-2

https://discord.gg/49dCV3W4eN

Check out our MSE-themed merchandise if you want to support us or simply show off your love of materials science!

https://www.itsamaterialworldpodcast.com/shop

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpUXt6ui8iC5npSizlfIJ2A

https://www.instagram.com/itsamaterialworldpodcast/

http://linkedin.com/company/it-s-a-material-world-podcast/

https://twitter.com/ItsAMatWorldPod

Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed by either guests or hosts in this show are their own, and do not represent the opinions of the companies or organizations for which they are affiliated.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamps:

- Teaser (0:00 – 0:53)

- Intro, life updates, and episode highlights (0:53 – 7:12)

- Introducing Niks Tandel (7:12 – 8:03)

- The importance of metallurgy (8:03 – 9:48)

- Typical day of a metallurgist & working from home (9:48 – 14:20)

- The niche field of spring wiring (14:20 – 22:07)

- Tempering and heat treatments (22:07 – 25:45)

- The importance of failure analysis (25:45 – 28:54)

- Increasing revenue by 100% in 1 year (28:54 – 31:45)

- Innovations in metallurgy within 10 years (31:45 – 33:55)

- Advice for MSE’s to excel in failure analysis (33:55 – 36:37)

- Conclusion (36:37 – 37:37)

- MSE Academy (37:37 – 38:42)

Monday Oct 09, 2023

121: Evolution of Organic Electronics & Electronic Packaging (ft. Dr. Benedict San Jose)

Monday Oct 09, 2023

We hope you enjoy the episode! And as always, let us know what topics you’d like us to cover next!

Learn more about our MSE Career Development Online Course, which includes more industry-specific information and advice.

https://www.mseacademy.com/courses/students-tier-2

https://discord.gg/49dCV3W4eN

Check out our MSE-themed merchandise if you want to support us or simply show off your love of materials science!

https://www.itsamaterialworldpodcast.com/shop

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpUXt6ui8iC5npSizlfIJ2A

https://www.instagram.com/itsamaterialworldpodcast/

http://linkedin.com/company/it-s-a-material-world-podcast/

https://twitter.com/ItsAMatWorldPod

Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed by either guests or hosts in this show are their own, and do not represent the opinions of the companies or organizations for which they are affiliated.

Monday Sep 25, 2023

120: Metal Additive Manufacturing: Ultrasonic Energy vs Heat Energy (ft. Dr. Anagh Deshpande)

Monday Sep 25, 2023

We hope you enjoy the episode! And as always, let us know what topics you’d like us to cover next!

Learn more about our MSE Career Development Online Course, which includes more industry-specific information and advice.

https://www.mseacademy.com/courses/students-tier-2

https://discord.gg/49dCV3W4eN

Check out our MSE-themed merchandise if you want to support us or simply show off your love of materials science!

https://www.itsamaterialworldpodcast.com/shop

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpUXt6ui8iC5npSizlfIJ2A

https://www.instagram.com/itsamaterialworldpodcast/

http://linkedin.com/company/it-s-a-material-world-podcast/

https://twitter.com/ItsAMatWorldPod

Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed by either guests or hosts in this show are their own, and do not represent the opinions of the companies or organizations for which they are affiliated.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamps:

- Teaser (0:00 – 0:57)

- Intro, travel, and episode highlights (0:57 – 4:53)

- Introducing Dr. Anagh Deshpande (4:53 – 5:32)

- Metal vs. plastic additive manufacturing (5:32 – 9:08)

- Availability of metal 3D printers (9:08 – 12:42)

- Ultrasonic vs. lasers for melting metal (12:42 – 15:27)

- Anagh’s story (15:27 – 18:36)

- Challenged in large-scale metal AM (18:36 – 20:37)

- Materials that work with metal AM (20:37 – 24:54)

- Speed of printing vs. resolution (24:54 – 29:39)

- Pitching ideas to investors (29:39 – 31:51)

- To use or not to use powder (31:51 – 33:37)

- Advice: getting involved in metal AM (33:37 – 35:21)

- Conclusion (35:21 – 36:01)

- MSE Academy (36:01 – 37:07)

Monday Sep 18, 2023

119: Disruption vs. Incrementalization in the Energy Transition (ft. Dr. Reed Eisenhart)

Monday Sep 18, 2023

What does it take to completely revolutionize the global energy infrastructure?

This is the Energy Transition.

We’ve done it before.

Once the value of gasoline was discovered and understood, gasoline production increased by orders of magnitude within just a few decades. How does this compare with the need to reach net-zero carbon emissions as soon as 2050? Are solar panels, batteries, and biofuels capable of such a meteoric rise?

In today’s episode, we welcome Dr. Reed Eisenhart, an Independent Consultant for Energy Transition Technologies. With him, we discuss all things Energy Transition, specifically:

🔹 What is the Energy Transition and how MSE’s can fill key roles in it.

🔹 The differences between innovating iteratively by improving existing technology (incrementalization) and creating something new (disruption).

🔹 How to determine if a new technology or invention is worth pursuing.

🔹 Key technical differences between sodium ion and lithium ion batteries.

🔹 And much more!

We hope you enjoy the episode! And as always, let us know what topics you’d like us to cover next!

Learn more about our MSE Career Development Online Course, which includes more industry-specific information and advice.

https://www.mseacademy.com/courses/students-tier-2

https://discord.gg/49dCV3W4eN

Check out our MSE-themed merchandise if you want to support us or simply show off your love of materials science!

https://www.itsamaterialworldpodcast.com/shop

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpUXt6ui8iC5npSizlfIJ2A

https://www.instagram.com/itsamaterialworldpodcast/

http://linkedin.com/company/it-s-a-material-world-podcast/

https://twitter.com/ItsAMatWorldPod

Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed by either guests or hosts in this show are their own, and do not represent the opinions of the companies or organizations for which they are affiliated.

Watch the full episode here:
https://youtu.be/0fySE54PGB8

#EnergyTransition #Innovation #NetZero

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamps:

- Teaser (0:00 – 0:51)

- Intro, travel, and episode highlights (0:51 – 4:32)

- Introducing Dr. Reed Eisenhart (4:32 – 5:27)

- Reed’s work: energy, batteries, and more (5:27 – 7:34)

- Moving from industry to consulting (7:34 – 11:39)

- What is the Energy Transition (11:39 – 22:09)

- Improving current tech or making something new (22:09 – 31:31)

- Examples of disruption vs. incrementalization (31:31 – 36:59)

- Answering the question “which technology is worth pursuing?” (36:59 – 41:13)

- Important upcoming MSE technologies (41:13 – 44:40)

- Sodium ion batteries vs. lithium ion batteries (44:40 – 50:03)

- Advice: getting involved in the energy transition (50:03 – 54:51)

- Conclusion (54:51 – 55:12)

- MSE Academy (55:12 – 56:17)

Monday Sep 11, 2023

118: A Program That Predicts the Properties of New Polymers (ft. Dr. Rishi Gurnani)

Monday Sep 11, 2023

Bakelite was discovered in 1907. Nylon was discovered in 1935, polyethylene in 1936, Kevlar in 1966. All of these discoveries were revolutionary and had years of work put into their discovery. Each major discovery is years apart. Maybe scientists took a trial-and-error approach, trying new ideas until they worked. Maybe some materials were discovered by accident. What if discovering new polymers was possible in just a few minutes?

In today’s episode, we discuss AI-assisted polymer discovery with Dr. Rishi Gurnani, Technology Development Lead at Matmerize. Check out the links below to see how to use Matmerize’s AI tool, PolymRize. Specifically, we discuss:

🔹 Approaches for how MSE’s can learn coding.

🔹 Case studies of how AI can assist in polymer discovery.

🔹 The difficulty of predicting the properties of polymers, given the interdependence of many material properties.

🔹 Challenges in AI, like getting high-quality datasets and overcoming the AI learning curve.

🔹 And much more!

We hope you enjoy the episode! And as always, let us know what topics you’d like us to cover next!

#PolymerDiscovery #ArtificialIntelligence #MaterialsScience

Learn more about our MSE Career Development Online Course, which includes more industry-specific information and advice.

https://www.mseacademy.com/courses/students-tier-2

https://discord.gg/49dCV3W4eN

Check out our MSE-themed merchandise if you want to support us or simply show off your love of materials science!

https://www.itsamaterialworldpodcast.com/shop

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpUXt6ui8iC5npSizlfIJ2A

https://www.instagram.com/itsamaterialworldpodcast/

http://linkedin.com/company/it-s-a-material-world-podcast/

https://twitter.com/ItsAMatWorldPod

Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed by either guests or hosts in this show are their own, and do not represent the opinions of the companies or organizations for which they are affiliated.

Watch the full episode here:
https://youtu.be/srLJlK67tXc

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamps:

- Teaser (0:00 - 0:47)

- Intro, travel, and episode highlights (0:47 – 5:24)

- Introducing Dr. Rishi Gurnani (5:24 – 6:11)

- AI in polymer discovery (6:11 – 8:17)

- Matmerize (8:17 – 10:22)

- Functional use of AI product (10:22 – 12:52)

- Work environments of industry vs. academia (12:52 – 15:07)

- Rishi’s work in Matmerize (15:07 – 18:42)

- Communication & complexity in AI (18:42 – 21:01)

- Learning coding in MSE (21:01 – 23:58)

- Key learnings (23:58 – 26:09)

- Case studies (26:09 – 28:20)

- AI with inter-dependent material properties (28:20 – 29:51)

- Gauging confidence in AI models (29:51 – 32:23)

- Intimidation and learning curve of AI (32:23 – 35:35)

- Technical communication with clients (35:35 – 37:14)

- Getting good-quality datasets for AI (37:14 – 39:04)

- Challenges in AI (39:04 – 42:34)

- Advice (42:34 – 44:12)

- Conclusion (44:12 – 44:37)

- MSE Academy (44:37 – 45:42)

Monday Sep 04, 2023

117: Choosing Ethical and Environmentally Compliant Materials (ft. Caitlin Hirschler)

Monday Sep 04, 2023

We hope you enjoy the episode! And as always, let us know what topics you’d like us to cover next!

Learn more about our MSE Career Development Online Course, which includes more industry-specific information and advice.

https://www.mseacademy.com/courses/students-tier-2

https://discord.gg/49dCV3W4eN

Check out our MSE-themed merchandise if you want to support us or simply show off your love of materials science!

https://www.itsamaterialworldpodcast.com/shop

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpUXt6ui8iC5npSizlfIJ2A

https://www.instagram.com/itsamaterialworldpodcast/

http://linkedin.com/company/it-s-a-material-world-podcast/

https://twitter.com/ItsAMatWorldPod

Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed by either guests or hosts in this show are their own, and do not represent the opinions of the companies or organizations for which they are affiliated.

Watch the full episode here:
https://youtu.be/Zg_NEsld4KA

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamps:

Teaser (0:00 - 0:42)
Intro, travel, and episode highlights (0:42 - 4:55)
Introducing Caitlin Hirschler (4:55 - 5:49)
What is environmental compliance engineering (5:49 - 11:25)
Compliance decision that aren’t black-or-white (11:25 - 15:14)
Useful skills for environmental compliance roles (15:14 - 18:54)
Emotional intelligence as an engineering skill (18:54 - 25:14)
Sustainability vs. regulatory compliance (25:14 - 26:52)
Responsibility when regulations are lax (26:52 - 32:07)
How to challenge corporate regulatory processes (32:07 - 34:37)
Environmental compliance in 5-10 years (34:37 - 36:57)
Example with Caitlin’s role and company (36:57 - 38:19)
Advice on the corporate ladder (38:19 - 41:05)
Conclusion (41:05 - 41:43)
MSE Academy (41:34 - 42:48)