An introductory materials engineering course is expected to lay the foundation for providing insights into materials behavior so that manufacturing engineers are able to select, optimize, and control appropriate manufacturing processes. However, the task of teaching a materials engineering course is complex and difficult due to the following facts: The subject matter draws upon various disciplines such as physics, chemistry, and mathematics. Students may lack the ability to visualize and rationalize about the abstract three-dimensional arrangement of atoms that make up the structure of materials). Behavior of materials is influenced by phenomena occurring at varying length scales; e.g., nano-scale atomic structure, meso-scale at the level of individual crystals, micro-scale at the level of polycrystalline, multiphase materials to bulk scale at the level of thousands of tons of a material. Students find it difficult to navigate through the correlations between the differing levels of structural detail with materials properties and performance. The relationships between processing, microstructure and properties are highly non-linear. Consequently, considerable material data exists in form of complex diagrams (e.g. a variety of X-Y plots depicting process - property relationships, equilibrium diagrams, continuous cooling transformation -CCT and Time -Temperature -Transformation -TTT diagrams) that are difficult read, interpret and apply. The spectrum of available materials broadens every day from well-established materials such as iron, copper, and aluminum alloys to hybrid, intelligent, bio, and nano materials. The appropriate choice of material for a given application is becoming complex due to contemporary additional requirements of the total life-cycle costing approach, which includes the energy, environmental, and recycling considerations.
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