engineering

Materials genome

Materials genome is a engineering topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Materials genome rather than just read about it. In short: Materials genome is an analogy to genomes in biology, but in a conceptual sense: the many important phases, defects, and processes that make up engineered materials are the "genome" of materials science. The Materials Genome Initiative (MGI) is a federal, multi-agency effort to design, manufacture, and deploy materials and materials-based technologies significantly faster and cheaper than ever before.

Key takeaways

Materials genome belongs to engineering; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Materials genome to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Materials genome from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Materials genome is an analogy to genomes in biology, but in a conceptual sense: the many important phases, defects, and processes that make up engineered materials are the "genome" of materials science. The Materials Genome Initiative (MGI) is a federal, multi-agency effort to design, manufacture, and deploy materials and materials-based technologies significantly faster and cheaper than ever before. The MGI partially references the Human Genome Project, but only conceptually, and is a broader and less targeted effort.

History The name "materials genome" was coined in December 2002 by Dr. Zi-Kui Liu who incorporated the company MaterialsGenome, Inc. in Pennsylvania, USA, and filed the trademark protection on March 5, 2004 (78512752). The Certificate of Registration (Reg. No. 4,224,035) was issued by the Patent and Trademark office on October 16, 2012. In 2005, Zi-Kui Liu and Pierre Villars jointly crafted a proposal on "Materials Genome Foundation" when they met in Switzerland. In January 2006, they presented the proposal to a panel organized by ASM International. In 2008, United States Automotive Materials Partnership (USAMP) supported by the United States Department of Energy funded a smaller version of the concept of "Materials Genome Foundation", which resulted in the development of the software package ESPEI. In June 2011, the name "materials genome" was used in the United States National Science and Technology Council "Materials Genome Initiative" in consent with MaterialsGenome, Inc. In 2014, Liu published an article to reflect "Perspective on Materials Genome" in English, and in Chinese In early 2015, Chenxi Qian, Todd Siler and Geoffrey Ozin jointly published a paper in Small, discussing about the possibilities and limitations of a nanomaterials genome, expanding concept of the materials genome by incorporating the important parameters of nanomaterials such as size and shape information into the roadmap. In May 2016, a group led by Sorelle A. Friedler, Joshua Schrier and Alexander J. Norquist claimed the first machine-learning-assisted materials discovery, as an example of humanity's early attempts to design and develop materials via data-driven approaches proposed by the Materials Genome Initiative. In May 2017, progress on the Materials Genome Initiative was reviewed in 2017 at a workshop sponsored by NSF and future directions were identified.

References

External links https://www.nist.gov/mgi https://www.matse.psu.edu/directory/zi-kui-liu https://www.fordham.edu/info/28651/joshua_schrier

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Materials genome

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Materials genome claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In engineering, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Materials genome before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Materials genome ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Materials genome

In research: Materials genome appears in engineering research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Materials genome in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Materials genome is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Materials, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Materials genome outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Materials genome in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Materials genome means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Materials genome out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Materials genome in simple terms?

Why does Materials genome matter?

Because it connects several engineering ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Materials genome?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Materials genome.