"Engineering Toughness in Advanced Ceramics"

This event is sponsored by FAMU-FSU College of Engineering Department of Materials Science and Engineering.

Abstract: Due to their susceptibility to brittle fracture, the use of advanced carbide, oxide, and nitride ceramics as structural materials in industrial applications has remained limited. This brittleness arises primarily from restricted atomic motion within the rigid ionic or covalently bonded structures of ceramics, which hinders the activation of plasticity mechanisms such as dislocation motion needed to accommodate plastic deformation. Several intrinsic and extrinsic strategies have been implemented to improve the mechanical performance of ceramics, including micro-alloying, grain boundary engineering, impurity engineering, and secondary reinforcement. Although improvements in toughness and strength have been successfully demonstrated at the microscale, translating these enhancements into ceramics larger than a few centimeters has remained challenging. In this talk, Dr. Zare will review a decade of research aimed at enhancing the mechanical performance of advanced boron carbide (B₄C) ceramics and introduce a novel approach aimed at overcoming the limitations of current methodologies. Boron carbide is an ultrahard, lightweight material that is highly attractive for use in aerospace, space, and protective systems, where weight reduction and high strength are critical.

Arezoo Zare, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor

School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering

Washington State University

Speaker Bio: Arezoo Zare is an Assistant Professor in Mechanical and Materials Engineering at Washington State University. She earned her Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Oklahoma State University and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Johns Hopkins University. Her research focuses on mechanics of materials in extreme environments, including high strain rates, cryogenic temperatures, and large radiation fluxes. Her work is supported by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Washington State Joint Center for Aerospace Technology Innovation, and Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. She is recognized as the Washington State University’s Dean’s Faculty Fellow, and is also the recipient of the APS Early Career Travel Award and TMS Poster Competition honors. Her work has been published in Acta Materialia, Journal of the American Ceramics Society, and other leading journals.