New Composite Metal Foams Developed in MAE
November 5, 2007
From NCSU News

VIDEO OF COMPOSITE METAL FOAM RESEARCH

New composite metal foams can revolutionize the fields of blast mitigation, seismic control and crash protection in cars, trains, marine structures, space- and aircraft. To address the increasing needs of the aerospace, naval, automotive, army and other industries for advanced materials to provide the lightweight and high strength/damping capacity, to be used in producing safety devices, an NSF CAREER researcher, Dr. Afsaneh Rabiei of North Carolina State University, invented a new ultra high-strength composite metal foam (CMF).

The application of new composite metal foams in production of novel safety devices like structural seismic protection devices, ballistic armors and blast protection devices, as well as cars, trains, marine structures, aircraft and spacecraft, crash boxes, and dampers for spent nuclear fuel casks transferring nuclear waste can revolutionize their performance and protection rates. Through a superior energy absorption capacity together with a low density these materials can save lives, improve performance, but also benefit society by improving fuel economy, energy consumption, and reducing the maintenance of moving structures.

This research was funded by the National Science Foundation.