TMS2018 All-Conference Plenary

Don’t miss this rare TMS Annual Meeting & Exhibition all-conference plenary session and the chance to preview a visionary future for materials science and engineering with one of the leaders in the computational materials design revolution.

"Materials and ICME as an Enabler for Sustainable Energy and Interplanetary Travel"

Date: Monday, March 12
Time: Noon to 1 p.m.
Location: Phoenix Convention Center, West Ballroom 301

Materials challenges abound in the pursuit of interplanetary settlement and the transition to sustainable energy here on Earth. Lightweight structures that reliably operate in the extremes of space for long durations, high-temperature materials for reliable reuse in highly efficient rocket engines, advanced materials for body structure, and advanced energy storage that can be efficiently manufactured in high volumes, represent just a few of the opportunities for materials innovation to drive these ambitious goals. Not only do these materials need to be highly capable, they need to be cost effective and scalable in volume manufacturing.

Transition to sustainable electric vehicles for transportation will involve replacing a fleet of hundreds of millions of petroleum fueled vehicles as quickly as possible. In addition, installed renewable electricity production will have to scale in a similar fashion to ensure those vehicles are powered by the cleanest energy possible. Technical achievements have also shown we can reach and explore beyond the confines of our planet. Many new technologies will need to be employed and perfected to allow living in the harsh conditions of other worlds and in space.

The new materials and manufacturing methods enabling these goals will need to make greater leaps in capability and in timeframes never before achieved. Fortunately, materials engineering has also made great strides in the last decade, embracing the integration of computational methods and advanced systems design into a framework we now call Integrated Computational Materials Engineering.

It’s a good time to be a materials engineer.

About the Presenter:

Charlie Kuehmann currently leads the materials engineering organizations at both Tesla and SpaceX, driving material solutions to enable the world’s transition to a sustainable future, the commercialization of space, and a multi-planetary civilization.

Kuehmann has been a leader in computational materials design since its inception, creating one of the first companies dedicated to commercializing this new technology. As a result, he’s innovated an array of alloys, including high-performance steels for race cars, aluminum alloys for aircraft, gear materials for helicopters, high-temperature alloys for turbine engines, and even bubble-gum. Kuehmann has more recently brought computational materials design technology to the consumer electronics industry, and through his current positions, to electric vehicles and spacecraft.