Metallic Coatings

Coating materials, specifically metallic-base coatings, can exhibit enhanced and interesting mechanical, thermal, magnetic and catalytic properties when their structures are engineered in micro and nano length scales. For example, in the case of Ni-base coatings, the strength of the material has been proved to increase almost ten times when their grain structures are modified to nano-size. On the other hand, the creep strength of superalloys is enhanced as their grain size increases. The development of metallic coatings is therefore particularly interesting and can pose significant impacts on advancement of engineering materials and applications.

In this area, we investigate and develop several coating techniques including electrodeposition and dip-coating for productions of nanostructured and alloy materials, which include nanocrystalline materials, nano-composites, and galvanized steels. The materials properties of interest include strength, corrosion and wear resistance.