Jinwoo Hwang
Ohio State University, OH·Materials Science
Metallic glasses are metals whose atoms are frozen in a disordered arrangement rather than a regular crystal. They can be extremely strong, resist corrosion and have useful magnetic properties, with possible uses in electronics, aerospace and nanotechnology.
- Fields
Materials Science
Engineering
Physics
- Topics
metallic glasses
amorphous metals
deformation
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jul 2027
What they work on
- Use 4D scanning transmission electron microscopy (4D-STEM) on metallic glasses with slight compositional differences to identify dominant medium-range order structures (local atom-packing patterns), their relaxation times and evolution pathways.
- Apply machine learning to angular correlation functions from 4D-STEM data to determine the types, volume fractions and spatial distributions of medium-range order structures.
- Extend 4D-STEM into the time domain to track thermal relaxation of medium-range order and relate it to activation energies of shear transformation zones, the atom clusters that rearrange under stress.
- Connect experiments to atomistic and mesoscale simulations to test how uneven local structures and activation energies drive softening and shear band localization in aged and rejuvenated glasses.
More about the research
Their weakness is that they often fail suddenly. Deformation concentrates in narrow bands instead of spreading out. This project asks how the arrangement of atoms controls that behavior, and why some metallic glasses bend more before breaking than others.
Why it matters
Metallic glasses could serve as strong, corrosion-resistant materials in electronics, aerospace and nanotechnology, but sudden brittle failure limits their use. By linking atomic-scale structure to how deformation spreads or concentrates, this work could guide manufacturers in designing more ductile, reliable metallic glasses. It could also show how heat and mechanical treatments improve their toughness.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Michael Falk
Johns Hopkins University, MD·Materials Science
Use machine learning to derive structural order parameters of amorphous metals from electron nanodiffraction and atomistic simulation data, linking measurements made at different scales.
Daniel Bediako
University of California-Berkeley, CA·Chemistry·Early-career
Synthesize vanadium-intercalated TMD crystals, which have vanadium atoms inserted between layers, that are predicted to be altermagnets, using solid-state synthesis and crystal growth.
Megan Holtz
Colorado School of Mines, CO·Materials Science·Early-career
Control symmetry and symmetry-breaking in the polar ordering of hexagonal ABO3 oxides using atomically precise molecular beam epitaxy, aiming to stabilize new ferroelectric functions and emergent phenomena.
The school
Ohio State University: 71 labs on PI Pages, $1.6B a year on research, 882 research doctorates a year.
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