Structured and Applied Materials

The Advanced Concepts Laboratory’s research in materials is focused on the enhancement of transport and mechanical properties through the synthesis of hierarchical, often biologically inspired materials systems, with a focus on manufacturing. These efforts have led to wide array of applications, including high temperature acoustically absorptive microchanneled structures, reticulated metal foams with tailored permeability for microscale evaporative cooling, diamond-metal matrix composite thermal shims, glass-matrix nanocomposite scintillators for gamma-ray spectroscopy, magnetic nanocomposite, micropatterned dielectrics and biologically inspired reversible attachment systems. In support of these activities, ACL maintains versatile and extensive materials processing, fabrication and characterization capabilities.