Materials Technology

Surface integrity plays an important role in mitigating the degradation and failure of structural metal alloy components, especially in corrosion and/or erosion environments. This collection specializes in new developments of materials and technologies within the scope of surface engineering and protective coating towards biocompatible applications.

Ever-growing additive manufacturing (AM) of structural metal alloy components are pushing the requirement for surface finishing at an unprecedent pace. The rough surface of AM components adversely influences their fatigue life while dross particles breakoff from AM components may cause local contaminations of their serving environment. These intrinsic characters, together with lack-of-fusion defects, bring up a great challenge for AM components to serve, e.g., biomedical implants, in corrosion and/or erosion environments. On the other hand, one of the most important advantages of AM is rapid manufacturing of customized structural components with complex geometries. Traditional methods may lose their efficiencies or even fail in surface finishing of such AM components with complex surface geometries. In this light, material and technology development for surface finishing of AM components has been attracting increasing research interest worldwide, driven not only by the technical challenges but also by the industrial requirements. Surface engineering and protective coating are basically two dominant technicial routes for surface finsihing of AM components. Understanding the relationship among the process, micronstructure, and performance plays a key role in both surface engineering and protective coating. Theoretical modlling and simulations, as well as their assistance by merchine learning and artificial intenligence, have been emerging as a strategic tool for accelerating the material selection and process design/optimization.

This article collection will be structured along the following main topics, but not limited, in materials and technologies towards biocompatible applications:

• Surface Engineering
  1. Cold-working
  2. Laser treatment
  3. Chemical polishing
  4. Electrochemical treatment
• Protective Coating
  1. Physical vapor deposition
  2. Chemical vapor deposition
  3. Atomic layer deposition
  4. Anodization and plasma electrolytic oxidation
  5. Hydrothermal and wet chemical methods
  6. Electrical and electroless plating
• Corrosion and erosion
  1. Corrosion and erosion environment simulations
  2. Corrosion inhibitors developments
• Tribology and tribocorrosion
  1. Friction and wear testing
  2. Interface bonding strengthening
• New concepts and strategies in surface finishing
  1. Surface functionalization
  2. New materials and processing techniques

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Dr Hongfei Liu is a principal scientist at the Institute of Materials Research and Engineering (IMRE). He received his PhD degree (Condensed-State Physics) in 2001 from the Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. He held an adjunct assistant professor position at the Dept. Mater. Sci. Eng. National University of Singapore during 2009-2011. His research focuses on design, process and characterization of thin films and nanomaterials for electronic and optoelectronic applications; laser-assisted deposition/coating of alloys and composites for industrial applications; surface engineering of structural metal alloys; and protective coating for medical devices, aerospace components, and civil infrastructural systems. He has published over 200 papers in peer-reviewed journals. He is a scientific committee member of international conference on advanced surface enhancement (INCASE) and an editorial member of a few journals of materials science and engineering, e.g., Scientific Report (NPG), Coatings (MDPI), etc. Currently, He is leading a research group of Surface Engineering and Protective Coating (SEPC) at IMRE.

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All manuscripts submitted to this Article Collection will undergo desk assessment and peer-review as part of our standard editorial process. Guest Advisors will not be involved in peer-reviewing manuscripts unless they are an existing member of the Editorial Board.

Please review the journal scope and author submission instructions prior to submitting a manuscript.

The deadline for submitting manuscripts is 10 February 2025.

Please contact Agnes Zhou at [email protected] with any queries regarding this Article Collection.

For Taylor and Francis Journals: Please be sure to select the appropriate Article Collection from the drop-down menu in the submission system.

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