Annual Report 2021

Director's Message

Dear colleagues and friends of the Duke Materials Initiative,

Welcome to this second annual report of the Duke Materials Initiative, in which we bring you highlights of our recent work and show impact toward solving some of society’s toughest challenges. In the highlights below you will see how we are leveraging the strength of interdisciplinary collaboration to:

• Address climate change with basic science to unlock the secrets of energy materials at the molecular level
• Address important unmet medical needs with biomaterials and biomaterial implants
• Create new knowledge in the use of metamaterials and photonics to take camera technology and electronics to a new level
• Use artificial intelligence to accelerate the search for new materials with specific properties to meet the demands of manufacturing and national defense
• Understand the impact of nanomaterials on the environment and discover a path to a more sustainable future
• Train the next generation of academic and industry leaders in materials science and engineering

We are grateful for the steady and growing support of external funding for these endeavors from the National Science Foundation (NSF), National Institutes of Health (NIH), U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) and others. We are also excited and emboldened by support from the Duke Science and Technology (DST) initiative, funded, in part, by a $100 million investment from the Duke Endowment. The DST will impact materials science and engineering research by enabling Duke University to hire talented new faculty who will advance research in key science and engineering areas for decades into the future.

Thank you for your support—as colleagues, collaborators and friends of the growing enterprise of materials science and engineering at Duke University!

Sincerely,

Stefan Zauscher

Director, Duke Materials Initiative
Professor, Thomas Lord Department of Mechanical Engineering & Materials Science