Throughout the century, engineers learned new methods to analyze, process, refine, and add to materials in ways that maximized their properties, enhanced their performance, and met design challenges. They set about to reshape skylines with sleek architecture of steel and glass, forge great sheets of metal for airplane wings, fabricate plastics into heart valves and computer circuits, and create new composites for spacecraft. It is a major engineering enterprise to design, analyze and test materials. Analytical methods coupled with the powerful computational tools that allow detailed imaging and simulation have completely revolutionized materials research. The material for the blades must be strong enough to withstand the stress and force of the gases and heat, light enough to maximize efficiency, and durable enough for extensive use.
Copper is a highly conductive metal, but it is soft.
Mixing it with a minute amount of silver makes it strong enough conduct electricity without melting. The wrong material, or the wrong amount of copper to silver, could spell disaster in many areas, including disconnecting a telephone call or causing the lights to go out. Engineers are involved in solving such needs precisely. Because materials have different properties, some are better than others for certain things. Computers using plastic photonic circuits handle data more rapidly than electronic devices - photons travel much faster, and plastic components are lighter than metals, can store information more compactly, and are not subject to magnetic interference.