Interests New materials and new methods to prepare them are essential to virtually all aspects of technological development. Many desirable properties are achieved by the application of metastable materials like metallic glasses and nanocrystalline materials . Our current research interest is the application of high energy ball milling, a process called mechanical alloying or mechanochemical synthesis , to the preparation of novel materials.
Investigations are under way to prepare nanocomposites for magnetic and structural applications.
The application of mechanical alloying to the preparation of materials requires accurate understanding of the mechanism of the process. This is a difficult problem due to the complex combination of mechanical, chemical, thermal, and transport processes taking place simultaneously in a ball mill. We are especially interested in highly exothermic reactions, that become self-sustaining after a period of mechanochemical activation in the ball milling. The variation of the ignition time with composition and milling conditions and the microscopic changes of the sample during activation are studied. Mechanochemical reactions between a metal oxide and a more reactive metal and combination reactions to form carbides, borides, and sulfides are investigated.