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MATERIALS are vital to almost everything we make, and choosing which one to
use and when is a thoroughly professional activity. The job of the materials
engineer is to understand the properties of the materials that he or she works
with, ranging from acrylic resins to zirconium alloys. This is most critical in
aeroplanes, electronic and opto-electronic systems, nuclear power stations and
telecommunication satellites, where failure can have devastating consequences.
The job of the materials engineer is to ensure that equipment does not fail,
crack, rust or break when it is doing the job for which it is designed. There is
plenty of scope for such people these days.

Materials are shaped by casting, moulding, extruding, drawing through a die
and other processes. Their physical properties in action depend on how this is
done. When made into specific articles, the material chosen usually has to work
with components made of different materials, and may have to operate under a
range of conditions. And there are two new requirements nowadays: materials
should be recyclable to enable manufacturers to use scarce resources to the
full鈥攁nd they should be capable of being engineered.

Materials engineers and scientists are employed by the producers of
materials, such as Corus (previously British Steel in Sheffield) and Pilkington
(St Helens) and by those organisations that use materials to make their
products. Leading employers include oil companies and energy producers, such as
BP and British Energy, and car and aeroplane manufacturers, such as Rolls Royce,
Jaguar and BAe Systems. The laboratories of the Defence Evaluation and Research
Agency in Farnborough and Malvern, are also major employers of such people.
Missiles, combat aircraft and other equipment for the armed forces must work
reliably in extreme conditions. Organisations such as RAPRA, near Shrewsbury,
which is the research association for the polymer, rubber and plastics industry,
and CERAM in Stoke-on-Trent, which serves the ceramics industry, are often on
the lookout for qualified materials engineers.

Tom Hutchinson studied materials engineering at the University of Liverpool
for a four-year master of engineering (MEng) degree and won the highly
prestigious national 鈥渕aterials student of the year鈥� competition in 1999 . He
has completed several projects that give a good idea of what materials
engineering is all about. During an industrial year at Raychem he designed a
titanium-nickel alloy sensor which switches on a heating element in car wing
mirrors when they begin to mist up. Another of his devices detects the state of
the oil in a car鈥檚 engine and reveals when it needs changing.

Materials are central in the manufacture of integrated circuits. Computers
are becoming smaller and smaller because new technologies are being found to
increase the circuitry that can be worked onto the same area of chip. Materials
engineers have a big part to play in this. Hutchinson, who is now studying for a
PhD at Liverpool, worked out how to make gold thread just a few nanometres in
diameter. He produced a small indent in a surface of a silicon chip, dropped
gold balls into it and then melted them so that they coalesced into a wire. It
all sounds easy, but working on such a scale is never straightforward.

Materials engineers and materials scientists often have to work in many
contexts and with other specialists鈥攕uch as polymer scientists, textile
technologists and metallurgists. They can study the basics of most of these
specialities at degree level. Five universities offer degrees in materials
engineering鈥擝runel, Liverpool, Loughborough, Northumbria at Newcastle and
Sheffield Hallam. At Oxford the courses focus on engineering and materials, at
Cambridge materials and metallurgy, and at Teesside University materials systems
engineering. A dozen other universities run courses in materials science and
engineering.

Some universities offer courses specialising in one range of materials. For
example, aerospace materials can be studied at Imperial College of Science,
Technology and Medicine, biological materials at the University of Wales Bangor,
electronic materials at Herriot-Watt Edinburgh and South Bank London, and
composite materials at the University of Plymouth. Materials scientists and
materials engineers cover many similar subjects in their studies including the
many ways in which materials can be formed, coated, thermally treated and
tested. Much chemistry, physics and maths are involved. While materials
scientists investigate the microstructure of materials and what makes them
behave in certain ways, materials engineers place the emphasis on how the
materials can be fabricated and manufactured in a way that works best for their
properties and applications.

At the University of Liverpool students studying the four-year MEng course in
materials engineering cover the same ground for the first two years as those
taking a degree in materials science. This includes mathematics, physics and
chemistry plus an introduction to materials science and computing. It is quite
common for universities to offer a range of similar degree courses where the
differences occur in the options that students can take later in their
studies.

For some, the route to a career in materials begins with a degree in another
subject such as engineering, chemistry or physics and then gathers momentum
through postgraduate study. More than thirty universities offer postgraduate
courses in materials. Brunel offers a course on nondestructive testing of
materials and another on packaging technology. At UMIST you may study advanced
engineering materials, at Napier plastic moulding technology. Materials
manufacturing technology and management is offered by Sheffield Hallam.

The Institute of Materials in London, with more than 18 000 members, is the
professional body of materials engineers and scientists. It is accredited by the
Engineering Council to put forward its members for professional status as
chartered engineers. Typical salaries for graduate trainees in materials
engineers are in the region of 拢18 000 a year.