3 Credit Hours

The long-term objective of this course is to provide students with a fundamental understanding and working knowledge of dielectric, magnetic, etc. (so-called) functional materials. This includes coverage of insulators, conductors (both electrical, ionic, and thermal), dielectric/ferroelectric/piezoelectric, antiferro/ferro/ferrimagnetic, multiferroic/magneto-electric, optical, and other functional materials.

Prerequisites

Prerequisites:
a). An undergraduate degree in Materials Science and Engineering
b). Completion of MSE 500
c). Completion of an undergraduate course in Introduction to Materials Science and Engineering along with at least one semester of research experience in functional materials.

Course Objectives

At the end of this course, students should be able to explain the relationships between materials properties (i.e., transport, optical, dielectric, magnetic, and more) and the atomic, electronic, compositional, and microstructural effects that determine these properties. In this course, we will explore the interplay between crystal, electronic, chemical, and microstructural degrees of freedom in functional materials. The course will cover a broad range of materials including those with perovskite, spinel, garnet, hexagonal, and other crystal structures. We will briefly investigate the connection of processing to properties in these materials and will also investigate state-of-the-art devices including electrical components; capacitors, resistors, and inductors; structure-property relations for pyro-, piezo-, and ferroelectric materials; varistors, thermistors, transducers, actuators, memory elements, multilayered components, and their applications.

Course Requirements

The overall grade will be determined by homework grades, quizzes, paper spot checks, exam, and research presentation. Typically, all submissions within each category will be weighted equally unless stated otherwise.

In-Class Quizzes:
There will be 4 or more short in class “pop-quizzes” throughout the semester. There are NO make-up opportunities for the in-class quizzes, with no exceptions. Paper Spot Checks:

• We will read and discuss about 5 research papers. As noted, we will have in-class discussions about these papers and students are requested to participate to the best of their ability. Such spot checks will help you prepare for this.
• We will have online quizzes about the papers. These quizzes will help prepare students for thein-class discussion. The quizzes will be posted to Moodle ~ 24 hours (or longer) ahead of the class we will read the paper in, students can complete the quiz any time until the next class starts.

Homeworks:
Unless stated otherwise, homework assignments are due on the day and time listed on Moodle. Group problem solving and teamwork is encouraged on the homeworks, but all turned in problem solutions should be your own work.

Exam:
There will be one open-resource take-home exam.

Research Presentation:
We will have a research symposium style presentation session in class on April 16 and 18. The teams will be responsible for completing the following:

• Choosing a topic
• Providing an abstract for their report/presentation
• Presentation
  Students will prepare and present a 15-minute presentation on some topic related to the course. Additional details concerning the subject matter, grading, and expectations will be provided well prior to the assignment of the presentations.

Textbooks

E-Textbook (Free, e-book is available online through NC State library):

• Robert Newnham, Properties of Materials – Anisotropy, Symmetry, Structure, 1st Edition, Oxford University Press: New York (2005).
• J. Moulson, J. M. Herbert, Electroceramics: Materials, Properties, Applications, 2nd Ed., Wiley: New York (2003).
  Other references:
• J. F. Nye, Physical Properties of Crystals – Their Representation by Tensors and Matrices, Clarendon Press, Oxford (1985).
• M. E. Lines and A. M. Glass, Principles and Applications of Ferroelectrics and Related Materials, Oxford University Press Inc. New York (2001).

Created: 11/17/2025