Metals, Ceramics, Plastics - Building the Twenty First Century - GENS3501

This course is designed to introduce students with a non-technical background to the science of advanced materials, with particular emphasis on how they function and where they are used.

The following topics are included: Surfaces are not superficial; Zeolites: crystals with holes; New forms of carbon: buckyballs, nanotubes and buckycondoms; Conductors and superconductors; Polymers: how to make them and what they can do; Synthesis of materials; Hot metal: its production and use; Making metals strong: the tricks of the blacksmith exposed; Why steel rusts but gold does not; Solar cells, lasers and transistors: how they work; Composites: making plastics strong; Ceramics: from earthenware to space; Smart materials.

Consideration of these materials includes examination of how they have impacted on and contributed to society over the last 100 years, and how they may help shape social and technological development in the future.

Note: 28 hrs/week lecture/tutorials. Offered over 5 days on a full-time basis in the summer recess, 26-30 January 2009. Includes field trip to Powerhouse museum.