Work to improve metals earns ‘young leader’ award
Kiran Solanki leads research aimed at improving the performance and resilience of light-weight metals.
Posted February 12, 2013
Kiran Solanki is being recognized by a major materials science and engineering organization for his accomplishments and leadership potential in the field.
Solanki is an assistant professor in the School for Engineering of Matter, Transport and Energy, one of the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University.
He is one of four selected to receive the 2013 Young Leader Professional Development Award from TMS – The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society, which bestows the honor on young faculty members to help support their promising research.
Solanki is being recognized by the TMS Light Metals Division for his work with a range of materials, including magnesium for automotive applications, titanium for aerospace and naval applications, and steel-based materials used for nuclear reactors and related technologies.
“We research materials all the way from nano-scale to micro-scale and we try to understand how we can combine different materials with enhanced properties for specific purposes,” Solanki explains.
His team examines the deformation and failure modes of materials when different concentrations of solutes –substances that dissolve and change when placed into solutions – are added to base metals.
His research team is studying how the ratios of solute to base metals affect the performance of metal alloys, and how atomic-scale impurities affect the resiliency and strength of metals.
Solanki will be formally presented the award during the TMS Annual Meeting March 3-7 in San Antonio, Texas.
He will give a presentation about his research at the international gathering. He will be joined at the event by two of his students, Mehul Bhatia and Ilaksh Adlakha, who are pursuing doctoral degrees in mechanical engineering. They will also make presentations about their research. Bhatia was awarded a TMS student travel grant to attend the conference and present his work.
TMS is an international organization of materials researchers, engineers, scientists, educators and administrators, as well as students, with more than 11,000 members from more than 70 countries.
At the TMS annual meeting in 2012, Solanki received an award from the organization for a research paper he co-authored on discoveries he helped to make for optimizing the performance of light-weight metal alloys.
Written by Natalie Pierce and Joe Kullman
Media Contact:
Joe Kullman, [email protected]
(480) 965-8122
Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering
