Engineering students in Tallahassee do research for the Air Force

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV) – The Air Force is now partnering with Florida State University, giving them more than $ 6 million to develop and test the next generation of aerospace materials.

Research is now ongoing at the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering.

Students going to the lab to make carbon materials that the Air Force will use in everything from airplanes to missiles.

“We will work to produce composites with the properties the Air Force wants, and we appreciate the Air Force’s trust in us,” said Frank Allen, operations director of the High Performance Materials Institute.

Assistant professor Rebekah Sweat teaches her students to use computer simulations to invent new materials.

“So that we can better design and predict with you. We can use this information and incorporate it into production and better optimize the various multifunctional properties. Kind of like electrical properties, strength properties, ”described Sweat.

Plates are made from the newly designed materials, which are then tested by master student Cecil Evers.

“I do a lot of mechanical tests to see how strong and stiff the panels are and how they behave at different temperatures. Right, if we start at room temperature and then move on to higher temperatures, how does the properties of the panels change, ”said Evers.

Here Evers tests the strength of a panel by applying force until the material breaks.

Students are excited to do research for the military during their undergraduate studies.

“You know, doing this research may look like you’re in a lab doing these tests, but the wider implications of what actually happens are so much bigger than me, and it’s so much bigger than a ten -Minute lab assessment and I think it’s just great for me to know that I can go to a lab and work for an hour and that can potentially do all of these life changing things, ”said Katelyn Sears, a research assistant at the high Performance Materials Institute.

Reaching for the sky, experiment after experiment.

Researchers at FAMU-FSU College of Engineering are also working on a project for NASA that makes materials for space exploration.

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