THE IMAT TEAMExecutive Director: David L. McDowell, david.mcdowell@imat.gatech.eduDeputy Director, Innovation Initiatives: W. Jud Ready, jud.ready@gtri.gatech.eduAssociate Director, Shared Resources: Eric Vogel, eric.vogel@mse.gatech.eduInnovation Strategies: Surya Kalidindi, surya.kalidindi@me.gatech.eduIndustry/Business Liaison: M. Brooke Beckert, brooke.beckert@imat.gatech.eduMarketing and Communications: Kelly B. Smith, kelly.smith@gatech.eduCenter Manager: Cecelia Jones, cecelia.jones@imat.gatech.eduAdministrative Professional II: Farlenthia Walker, farlenthia.walker@imat.gatech.eduTrakia Bennett, Financial Administrator III: trakia.bennett@ien.gatech.edu

DEVELOPMENT AND INDUSTRY LIAISONSOffice of Development: Lori Brown

Industry Collaboration and Commercialization: Don McConnell

Georgia Institute of Technology

Institute for Materials

500 10th St. NW • Fourth Floor • Paper Tricentennial Building

Atlanta, GA 30332 • 404.894.7769

www.materials.gatech.edu

Copyright 2017 • Georgia Institute of Technology • An equal education and employment opportunity institution.

The Institute for Materials (IMat) has just completed itsfourth full year since formal launch in June 2013. We arepleased to report IMat has reached several importantmilestones during the past year in support of building

Georgia Tech’s materials innovation ecosystem. In terms of new ventures, IDEAS:MD3 officially launched in August 2016, and now has 12 organizations from government and industry participating. The center for Materials Design,Development and Deployment (MD3) was established under theInstitute for Data Science and Engineering (IDEAS) to nurture andgrow a community around theemerging field of materials informatics.Seed funding was provided by IMatand Georgia Tech's Executive VicePresident of Research Steve Cross.The Materials Characterization Facilityalso celebrated a milestone — its firstyear of operation. The facility isadministered by both the Institute forMaterials and the Institute forElectronics and Nanotechnology. Aspart of rolling out the MCF, Georgia Tech has made considerableinvestment in new equipment and tools that will have significantimpact on high-resolution microscopy and X-ray diffractionmeasurements. We also continue to position Georgia Tech’s materials communitymembers as thought leaders both nationally and globally. During2016-17, we contributed to a variety of conversations andparticipated on a number of panels focused on the ability ofmaterials to address 21st century grand challenges of deepglobal societal and economic importance.IMat is already looking to the next five years in order to add valueto Tech’s position in the broader materials community by furtherenabling the field of materials research. To that end, we — alongwith input from leaders both inside and outside Georgia Tech —developed a new strategic plan that will take us into 2022.

David L. McDowell, Executive Director

BUILDING A MATERIALSINNOVATION ECOSYSTEM

ANNUAL REPORT2 0 1 6 — 2 0 1 7

During 2016-17, the MaterialsCharacterization Facility (MCF) mademajor strides toward providing state-of-the-art, shared and affordable access of

materials characterization tools, facilities, expertiseand services to a broad cross section of GeorgiaTech researchers, other universities and industry.The facility is administered by both the Institute forMaterials and the Institute for Electronics andNanotechnology.

BY THE NUMBERSThere were more than 180 active billing groups with more than 500 active users resulting in more than 17,000user hours and more than $450,000 in generated user fees. The amount of user fees collected was about 10percent greater than the year prior.

NEW AND UPGRADED EQUIPMENTAn upgrade was completed to the Kratos XPS/UPS system,including Automatic 4-axis motion control for sample loading andpositioning, new Gas-Cluster Ion Source for enhanced depthprofiles of polymers, and the addition of real-time chemical imagingthrough a new delay-line-detector.Two new pieces of equipment were added to the facility, includinga Gatan One-View high frame rate camera for the FEI Tecnai TEMto permit high time resolution imaging of in-situ behavior and anOxford Omicron micromanipulator for the FEI Nova FIB/SEM toimprove the TEM sample preparation capability.

TRANSMISSION ELECTRON MICROSCOPY (TEM)The MCF began offering TEM sample preparation, imaging and analysis services on a fee-based schedule. TheMCF has five TEMs available for use. In its early stages, the Institute for Materials provided support in order tooffer free TEM service to about ten PIs. The F30 is a 300 kV TEM, equipped with an EDS detector and Gatan image filter system (Tridiem 863 UHS),which can do elemental EELS mapping. The sample holders include a Tomography Holder (High Field of View)and both heating and cryo holders from Gatan. Other attachments include an electron holography biprism anda Lorenz lens.The HD2700 is an aberration-corrected dedicated scanning transmission electron microscope (STEM), whichcan be operated at 80, 120 or 200 kV. Its HAADF-STEM image resolution is ~0.136 nm. A SDD EDSdetector is also attached for elemental analysis.The 100CX, HF2000 and F30 systems are located in the Paper Tricentennial Building (formerly the IPST),while the HT7700 and HD2700 are in the Marcus Nanotechnology building.

SHARED USER MANAGEMENT SYSTEM (SUMS)The Shared User Management System (SUMS) was implemented during the 2016-17 year, a common GTsoftware framework for scheduling and billing of shared facilities. With this system, users with Georgia Techcredentials can search for, gain access to and pay bills for any piece of equipment in the MCF, as well as othercampus shared-user tools. Its benefits extend beyond convenience, continuing to foster multi-disciplinarycollaboration across campus between departments, IRIs, labs and researchers.

IDEAS:MD3 officially launched in August 2016, and now has 12 organizations fromgovernment and industry participating. The center for Materials Design, Developmentand Deployment (MD3) was established under the Institute for Data Science andEngineering (IDEAS) to nurture and grow a community around the emerging field of

materials informatics. Seed funding was provided by IMat and Georgia Tech’s Executive Vice President ofResearch Steve Cross.The primary goal of IDEAS:MD3 is to attract stakeholders from academia, government andindustry whose manufacturing lines and research instrumentation generate dense datasets for which traditional analytical techniques are prohibitively time consuming. Theseuser organizations pay a fixed fee that allows IDEAS:MD3 staff to provide an in-depthevaluation of the user’s data and recommend the best methods to extract usefulknowledge that will either decrease development time or help achieve a greatercompetitive advantage. Users may opt to send staff to Georgia Tech’s campus for hands-on workshops and interactions with students, or fund a more comprehensive, sponsoredresearch project based on findings from the initial evaluation provided by IDEAS:MD3. Tailored workshops are being scheduled for each organization throughout fall 2017 and winter 2018. The workshops will focus ondata and topics of interest to the user, and its staff will be primed on basic materials informatics concepts. Beyond the introductory workshop, users will be encouraged to submit project topics for a graduate course in Materials Informaticsled by IDEAS:MD3’s Director Surya Kalidindi. During the semester-long course, students will apply data analytics tools to address achallenge or problem provided by the user organization. The course will be an outstanding opportunity for organizations to not onlyreceive valuable data science tools, but also to develop rapport with a newly established talent pipeline.

The Institute for Materials strives to project the thought leadership of the GeorgiaTech materials community. This thought leadership is recognized in our faculty’s workas trendsetters in materials research and education in terms of an innovationecosystem for materials discovery and development. At IMat, we’ve developed a

significant thought leadership position in materials discovery and development, as evidencedby the following selected recognitions received during 2016-17:• Co-founded the Materials Accelerator Network in 2013 with the University of Michigan andthe University of Wisconsin and have added UC-Berkeley’s Materials Project, Texas A&Mand the University of Connecticut.• In mid-2016, Dave McDowell and Surya Kalidindi jointly published an article in MRSBulletin on the materials innovation ecosystem concept at Georgia Tech.

• The new materials data science institute IDEAS:MD3 was launched with support of IMat and the EVPR in August 2016.• In August 2016, Dave McDowell was the sole academic representative, along with industry and federal participants, in a closing panel discussion at the White Houseregarding the first five years of the U.S. Materials Genome Initiative.• Professors Kalidindi and McDowell, along with Assistant Professor A.J. Medford, published a JOM article in 2017 on Materials Data Science and Informatics, featuring Georgia Tech’s initiatives, including the two MOOCs released in 2016.• Dave McDowell contributed an invited chapter entitled “New and Improved Materials in theNext Production Revolution” in the 2017 Office for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Volume The Next Production Revolution: Implications for Government and Business.(Book cover at left.)

In 2016, IMat’s leadership team began preparing for the completion of thefive-year roadmap laid out during its official launch in 2013. This preparationincluded gathering input — both internally and externally — for a newstrategic plan addressing both challenges and opportunities the Institute will

face in the next five years. The process led to an assessment of IMat’s initialimpact and the identification of three goals believed critical in completing thestrategic plan by 2022.A diverse set of stakeholders contributed in formulating the new strategic plan,including a committee of faculty and representatives from 12 Units, Schools andDepartments across Georgia Tech, as well as IMat’s External Advisory Panel andindustry partners.The resulting plan sets the Institute for Materials on a path to further develop andexpand the materials innovation ecosystem, guide that ecosystem throughsignificant global thought leadership and prepare a new workforce for next-generation materials innovation.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARYVision: To be the international leader in defining and enabling the integration ofexperiments, computation and data science in materials research anddevelopment to address 21st century scientific and technological grand challenges having significant global economic and societal impact.Mission: To foster development of a materials innovation ecosystem via shared resources and innovation initiatives to accelerate discovery and development of advancedmaterials.Launched in June 2013, IMat adds value to Georgia Tech’s materials research and education portfolio by:

• Linking campus materials research facilities and administering the joint IEN/IMat Materials Characterization Facility.• Promoting networking and collaboration in cross-cutting research and educationalaspects of materials discovery, design and development to foster disruptiveinnovation, with value-added emphasis on the emergent role of materials datascience and informatics.• Building strategic partnerships with industry, academia and government.• Supporting development of cross-cutting research teams and proposals.• Projecting global thought leadership in advancing a materials innovation ecosystem.

IN THE NEXT FIVE YEARS, IMAT HAS THREE PRIMARY GOALS:Goal 1: Further define and nurture the materials innovation ecosystemat Georgia TechFoster development of a cross-cutting materials innovation ecosystem that leveragese-collaborative materials discovery, design and development to flesh out future lab-to-cloud infrastructure for materials research.Goal 2: Project thought leadership of the Georgia Tech materials communityPromote Georgia Tech’s leadership position in novel experimental techniques and

methods for materials synthesis, processing and characterization at multiple scales, including high throughput methods and coupling with computational simulation and datascience.Goal 3: Prepare the workforce of the future for materials discovery and developmentBecome recognized as an interdisciplinary leader in novel pathways to prepare the future workforce for materials innovation.

Materials Innovation EcosystemMultiscale modeling• Process-structure• Structure-property

Entrepreneurial support:start-ups and spin-offs

Verifications and validation — experiment/model coupling

Process models formanufacturingand scale-up

Sensors and in situmeasurementsand automation

Materials characterizationand microstructurerepresentation

Designer materialsknowledge systems anddigital representation

Systems design and MDO• Design exploration• Detail design

Databases, datasciences and material

informatics

Synthesis andprocessing

Materials discovery —first principles and atomistics

Distributed Collaborative Networks

ExperimentalTools

DigitalData

ComputationalTools

HIGH THROUGH

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Adding Value to the Georgia Tech Materials Innovation Ecosystem

Collaboration inMaterials + X to fosterdisruptive innovation

Integrativelinkages to

shared resources

Strategic partnershipswith industry, academia

and government

Interdisciplinarycenter proposal

development

Networking and collaboration in materials

discovery, designand development

Data science linkages

State-of-the-art facilities

Teaming & networking

External partnershipswith industry

• Ideation• Strategic agreements

Making an impactwith large-scale

research

BUILDING A MATERIALS INNOVATION ECOSYSTEM — STRATEGIC PLAN 2017

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP: WHAT DOES GEORGIA TECH THINK?

Above, Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) at GT.