Ashwin Shahani receives second Young Investigator Program award

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NEW YORK – Ashwin Shahani will be receiving his second Young Investigator Program (YIP) award for his proposal on “Abnormal Grain Growth in Four Dimensions.” The proposal on Chiral Metamaterials by Design earned Shahani his first YIP award last fall.

“I am thrilled to begin research on a longstanding problem in the materials community, regarding the precise role of particles on the motion of grain boundaries. Classical theories dating from the 1940’s and onwards suggest that particles constrict the migration of grain boundaries, but recent simulations and experiments suggest that instead particles may give rise to abnormally large grains in poly-crystals (in the absence of strain),” Shahani said in a press release.

“To resolve the debate, my team will harness new developments in in situ and laboratory-based X-ray imaging. Through our results, we will pinpoint the thermodynamic and kinetic factors that allow grain boundaries to navigate through a particle cloud.  This research has important implications for the controlled manufacture of strong and lightweight poly-crystalline alloys for next-generation army systems,” he added.

Shahani received his Bachelors in Materials Science and Engineering from Cornell University in 2012 and his Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from Northwestern University in 2016, he teaches Kinetics and Transport in Materials Engineering and the Fundamentals of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Michigan.

The ARO YIP awards are one of the most prestigious honors bestowed by the Army to outstanding scientists beginning their independent careers, according to a press release.