NASA Grants $500,000 to Texas A&M Research of Memory Shape Alloys also known as "Smart Metals"

COLLEGE STATION-  We hear about new research from A&M University almost every day. NASA is even giving the school half a million dollars to research memory shape alloys which some people call smart metals.

Airplanes, cars, even braces these are some things memory shaped alloys can be used for.

"They are smart because they can change shape depending on the temperature and more importantly they can change back to their original form,” says Raymundo Arroyave a partner in the NASA project and associate professor at Texas A&M.

For instance,  a smart metal seal could have even prevented the 2010 gulf of Mexico gas explosion.

"If some extraordinary temperature happens, the seal will lock, preventing this catastrophe,” says Alaa Elwany, the Principal investigator for the NASA Project and Assistant Professor at Texas A&M.

Now, a half a million dollar grant from NASA will allow three Texas A&M professors to research the production of these metals.

"They gave us a specific task which is ‘help us print shape memory alloy using 3-d printing’," says Elwany.

Dr. Elwany, is a specialist in the fabrication.  He and his PhD students create products out of a variety of metals using a 3-D printer.

"We want to be able to use the same part, the same material on the same machine and get the exact same product. We don't want it run it twice and get two different things,” says Elwany.

You put powdered steel into the machine and it creates small objects, like a hip replacement.  Something most people have to wait weeks for, the machine can make in a few hours.

"According to the Whitehouse, advanced manufacturing is one way to bring manufacturing jobs in to the U.S. so we are going to use this not only to do research but also to teach undergrad and graduate students,” says Elwany.

"This is one of the few schools that does the process research so it means a lot to Texas A&M and it means a lot to us,” says Gustavo Tapia, a PhD student working on the project.

Putting A&M on the map for research on these smart metals and advancing the future of how metal products are made.

Dr. Elwany estimates that they will work on the project between three to seven years.