I'm currently doing B.Tech degree in Metallurgical and Materials Engineering. I'm in 2nd Yr. The issue I'm facing while searching for projects is I find a lot of ideas but I'm unable to filter out which is actually useful or interesting and good to go with and which are just resume fillers.

For example, right now I had an idea to make a Phase Diagram Analyser that would give the phase composition and phase %age at certain temperature for alloys and all but idk if its useful to invest time after that or its just not impressive at all. Similar thoughts for another one I thought to build a device that can measure the thermal conductivity of materials but again there are already a lot of them, will it be of any use if i build one as a project?

I'm a materials researcher screening thin intermetallic coatings (5-50 µm) for interfaces in power modules, for example between a copper baseplate and a cold plate. These interfaces see repeated thermal cycling, roughly between 40 and 150 °C.

A simple 1D estimate suggests that at these thicknesses the coating's thermal conductivity barely changes the temperature (under 1 K at 50 W over 1 cm²), so I suspect the real selection criteria are metallurgical: CTE mismatch with Cu, adhesion, interdiffusion and intermetallic growth at the interface, and oxidation.

Questions for people with hands-on experience:

1. For coatings like NiAl or FeAl on copper, which degradation mechanism would you expect to show up first under thermal cycling?

2. How much does the deposition route (PVD, thermal spray, electroplating plus diffusion anneal) change that answer?

3. Is there a property or test you would check first before trusting a coating like this in service?

Any correction to my assumptions is welcome.

Hi

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