IFHTSE Global 21: heat treatment and surface engineering in the twenty-first century: Part 9 – Influence of materials science on heat treatment and surface engineering.

Significant progresses have been made in the past decades in the discipline of materials science, which include, but not limit to, the synthesis of new materials, advancement in analytical and experimental techniques, sustainable and environmentally friendly processing technologies, computational material science and nanotechnology. These developments have major influences on the research and application of heat treatment and surface engineering, and provide new opportunities to engineer the surfaces of new and conventional materials using advanced technologies to meet the ever increasing demands in surface and subsurface related properties. This survey gives a brief review on some aspects of heat treatment and surface engineering which keep pace with new developments in materials science. The specific areas being examined include: (i) advanced analytical techniques; (ii) sustainable and environmentally friendly technologies; (iii) surface engineering of emerging new materials such as intermetallic compounds, shape memory alloys and biomaterials; (iv) the search for superhard coatings and surface nanostructured materials; (v) mathematical modelling of surface engineering systems.