Dear Colleagues,

Lean production and world class manufacturing, together with sustainable development and the adoption of other modern qualities and business excellence strategies, addressed in a continuously demanding economic environment, impose the need for tight control of the usage of materials and energy resources, towards cleaner and more environmentally-friendly industrial processes. In light of economic globalization and the new industrial revolution, through digital transformation, the utilization of smart and sophisticated materials systems, the need for minimizing scrap and increasing efficiency, reliability and lifetime ,and, on the other hand, support for fuel economy and the shrinkage of carbon footprints, are absolutely necessary conditions for imminent economic growth. These parameters require the development and fabrication of high-resistance metals and alloys and explicit knowledge of their potential damage and degradation mechanisms, in order to ensure the prevention of sudden, undesired, costly, and catastrophic failures.

The occurrence of unexpected failures in critical industrial and transportation sectors, could lead to serious accidents or even to disasters, having crucial consequences on infrastructure, people and society in general. A profound knowledge of degradation and failure mechanisms in metals and alloys is an absolute prerequisite, which will lead to the understanding and identification of the root-cause of failure(s) or to successful failure prevention. Together with the failure mechanisms, the acknowledgment of service conditions (temperature, type/nature of the environmental parameters, loading patterns) or information pertaining to industrial production processes, involved in the fabrication of metal components, is of critical significance in order to put all the failure “puzzle pieces” in a meaningful and reasonable order. The “reconstruction” of the failure scene is mainly focused on the interpretation of its natural complexity and the unfolding of a logical sequence of the events. These failure-linking events, which have occurred con-currently, intermittently, or successively, give rise to a final ultimate failure, in a “backward-thinking” procedure. The organization of failure investigation is a multi-step, structured, and disciplined process, which has to be limited in a time-frame and budgeted, according to the requirements of the demand. The collection of the “pieces” and “clues” during failure investigation is a diligent process. In the real world, missing pieces disrupt the continuity and clarity of “cause-and-effect” chain relationships, converting them from deterministic to fuzzy or stochastic.         

In the frame of this Special Issue (“Failure Mechanisms in Alloys”), a valuable insight is aimed to be offered, covering critical subject areas in the field of metals and metallic component degradation processes. Indicative topics included in this thematic area, are the following:

• Microstructural-induced degradation and embrittlement
• Analysis and mechanics of fracture
• Damage evolution at nano- and microstructural level
• Environmentally-induced degradation processes, corrosion, wear and combined mechanisms
• Progressive mechanical failures, creep and fatigue
• Texture and morphology of fracture
• Modeling and simulation of degradation processes
• Failures in new and modern manufacturing processes, e.g., in additive manufacturing and severe plastic deformation
• Novel and modern analysis techniques for failure investigation
• Failure prevention strategies pertaining to microstructure or surface modification

Emphasis is given, as a subject-core, to materials and microstructural aspects of metals and metallic components, along to their interactions with the evolution of failure. Special focus is placed on industrial manufacturing case histories and case-study approach papers, as they could provide important knowledge, rendering experience to industrial problem solving.  A cross-functional and multi-disciplinary approach, covering production sectors, ranging from metal manufacturing, chemical process, construction, and mechanical, to transportation and electrical/electronic industries, will be fully appreciated. 

Last, but not least, it is hoped and strongly believed that the accumulation of additional knowledge in the field of failure mechanisms and the adoption of the principles, philosophy and a deep understanding of failure analysis process approaches, which are not limited to the quality improvement of metals and alloys, but also extends to all aspects of personal and social life, will strongly promote the learning concept as a continuously-evolving process and a modus vivendi for humankind.

Dr. George Pantazopoulos
Guest Editor

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• Microstructural degradation
• Fracture analysis
• Fracture mechanics
• Fractographic evaluation
• Fracture modeling and simulation
• Environmental induced cracking
• Corrosion induced failures
• Wear and tribological failures
• Creep failures
• Texture evolution related to fracture
• Fatigue fractures
• Manufacturing defects
• Failure analysis
• FMEA/FTA and risk-based analysis in critical metal systems
• Microstructural modification to enhance damage tolerance
• Fracture/damage resistance
• Nano- and microscopic aspects of fracture and failure
• Special applications including railway engineering and biomedical materials
• New steels exhibiting high fracture resistance
• Plasticity induced damage
• High strain-rate phenomena
• Coatings and surface modification for enhanced wear and corrosion resistance