MIT engineers have created a new aluminum alloy that can be 3D printed, tolerates extreme heat, and reaches strength levels far beyond conventional aluminum. Tests show the material is five times stronger than aluminum made using standard manufacturing techniques.

The alloy is produced by combining aluminum with several other elements, chosen through a process that blends computer simulations with machine learning. This approach dramatically narrowed the search for the right recipe. Traditional methods would have required evaluating more than 1 million possible material combinations, but the machine learning model reduced that number to just 40 promising options before identifying the optimal formula.

When the researchers printed the alloy and put it through mechanical testing, the results matched their predictions. The printed metal performed on par with the strongest aluminum alloys currently produced through traditional casting.

A Lighter Metal With Big Industrial Potential

The team believes the new printable aluminum could lead to stronger, lighter, and more heat-resistant components, including fan blades for jet engines. Today, those blades are typically made from titanium -- which is more than 50 percent heavier and can cost up to 10 times more than aluminum -- or from advanced composite materials.

"If we can use lighter, high-strength material, this would save a considerable amount of energy for the transportation industry," says Mohadeseh Taheri-Mousavi, who led the research as a postdoc at MIT and is now an assistant professor at Carnegie Mellon University.

John Hart, the Class of 1922 Professor and head of MIT's Department of Mechanical Engineering, says the benefits extend well beyond aviation. "Because 3D printing can produce complex geometries, save material, and enable unique designs, we see this printable alloy as something that could also be used in advanced vacuum pumps, high-end automobiles, and cooling devices for data centers."

Details of the work appear in the journal Advanced Materials. MIT co-authors include Michael Xu, Clay Houser, Shaolou Wei, James LeBeau, and Greg Olson, with additional collaborators Florian Hengsbach and Mirko Schaper of Paderborn University in Germany, and Zhaoxuan Ge and Benjamin Glaser of Carnegie Mellon University.

From Classroom Challenge to Materials Breakthrough

The project traces its roots to an MIT course Taheri-Mousavi took in 2020, taught by Greg Olson, professor of the practice in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering. The class focused on using computational simulations to design high-performance alloys. Alloys are made by combining multiple elements, and the specific mix determines strength and other key properties.

Olson challenged students to develop a printable aluminum alloy stronger than any that existed at the time. Aluminum's strength depends heavily on its microstructure, particularly the size and density of tiny internal features called "precipitates." Smaller, more closely packed precipitates generally result in a stronger metal.