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Extraordinarily rugged with a melting temperature of several thousand degrees Fahrenheit. That describes the results of research into new ceramic materials sponsored by the Office of Naval Research (ONR) and recently published in the Journal Nature. A research team, led by ONR’s Principal Investigator, Dr. Stefano Curtarolo, Duke University, developed a computational method for creating new types of ceramics using transition metals – carbonitrides or borides – through a process called Disordered Enthalpy-Entropy Descriptor (DEED). The applications are endless, said Dr. Eric Wuchina, a research materials engineer who was the program officer with ONR’s Sea Warfare and Weapons department when Curtarolo’s research team was awarded the Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (MURI). According to Wuchina, the variety of new compositions could create potentially millions of new materials.

During a visit to San Diego for the U.S. Pacific Fleet-led Unmanned Integrated Battle Problem 21, Chief of Naval Research Rear Adm. Lorin Selby said America’s growing focus on autonomous capabilities is showing impressive results.

ONR SCOUT is an ongoing, multiagency experimentation campaign to identify new ways to bring unmanned technologies to warfighter problems, test them in realistic operating conditions and get them to the fleet and force. SCOUT is committed to partnering with industry to get nontraditional, commercial-off-the-shelf, government-developed and/or government-sponsored technologies to the fleet rapidly.