Recently, the demand for shape memory alloys in the biomedical industry is increasing. Nitinol alloy, which accounts for most of the shape memory alloy market, occupies most of the biomedical field. Nitinol for biomaterials requires a clean surface without sub-micron surface integrity and surface defects in order to be used more safely in a living body. Among them, new technologies such as polishing using MR fluid are being studied, but there is a disadvantage in that it takes a long time for processing due to a low material removal rate. In this study, material removal studies were conducted for effective polishing, and excellent polishing properties of MR fluid were confirmed.

The composition of martensite transformation in NiAl alloy is determined using pure nickel and aluminum powder by vacuum hot press powder metallurgy, which is a composition of martensitic transformation, and the characteristics of martensitic transformation and microstructure of sintered NiAl alloys are investigated. The produced sintered alloys are presintered and hot pressed in vacuum; after homogenizing heat treatment at 1,273 K for 86.4 ks, they are water-cooled to produce NiAl sintered alloys having relative density of 99 % or more. As a result of observations of the microstructure of the sintered NiAl alloy specimens quenched in ice water after homogenization treatment at 1,273 K, it is found that specimens of all compositions consisted of two phases and voids. In addition, it is found that martensite transformation did not occur because surface fluctuation shapes did not appear inside the crystal grains with quenching at 1,273 K. As a result of examining the relationship between the density and composition after martensitic transformation of the sintered alloys, the density after transformation is found to have increased by about 1 % compared to before the transformation. As a result of examining the relationship between the hardness (Hv) at room temperature and the composition of the matrix phase and the martensite phase, the hardness of the martensite phase is found to be smaller than that of the matrix phase. As a result of examining the relationship between the temperature at which the shape recovery is completed by heating and the composition, the shape recovery temperature is found to decrease almost linearly as the Al concentration increases, and the gradient is about -160 K/ at% Al. After quenching the sintered NiAl alloys of the 37 at%Al into martensite, specimens fractured by three-point bending at room temperature are observed by SEM and, as a result, some grain boundary fractures are observed on the fracture surface, and mainly intergranular cleavage fractures.

우리나라는 지진에 대해 비교적 안전한 지역으로 인식되고 있었으나, 최근 경주지진과 포항지진이 발생하면서 시설물에 상당한 피해가 발생되면서 지진피해 저감장치를 적용한 내진설계 및 보강에 대한 연구와 개발이 수행되고 있다. 이미 건축된 구조물의 유지⋅보수에 대한 관심이 높아짐에 따라, 구조물의 감쇠, 강성 등을 국부적으로 변화시켜 지진 하중에 의한 에너지를 흡수하고 소산시키는 내진설계 방식인 제진기술이 활용되고 있다. 그러나 강한 지진이 발생할 때 제진 장치의 손상으로 인하여 사용성이 매우 떨어지게 되는 문제점이 발생되고 있다. 최근에는 이러한 문제를 해결하기 위해, 구조물의 가새 부재에 별도의 열처리를 하지 않고 응력 제거만으로 원형복원이 가능한 초탄성 형상기억합금을 적용하는 연구가 진행되고 있다. 따라서 본 연구에서는 비좌굴 가새 부재에 초탄성 형상기억합금을 사용하여 자동복원이 가능한 프레임 구조물을 구성하여 비선형 정적해석을 수행하여 구조물의 내진성능을 평가하고, 초탄성 형상기억합금의 재료적 특성의 우수성을 검증하고자 한다.

니티놀이라고 하는 니켈-티타늄 형태의 형상기억 합금(SMA)은 상당한 양의 변형이 발생한 후에 추가적인 열을 가하지 않더라도 상온에서 원래 모양으로 복원될 수 있는 초탄성 효과를 가진다. 이러한 독특한 재료 특성 때문에, 니티놀은은 의료, 전기, 전자 및 기계 분야뿐만 아니라 토목 공학 분야의 내진 개량을 위한 변위 제어 장치로 널리 사용되어 왔다. 탄소강과 달리 초탄성 형상기억합금은 피로 저항성이 강하며 하중 속도에 따라 강성(하중-변위특성)등의 기계적 물성치가 변화한다. 본 연구에서는 하중 사이클의 반복 횟수와 속도에 따라 초탄성 형상기억합금의 기계적 물성치가 어떻게 변하는가에 대한 실험적 연구를 수행하였다. 본 연구로 인해 표준화된 초탄성 형상기억합금의 기계적 물성치는 이후 초탄성 형상기억합금을 적용한 내진 장치의 설계과정에서 활용함으로써 설계 효율성을 높일 수 있을 것으로 기대된다.

Shape memory alloys(SMAs) have revolutionized the material engineering sciences as they exhibit exclusive features i.e. shape memory effect(SME) and super-elasticity. SMAs are those alloys that when deform return to their predeformed shape upon heating, they also restore their original shape by removing the load. Research on properties of newly advent of several types of ferrous based shape memory alloys(Fe-SMAs), shows that they have immense potential to be the counterpart of Nitinol(NiTi-SMA). These Fe-SMAs have been used and found to be effective because of their low cost, high cold workability, good weldability & excellent characteristics comparing with Nitinol(high processing cost and low cold workability) SMAs. Some of the Fe-SMAs show super-elasticity. Fe-SMAs, especially Fe-Mn-Si alloys have an immense potential for civil engineering structures because of its unique properties e.g. two-way shape memory effect, super elasticity and shape memory effect as well as due to its low cost, high elastic stiffness and wide transformation hysteresis comparative to Nitinol. Further research is being conducted on SMAs to improve and impinge better attributes by improving the material compositions, quantifying the SMA phase transition temperature etc. In this research pre-existing Fe-SMAs are categorised and collected in a tabulated form. An analysis is performed that which category is mostly available. Last 50 years data of Fe-SMA publications and US Patents is collected to show its importance in terms of increasing research on such type of alloys to invent different compositions and applications. This data is analysed as per different year groups during last 50 years and it was analysed as per whether the keywords exist in title of an article or anywhere in the article. It was found that different keywords related to Fe-SMAs/categories of Fe-SMAs, almost don’t exist in the title of articles. However, these keywords related to Fe- SMAs/categories of Fe-SMAs, exist inside the article but still there are not too many publications related to Fe-SMAs/categories of Fe-SMAs.

The effect of oxygen on the shape memory characteristics in Ti-18Nb-6Zr-XO (X = 0-1.5 at%) biomedical alloys was investigated by tensile tests. The alloys were fabricated by an arc melting method at Ar atmosphere. The ingots were cold-rolled to 0.45 mm with a reduction up to 95% in thickness. After severe cold-rolling, the plate was solution-treated at 1173 K for 1.8 ks. The fracture stress of the solution-treated specimens increased from 450 Mpa to 880 MPa with an increasing oxygen content up to 1.5%. The fracture stress increased by 287MPa with 1 at% increase of oxygen content. The critical stress for slip increased from 430 MPa to 695 MPa with an increasing oxygen content up to 1.5 at%. The maximum recovery strain of 4.1% was obtained in the Ti-18Nb-6Zr-0.5O (at%) alloy. The martensitic transformation temperature decreased by 140 K with a 1.0 at% increase in O content, which is lower than that of Ti-22Nb-(0-2.0)O (at%) by 20 K. This may have been caused by the effect of the addition of Zr. This study confirmed that addition of oxygen to the Ti-Nb-Zr alloy increases the critical stress for slip due to solid solution hardening without being detrimental to the maximum recovery strain.

3D printing of NiTi alloys has been successfully achieved. A novel printing process has been developed and used, which consists in selective deposition of a solvent on a granule bed. The granules are composed of metal powders and thermoplastic binder, which are mixed and sieved by conventional methods. A sound green strength is obtained after solvent evaporation. Sintered parts exhibit good density, proper phase composition and shape memory behaviour.

The aging effects on the characteristics of the melt spun Cu based shape memory alloys have been investigated by the microhardness test, X-ray diffraction, differential scanning calorimetry, scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy. After aged for specific times, hardness of the ribbons began to increase and shape memory capacity diminished. At the initial stage of aging the austenitic transformation temperatures increased gradually, but at last became nearly constant: That is, the aging deteriorated the thermal stability. The increase in hardness was due to the formation of the precipitates. The loss in the shape memory capacity was due to the decrement of solute atoms in the matrix by the formation of the precipitates. In this study, it was confirmed that Mn is an effective element for Improving the thermal stability.