What are microstructures?

A microstructure is the small-scale structure of a material. Microstructures can only be viewed using at 25x magnification. Microstructures can have an influence on the physical properties of a material such as corrosion, ductility, strength, and toughness; and are useful when analyzing ceramics, composites, polymers, and metals.

What is ASM Alloy Center Database?

The American Society for Metals (ASM) produces information on property data sheets for standard alloys worldwide. These data sheets include physical and chemical property data and corrosion characteristics. These are considered the standard reference in the field of materials science.

Locating Microstructure Information

ASM allows you to search by metal or alloy standard number, for example 1040 steel, or chemical composition, which is useful to users creating new alloys.

To find microstructure images it is helpful to include microstructure in your search string.

The record can be confusing to someone unfamiliar with the ASM databases. To get the full information click on View Data Sheet.

The data sheet includes graphical information about the alloy as well as the microstructure images.

This can be a powerful tool for researcher needing microstructure information.

Angela R. Davis, Engineering Liaison Librarian, Penn State, ard21@psu.edu

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