A x e l e r a t i o

A multidisciplinary platform: Materials matter!
By Axel Drefahl

Introduction

Materials matter to nearly all aspects of life and human well-being. A sustainable future depends on how present generations succeed in understanding and processing matter on the nano-, meso- and macroscale. An impressive amount of material data and chemical knowledge has been accumulated over the past decades—in the printed literature as well as digital archives. Exciting new discoveries and progress in the design of novel device architectures happen world-wide and almost every day. How can one find and access this information in the context of individual interests or team challenges arising in a research environment? Materials matter! (MM! for short) is an open online platform trying to find out.

Currently, MM! offers a search interface to locate data and publications via the CurlySMILES language, which allow versatile and targeted formulation of material queries based on chemical notations. Search results are presented as sniplinks containing a microabstract for some particular material information and a link to original and further resources. The MM! platform is planned as a forum. In the near future it will expand its functionality such that users will be able to contribute sniplinks with content they think is relevant. Sniplinks will then take an additional role as informed (or informing) bookmarks. In the following sections, selected aspects of the MM! goal are discussed. Further details and instructions on the use of MM! are found in subsequent chapters (see the table of contents for an overview).
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Microabstract-based reviewing

The number of sniplink results that is found depends on the entered material formula. Results are organized by state and shape of the material, for example grouped as films or nanostructures. In cases where the search results in larger sets of sniplinks, the result page may serve as a starting point for a review on the query material.

Materials interest

From a research and engineering viewpoint, interest is typically focusing on information regarding pathways of synthesis and physicochemical properties of materials. Material design goes hand in hand with material analysis and iterative optimization of pathways and properties. And a pathway does not end with the envisioned product, but needs to consider the product life cycle including durability, human safety, environmental risk and eventual disassembly and recycling. To the point: a material matters not just by itself. Information on precursor compounds, by-products and degradation products is equally important to assess economics and sustainability aspects of a targeted material. Often, materials are applied as parts of heterostructures—phases, films, particles, diverse-shaped nanostructures, just to name a few. Then, information on the other interfacing part is also desired. It becomes obvious that efficient browsing, screening, organizing and comparing of data is critical for an explorative and multifaceted approach in materials design. Development of MM! is undertaken with these tasks in mind. Here, the flexible, yet precise encoding options of materials in CurlySMILES come into play. The CurlySMILES-tagged sniplinks provide the basis to interrelate material properties as a function of composition, nanostructure, microstructure and features such as impurity, porosity as well as interwoven network and framework architecture.