Successful habilitation of Dr. Wenwen Song
On 20.01.21 the employees of the IEHK could listen to an exciting lecture: Dr. Wenwen Song gave her postdoctoral lecture with the topic "advanced materials for automotive applications" in front of a digital audience of more than 80 participants.
In her 45-minute talk, Dr. Song gave an overview of the increasing demand for advanced materials used in the automotive industry. In particular, material innovation, process design, and property improvement were addressed. As an example, her own research (Steel Innovation Award 2018, Berlin) on Al-alloyed, high-strength lightweight steels was presented. The presentation was rounded off by an insight into the material recycling strategies and circular economy of modern materials used in the automotive industry: Dr. Song used the example of the contamination element copper to show that the precipitation behavior of such components of the steel, which are actually undesirable, can be used to achieve an increase in strength. Consequently, these components do not have to be extracted from the steel scrap at great expense in the recycling process and one has a complete material life cycle in terms of sustainability.
Dr. Song already received her doctorate summa cum laude from RWTH Aachen University in 2014 and has headed the "Nanostructured Materials" working group since 2016; she is also active as a project manager in various large-scale projects. However, Dr. Song is not only successful in research, but also in teaching: She was awarded as RWTH Lecturer in 2020, an award for outstanding teaching combined with good research results.
A more detailed post on this topic can be found on the IEHK Blog.