Materials Science & Engineering BS / Materials Science & Engineering MS

Major: Materials Science and Engineering
Degree Awarded: Bachelor of Science in Materials Science and Engineering (BSMSE) and Master of Science in Materials Science and Engineering (MSMSE)
Calendar Type: Quarter
Minimum Required Credits: 225.5
Co-op Options: Three Co-op (Five years)
Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP) code: 14.1801
Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) code: 17-2131

About the Program

The BS/MS in Materials Science and Engineering is an accelerated degree program that provides academically qualified students the opportunity to develop technical depth and breadth in their major and an additional complementary related area, earning two diplomas (BS and MS) within the typical duration of earning the bachelor's degree alone. A natural progression from the student’s undergraduate courses, with the necessary technical prerequisite understanding and skills, prepares students for graduate-level studies. Students can still enjoy the benefits and rewards of the Drexel co-op experience and gaining research experience by working with research faculty. Salaries for students with MS degrees can range up to 25% higher than those with BS degrees alone. 

For more information, visit COE Special Programs or the BS/MS webpage.
 

Admission Requirements

Students must have a cumulative GPA of at least 3.4 and have taken coursework sufficient to demonstrate a readiness to undertake graduate coursework. 

Degree Requirements

*

Co-op cycles for Materials Science & Engineering are only Spring/Summer.

COOP 101 registration is determined by the co-op cycle assigned and may be scheduled in a different term. Select students may be eligible to take COOP 001 in place of COOP 101.

**

Specialization tracks allow upper-class students to focus on a specific area of materials science and engineering through selection of three technical elective courses (minimum 9.0 credits, though 6.0 credits must be shared with graduate courses). This tailored specialization combined with foundational materials knowledge and co-op experiences gives students a customized education to prepare them for their future career and/or graduate school. Students choose from four pre-determined specialization tracks or create their own track. In addition to the specific courses listed for each pre-determined track, other courses may be accepted subject to approval by the MSE advisor. The pre-determined tracks are:

• Materials for Energy
• Materials for Medical Technologies
• Materials for Sustainability
• Manufacturing and Materials Processing

***

General Education Electives

†

Choose one of the approved Business Electives (GE): ECON 201, ACCT 110, OPM 200, ORGB 300 [WI] or approved by MSE advisor.  

‡

Choose one of the approved Societal Impact Electives: SOC 244, SOC 346, SCTS 202, SCTS 205 or approved by MSE advisor.

^

CHEM sequence is determined by the student's Chemistry Placement Exam score and the completion of a summer online preparatory course available based on that score.

^^

MATH and PHYS sequences are determined by the student's Calculus Placement Exam score and the completion of any summer online preparatory courses based on that score.

§

Some students may need a one-credit concurrent practicum course depending on their calculus exam score and summer preparatory review participation.

±

Students pursuing the non-thesis option must complete the undergraduate senior design sequence, in lieu of MATE 898 [WI]  (MS Thesis). MSE students pursuing the thesis option are not required to take MATE 491 [WI] , MATE 492, MATE 493 [WI] , and are required to complete 9.0 credits of MATE 898 [WI]  (MS thesis). In addition, these students need to complete an additional 8.0 credits of UG MATE Electives. 

¶

Of the 18.0 technical elective credits, which may include up to 6.0 credits of MATE 897, at least 9.0 credits must be taken as Materials Science and Engineering (MATE) courses, while the rest may be taken within the College of Engineering, College of Arts and Sciences, or at other colleges if consistent with the student's plan of study (and given advance written approval by their advisor). At least 9.0 of these 18.0 technical electives must be exclusive of independent study courses or research credits.

Any graduate-level course (500-999) in a STEM field (BIO, CAEE, CHE, CHEM, ECE, MATH, MEM, PHYS) as approved by the MSE graduate advisor, excluding MATE 536, MATE 503, and MATE 504

Writing-Intensive Course Requirements

In order to graduate, all students must pass three writing-intensive courses after their freshman year. Two writing-intensive courses must be in a student's major. The third can be in any discipline. Students are advised to take one writing-intensive class each year, beginning with the sophomore year, and to avoid “clustering” these courses near the end of their matriculation. Transfer students need to meet with an academic advisor to review the number of writing-intensive courses required to graduate.

A "WI" next to a course in this catalog may indicate that this course can fulfill a writing-intensive requirement. For the most up-to-date list of writing-intensive courses being offered, students should check the Writing Intensive Course List at the University Writing Program. Students scheduling their courses can also conduct a search for courses with the attribute "WI" to bring up a list of all writing-intensive courses available that term.

Sample Plan of Study

5 year, 3 coop: Non-thesis option

*

Co-op cycles for Materials Science & Engineering are only Spring/Summer.

COOP 101 registration is determined by the co-op cycle assigned and may be scheduled in a different term. Select students may be eligible to take COOP 001 in place of COOP 101.

**

General Education Requirements

***

Specialization tracks allow upper-class students to focus on a specific area of materials science and engineering through selection of three technical elective courses (minimum 9.0 credits, though 6.0 credits must be shared with graduate courses). This tailored specialization combined with foundational materials knowledge and co-op experiences gives students a customized education to prepare them for their future career and/or graduate school. Students choose from four pre-determined specialization tracks or create their own track. In addition to the specific courses listed for each pre-determined track, other courses may be accepted subject to approval by the MSE advisor. The pre-determined tracks are:

• Materials for Energy
• Materials for Medical Technologies
• Materials for Sustainability
• Manufacturing and Materials Processing

****

Choose one of the approved Business Electives (GE): ECON 201, ACCT 110, OPM 200, ORGB 300 [WI] or approved by MSE advisor.  

¶

Choose one of the approved Societal Impact Electives: SOC 244, SOC 346, SCTS 202, SCTS 205 or approved by advisor.

†

Students pursuing the non-thesis option must complete the undergraduate senior design sequence, in lieu of MATE 898 [WI]  (MS Thesis).

‡

Of the 18.0 technical elective credits, which may include up to 6.0 credits of MATE 897, at least 9.0 credits must be taken as Materials Science and Engineering (MATE) courses, while the rest may be taken within the College of Engineering, College of Arts and Sciences, or at other colleges if consistent with the student's plan of study (and given advance written approval by their advisor). At least 9.0 of these 18.0 technical electives must be exclusive of independent study courses or research credits.

Any graduate-level course (500-999) in a STEM field (BIO. CAEE, CHE, CHEM, ECE, MATH, MEM, PHYS) as approved by the MSE Graduate Advisor, excluding MATE 536, MATE 503, and MATE 504

5 year, 3 coop: Thesis option

*

Co-op cycles for Materials Science & Engineering are only Spring/Summer.

COOP 101 registration is determined by the co-op cycle assigned and may be scheduled in a different term. Select students may be eligible to take COOP 001 in place of COOP 101.

**

General Education Requirements

***

Specialization tracks allow upper-class students to focus on a specific area of materials science and engineering through selection of three technical elective courses (minimum 9.0 credits, though 6.0 credits must be shared with graduate courses). This tailored specialization combined with foundational materials knowledge and co-op experiences gives students a customized education to prepare them for their future career and/or graduate school. Students choose from four pre-determined specialization tracks or create their own track. In addition to the specific courses listed for each pre-determined track, other courses may be accepted subject to approval by the MSE advisor. The pre-determined tracks are:

• Materials for Energy
• Materials for Medical Technologies
• Materials for Sustainability
• Manufacturing and Materials Processing

****

Choose one of the approved Business Electives (GE): ECON 201, ACCT 110, OPM 200, ORGB 300 [WI] or approved by MSE advisor.  

¶

Choose one of the approved Societal Impact Electives: SOC 244, SOC 346, SCTS 202, SCTS 205 or approved by MSE advisor.

†

MSE students pursuing the thesis option are not required to take MATE 491 [WI] , MATE 492, MATE 493 [WI] , and are required to complete 9.0 credits of MATE 898 [WI]  (MS thesis). In addition, these students need to complete an additional 8.0 credits of UG MATE Electives. 

‡

Of the 18.0 technical elective credits, which may include up to 6.0 credits of MATE 897​, at least 9.0 credits must be taken as Materials Science and Engineering (MATE) courses, while the rest may be taken within the College of Engineering, College of Arts and Sciences, or at other colleges if consistent with the student's plan of study (and given advance written approval by their advisor). At least 9.0 of these 18.0 technical electives must be exclusive of independent study courses or research credits.

Any graduate-level course (500-999) in a STEM field (BIO. CAEE, CHE, CHEM, ECE, MATH, MEM, PHYS) as approved by the MSE Graduate Advisor, excluding MATE 536, MATE 503, and MATE 504

Facilities

Nanobiomaterials and Cell Engineering Laboratory
This laboratory contains a fume hood with vacuum/gas dual manifold, vacuum pump and rotary evaporator for general organic/polymer synthesis; gel electrophoresis and electroblotting for protein characterization; bath sonicator, glass homogenizer and mini-extruder for nanoparticle preparation; centrifuge; ultrapure water conditioning system; precision balance; pH meter and shaker.

Ceramics Processing Laboratory
This laboratory contains a photo-resist spinner, impedance analyzer, Zeta potential meter, spectrafluorometer, piezoelectric d33 meter, wire-bonder, and laser displacement meter.

Layered Solids Laboratory
This laboratory contains a vacuum hot-press; creep testers, Ar-atmosphere glove-box, high-speed saw, and assorted high temperature furnaces; metallographic preparation facilities; high temperature closed-loop servo-hydraulic testing machines.

Mechanical Testing Laboratory
This laboratory contains mechanical and closed-loop servo-hydraulic testing machines, hardness testers, Charpy and Izod impact testers, equipment for fatigue testing, metallographic preparation facilities and a rolling mill with twin 6" diameter rolls.

Macromolecular Materials Laboratory
This laboratory contains a hybrid rheometer, inert environment glove box, size exclusion chromatography with multi-angle laser light scattering, HPLC and RI detector & MALS, centrifuge, rotovapor, and vacuum oven used for developing innovative synthetic platforms to generate functional soft materials with complex macromolecular architectures.

Mesoscale Materials Laboratory
This laboratory contains instrumentation for growth, characterization, device fabrication, and design and simulation of electronic, dielectric, ferroelectric and photonic materials. Resources include physical and chemical vapor deposition and thermal and plasma processing of thin films, including oxides and metals, and semiconductor nanowire growth. Facilities include pulsed laser deposition, atomic layer deposition (ALD), chemical vapor deposition (CVD), sublimation growth, and resistive thermal evaporation.  Variable-temperature high-vacuum probe station and optical cryostats including high magnetic field, fixed and tunable-wavelength laser sources, several monochromators for luminescence and Raman scattering spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy with electron beam lithography, and a scanning probe microscope.

Nanomaterials Laboratory
This laboratory contains instrumentation for synthesizing, testing and manipulation of nanomaterials carbon and two dimensional carbides under microscope, high-temperature autoclaves, Sievert’s apparatus; glove-boxes; high-temperature vacuum and other furnaces for the synthesis of nano-carbon coatings and nanotubes; tube furnaces for synthesis of carbides and nitrides; potentiostat/galvanostat for electrochemical testings; ultraviolet-visible (UV-VIS) spectrophotometry; Raman spectrometers; Differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) and thermogravimetric analyzer (TGA) up to 1500 °C with mass spectrometer, Zeta potential analyzer; attrition mill, bath and probe sonicators, centrifuges; electro-spinning system for producing nano-fibers.

Functional Inorganic Materials Synthesis Laboratory
The laboratory contains equipment for the synthesis of inorganic and hybrid materials, including gas cabinets for NH₃ and H₂, a CVD furnace, and spin-coater; UV-Vis spectrophotometer; and a photodegradation test station with Xe 1000 W lamp.   

Films and Heterostructures Laboratory
This laboratory contains an oxide molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) thin film deposition system; physical properties measurement system (PPMS) for electronic transport and magnetometry measurements from 2 to 400 K, up to 9 T fields; 2 tube furnaces; spectroscopic ellipsometer.

Powder Processing Laboratory
This laboratory contains vee blenders, ball-mills, sieve shaker + sieves for powder classification, several furnaces. 

Soft Matter Research and Polymer Processing Laboratories
These laboratories contain computerized thermal analysis facilities including differential scanning calorimeters (DSC), dynamic mechanical analyzer (DMA) and thermo-gravimetric analyzer (TGA); tabletop tensile tester; strip biaxial tensile tester; vacuum evaporator; spin coater; centrifuge; optical microscope with hot stage; liquid crystal tester; microbalance; ultrasonic cleaner; laser holographic fabrication system; polymer injection molder and single screw extruder.

Natural Polymers and Photonics Laboratory
This laboratory contains a high purity liquid chromatography (HPLC) system; refractometer; electro-spinning and touch-spinning systems for producing nanofibers.

X-ray Tomography Laboratory
This laboratory contains a high resolution X-ray micro-tomography instrument and a cluster of computers for 3D microstructure reconstruction; mechanical stage, a positioning stage and a cryostage for in-situ testing.

MSE Undergraduate Teaching Laboratory
Contains an FTIR spectrometer, metallographic sample preparation, equipment, polymer 3D printers, polymer extruder and injection molder, Vickers hardness tester, inverted metallograph, multiple  furnaces.

Materials Characterization Core (MCC)
The Department of Materials Science & Engineering relies on the Materials Characterization Core facilities within the University for materials characterization and micro- and nano-fabrication. These facilities contain a number of state-of-the-art materials characterization instruments, including high resolution and variable pressure field-emission scanning electron microscopes (SEMs) with Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS) for elemental analysis, Orientation Image Microscopy (OIM) for texture analysis, various in-situ and in-operando stages (cryo mat, heating, tensile, 3- and 4-point bending, and electrochemistry); two Transmission Electron Microscopes (TEMs) with STEM capability and TEM sample preparation equipment; a dual-beam focused ion beam (FIB) system for nano-characterization and nano fabrication; a Nanoindenter; an X-ray Photoelectron Spectrometer (XPS)/Electron Spectroscopy for Chemical Analysis (ESCA) system; X-Ray Diffractometers (XRD); and an X-ray microscope (NanoCT) with an in-situ tensile/compression temperature controlled stage.

More details of these instruments, information on how to access them, and instrument usage rates can be found at Drexel University’s Materials Characterization Core webpage.

Materials Science and Engineering Faculty

Emeritus Faculty