Machine learning for structure-guided materials and process design

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in accelerated materials innovation in the context of the process-structure-property chain. In this regard, it is essential to take into account manufacturing processes and tailor materials design approaches to support downstream process design approaches. As a major step into this direction, we present a holistic optimization approach that covers the entire process-structure-property chain in materials engineering. Our approach specifically employs machine learning to address two critical identification problems: a materials design problem, which involves identifying near-optimal material structures that exhibit desired properties, and a process design problem that is to find an optimal processing path to manufacture these structures. Both identification problems are typically ill-posed, which presents a significant challenge for solution approaches. However, the non-unique nature of these problems offers an important advantage for processing: By having several target structures that perform similarly well, processes can be efficiently guided towards manufacturing the best reachable structure. The functionality of the approach will be demonstrated manufacturing crystallographic textures with desired properties in a metal forming process.