Observing hydrogen’s effects in metal
Hydrogen, the second-tiniest of all atoms, can penetrate right into the crystal structure of a solid metal. That’s good news for efforts to store hydrogen fuel safely within the metal itself, but it’s bad news for structures such as the pressure vessels in nuclear plants, where hydrogen uptake eventually makes the vessel’s metal walls more brittle, which can lead to failure. But this embrittlement process is difficult to observe because hydrogen atoms diffuse very fast, even inside the solid metal. Now, researchers at MIT have figured out a way around that problem, creating a new technique that allows the observation of a metal surface during hydrogen penetration. Their findings are described in a paper appearing today in the International Journal of Hydrogen Energy, by MIT postdoc Jinwoo Kim and Thomas B. King Assistant Professor of Metallurgy C. Cem Tasan. “It's definitely a cool tool,” says Chris San Marchi, a distinguished member of the...