Corrosion & Materials Integrity
The global energy transition and cyclic economy strongly pushes towards more efficient and sustainable material technologies for clean and efficient energy production, conversion, transportation, storage and consumption, while ensuring efficient a materials resources management. The development of durable and sustainable materials-based products typically requires an early-stage evaluation of the corrosion system during the development phase. Our expertise in complex corrosion systems and related materials integrity serves this urgent need from Swiss academia and industry. Accordingly, we are a national competence center for the investigation of corrosion failures and the development of corrosion prevention strategies. The root cause of a material failure is often of combined chemical and mechanical nature. Hence we combine our knowledge on environmental corrosion mechanisms with long-term experiences in the fields of fractography, metallography and microstructural and chemical analysis.
OUR EXPERTISE
We offer R&D, high-end services and failure analysis to exigent industrial needs in the following fields:
- Determination of corrosion mechanisms and corrosive media by characterizations of the materials' microstructure and the corrosion products
- Development of guidelines and recommendations for the prevention of recurrent corrosion fatalities
- Investigations of the corrosion-resistance of novel metallic materials and functional coatings under extreme environmental or operating conditions through the design and application of certified corrosion tests
- Field-investigations and chemical analysis of damages of metallic materials and components after impact of fire and chemical accidents
RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT
In recent years, we experience an ever-increasing demand for expert field and laboratory investigations of highly complex corrosion systems in rather new, but rapidly emerging application fields, such as additive manufactured components, laser-structured materials, batteries, medical implants and devices, high-strength steels and sensor technologies. The investigation and formulation of the surface reactivity and corrosion mechanisms of such advanced metallic materials and their functional surfaces requires localized monitoring of electrochemical reactions at solid-liquid interfaces by state-of-the-art surface-analytical techniques (e.g. capillary methods, XPS/HAXPES, environmental AFM, photoelectrochemistry, impedance spectroscopy and Kelvin probe microscopy).
The in-house development of advanced local electrochemical analysis techniques is a key activity in our lab with a focus on the development of user-friendly micro- and nano-capillary scanning techniques, which can be operated in aqueous (electrolytic) environments on a local scale (from the μm down to the nm range). Such advanced methods can, for example, reveal the crucial role of segregates, precipitates, defects and grain (or phase) boundaries on the local dissolution, reactivity, degradation and/or biocompatibility of advanced materials, coatings, metal implants and complex joined assemblies in electrolytic environments.
In recent years, we have implemented a state-of-the-art combinatorial analytical approach by local/micro electrochemistry, surface analysis (XPS/HAXPES) and Atomic & Kelvin Probe Force Microscopy (AFM/KPFM) with Kelvin Probefor investigating the effect of material heterogeneities and defects on the corrosion-susceptibility of advanced manufactured alloys and high-strength steels. For example, improve our fundamental understanding of the interaction of hydrogen with the passive oxide on streel, as well as on metastable pitting phenomena of extremely corrosion resistant materials, such as Titanium.
Swiss, corrosion, corrosion management, corrosion protection, corrosion mechanism, pitting corrosion, pitting, stress corrosion cracking, crevice corrosion, implant corrosion, corrosion damage, corrosion analysis, corrosion testing, failure analysis, damage case, metallography, fractography, electrochemistry, microcapillary, hydrogen embrittlement, hydrogen analysis, service, advise, consult, inspection, expertise
Swiss, corrosion, corrosion management, corrosion protection, corrosion mechanism, pitting corrosion, pitting, stress corrosion cracking, crevice corrosion, implant corrosion, corrosion damage, corrosion analysis, corrosion testing, failure analysis, damage case, metallography, fractography, electrochemistry, microcapillary, hydrogen embrittlement, hydrogen analysis, service, advise, consult, inspection, expertise
Swiss, corrosion, corrosion management, corrosion protection, corrosion mechanism, pitting corrosion, pitting, stress corrosion cracking, crevice corrosion, implant corrosion, corrosion damage, corrosion analysis, corrosion testing, failure analysis, damage case, metallography, fractography, electrochemistry, microcapillary, hydrogen embrittlement, hydrogen analysis, service, advise, consult, inspection, expertise
