Press Releases

The director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Mechanics of Materials IWM in Freiburg and professor of materials mechanics at KIT was named a TMS Fellow on March 18, 2026, at the annual conference of the American TMS – The Minerals, Metals and Materials Society in San Diego. The appointment as a TMS Fellow is the highest award for TMS members and honors the life's work of leading figures in materials science. The honor recognizes Prof. Peter Gumbsch's outstanding scientific achievements and technical contributions to multiscale materials modeling and the understanding of fracture and deformation processes.

Scientists at Fraunhofer IWM have developed and tested a substitution chain for lubricants and seals containing PFAS in a project funded by the state of Baden-Württemberg and a Fraunhofer project. This allows suitable PFAS-free materials solutions to be efficiently identified and evaluated.

In a new research project funded by the BMWE, design guidelines for welds for use in hydrogen technologies are being developed, based on the established recommendations of the International Institute of Welding (IIW). In the future, it should be possible to universally take into account the influence of hydrogen on fatigue strength and thus the service life of components for different applications when dimensioning welds, helping companies to both develop welded components more quickly and to reduce wall thicknesses. Within the project consortium, the Fraunhofer Institute for Mechanics of Materials IWM is responsible for formulating design concepts, materials testing, and digitalization. The project will start in February 2026.

The DVM stands for digitization, networking, and material innovations, bringing science and industry together to advance materials research, materials testing, and component testing. At the general assembly in December 2025, Prof. Dr. Christoph Eberl from Fraunhofer IWM in Freiburg was elected as the successor to Prof. Dr. Tilmann Beck from the Technical University of Kaiserslautern. He took office as chairman of the board on January 1, 2026.

The digital die casting twin links information regarding the condition of materials to all sub-processes of die casting and creates a knowledge base for meeting economic, technological, and ecological requirements. To this end, knowledge graphs for various process steps were created and networked at Fraunhofer IWM using ontology-based semantic structures. Fraunhofer IWM will present the digital twin at the EUROGUSS trade show from January 13 to 15, 2026.

The HyLife project aims to develop a physics-based service life prediction tool for materials in contact with hydrogen. Innovative test methods and materials models will be used to reliably predict the service life of components under the influence of hydrogen, thereby making a decisive contribution to the safe-ty and efficiency of hydrogen infrastructures.

Fraunhofer IWM has developed and commissioned a micro-tensile testing apparatus with an integrated high pressure hydrogen chamber that can be used to perform mechanical quasi-static or cyclic (fatigue) tests and fracture mechanics investigations on samples measuring just a few millimeters in size. The transferability of the test results from micro to macro samples is guaranteed. Micro sample testing technology opens up new possibilities for efficiently and reliably evaluating the mechanical properties of both small and thin-walled components, as well as local weak points in material structures and weld seams in large components.

Fraunhofer IWM has developed and successfully commissioned an autoclave for crack growth tests on CT samples in hydrogen at pressures of up to 170 bar. The compact design enables the cost-effective creation of a database for the design and safe operation of hydrogen infrastructure components.

How can new bio-based and biohybrid materials with improved features be developed faster? Six Fraunhofer institutes are jointly exploring this question in the SUBI²MA flagship project, using an innovative bio-based polyamide developed by Fraunhofer researchers as a model. Its specific properties make it a promising alternative to fossil-based plastics.

Climate change, snowmelt, and rising energy costs are putting pressure on ice rink operators. Skating on plastic sheets promises an economical and sustainable alternative. In the race to develop the most athletic skating experience, Glice AG from Lucerne, Switzerland, has now succeeded in a research project with Fraunhofer IWM in Freiburg to develop synthetic ice with gliding properties that are in no way inferior to those of frozen water. The creative interplay between Fraunhofer IWM's materials science research into the contact mechanisms — including the resulting material specifications necessary for enabling skating on plastic — and Glice AG's further development of the formula and manufacturing process for plastic ice sheets ultimately led to the breakthrough.