Foundations of Materials Science and Engineering W/ Student CD-ROM

It is a good book to start material science. The first chapter a good overview and has interesting insight to get the reader interested in material science and engineering. However, I feel in the second chapter it goes too far back into detail about atoms, electron clouds, quantum numbers and things of that sort. Just seems like stuff from a general chemistry book rather than a material science book.

This text book was purchased for use with an Aerospace Engineering Materials class and was extremely useful, clear text.

This is an excellent book providing a clear, easy to understand, overview of the basic principles of material science and engineering. Covered are all the essential topics including the chemistry and physics behind the structure of metal, ceramic, polymer, composite and electronic materials. Also included are optical, magnetic and electrical properties of materials with relevance to optical fibers, superconductors, and semiconductors. This is a great book for a student's first exposure to material science or as a reference for practicing engineers. I personally found chapters covering the mechanical properties of metals and corrosion well presented and a useful workplace reference. The book provides great insight to real world applications, bridging the gap between theory and practice.