Common Types of Materials
Composite materials
Materials designed from two or more constituent materials of significantly different chemical and/or physical properties that, when combined, lead to different characteristic properties than either individual component.
Magnetic materials
Materials that produce a magnetic field in response to an applied magnetic field. Such materials can have magnetic behavior including ferromagnetic or ferrimagnetic, paramagnetic, and diamagnetic.
Semiconductors
Small band gap insulators that can be doped with impurities or different surface functionality to controllably alter electrical properties for a desired application. Such materials can include a wide array of crystalline and polycrystalline inorganic solids.
Polymeric materials
Polymers are large molecules or macromolecules largely composed of C, H, O, and N that can range from synthetic plastics like polystyrene to natural biopolymers like proteins all of which lead to unique physical and mechanical properties.
Nanomaterials
Any materials that have architectures on the 1-100 nm scale whether these be metals, metal oxides, semiconductors, or polymer-based materials.