Breakthrough technologies require more than just rearranging or reshaping the parts and materials already available to us. Solving societal problems, both big and small, by revolutionizing what’s possible requires new materials with transformational properties and capabilities. Materials Engineers leverage math, chemistry, and physics as tools to understand, control, and design the materials we use to make things–enabling and implementing solutions to problems in all areas of science, technology and medicine.
A bachelor of science degree in materials science and engineering (MSE) prepares students for impactful, financially rewarding careers in industry, challenging and dynamic futures as innovators or entrepreneurs and advanced graduate study in a range of fields.
We are a close-knit program whose greatest pride are the students and their individual successes. Become a part of our work hard, play hard environment and achieve anything. We have interdisciplinary research opportunities.
Have research experience at graduation
NACE Summer 2023
Have industry experience at graduation
The UK Materials Engineering program emcompass a dynamic group of faculty and students working collaboratively to solve problems and positively impact society. Materials Engineering has a long history at the University of Kentucky. The program awarded its first bachelor's degree (in what was then called Metallurgical Engineering) in 1914, and was first accredited in 1936. The first doctoral degree conferred by the College of Engineering was awarded in Metallurgical Engineering to Dr. Carl J. McHargue, a member of the College's Hall of Distinction.
In 1994, the Department of Materials Science and Engineering merged with the Department of Chemical Engineering to form the present Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering. Since that time, our combined department has continued to award separate Materials Engineering and Chemical Engineering degrees at the B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. levels.
The Materials Engineering program is committed to growing and strengthening materials research in Kentucky. Exciting partnerships with the UK Electron Microscopy Center, the Center of Applied Energy Research, and numerous departments across UK’s campus connect Materials Engineering to an immense range of impactful projects.
On Sept. 12, the University of Kentucky will induct 20 alumni into the 2025 Hall of Distinguished Alumni, including five Pigman College of Engineering alumni. The alumni will be honored for their meaningful contributions to the Commonwealth, nation and the world.
Alexandra F. Paterson’s research paves the way for more reliable and innovative technologies that could benefit health care, manufacturing and everyday life. For her work, she has earned two prestigious national awards for early-career faculty: the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Young Faculty Award.
The University of Kentucky is well-represented on a list of the most-cited researchers in the world. In a database compiled by Stanford University in a partnership with Elsevier, 136 current UK scientists and scholars appear among the top 2% of the most-cited researchers across 22 disciplines. Of those 136 scientists and scholars, 20 are UK Pigman College of Engineering faculty.
