"Relating the Increasing Scarcity of Mineral-Based Materials to the Materials Science Curriculum"

A new course was developed and offering as a senior technical elective or beginning graduate course with the title" Strategic Metals and Materials for the 21st Century" with the stated objective of creating an understanding of the role of mineralbased materials in the modern economy focusing on how such knowledge can and should be used in making strategic choices in an engineering context.The success at garnering student attention will be discussed.A novel aspect of this course is the use of current literature (including 'business news') used to demonstrate the connectedness of materials availability and the development and sustainability of engineering advances.The concept of strategic recycling, including design for recycling and waste stream management will be considered and, in particular, how it relates to traditional topics such as extractive metallurgy also will be discussed in terms of how it might rejuvenate a field of study.