Mechanisms, machines and structures have to meet increasingly stringent requirements during operation. The economic and human costs of failure during service impose a great responsibility on those who develop materials and those who select and integrate materials in a final engineering design. A critical feature of successful development is the selection of the best material based on an awareness of the capabilities and opportunities afforded by all candidate materials, coupled with a design which takes full advantage of those capabilities. Materials & Design, as its title implies, publishes papers, articles and reports which describe the properties of a material which influence or control any practical design. All types of materials are covered, and all scales of application from micromachinery to large structural components. The technical level is postgraduate but not specialist: development rather than theory is stressed. Papers should be understandable and offer information useful to professionals working in fields outside the immediate subject of the paper. The aim is to promote a greater understanding of the attributes and capabilities of all types of modern engineering materials.