{"id":160836,"date":"2026-10-07T14:50:05","date_gmt":"2026-10-07T19:50:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/news\/?p=160836"},"modified":"2026-10-07T14:50:05","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T19:50:05","slug":"uwm-professor-wins-career-grant-for-work-on-costly-engineering-problem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/news\/uwm-professor-wins-career-grant-for-work-on-costly-engineering-problem\/","title":{"rendered":"UWM professor wins career grant for work on costly engineering problem"},"content":{"rendered":"

A metal bridge, automotive or airplane component may look perfectly solid on the outside. But that metal is made up of tiny crystals the size of blood cells. How those crystals fit together can determine how a piece of metal responds to stress.<\/p>\n

Understanding those interactions could help explain one of the most costly problems in engineering: metal fatigue. It’s a problem costing hundreds of billions of dollars a year.<\/p>\n

William Musinski, UWM assistant professor of mechanical engineering and materials science & engineering, is working to understand those issues.<\/p>\n

Musinski has received a five-year, $600,000 Early CAREER award from the National Science Foundation to investigate how and why tiny cracks form inside metals \u2013 and how those cracks eventually grow large enough to cause a part to fail.<\/p>\n

Read more about Musinski\u2019s work<\/a> \u2013 including how he uses extremely powerful X-rays produced by synchrotrons to peer inside metal \u2013 on the webpage of UWM\u2019s College of Engineering & Applied Science.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

William Musinski, UWM assistant professor of mechanical engineering is investigating the issue of metal fatigue \u2013 a problem costing hundreds of billions a year \u2013 by peering deep inside the metal to structures the size of blood cells. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3151,"featured_media":160837,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","uwm_wg_additional_authors":[]},"categories":[174],"tags":[],"section":[141,139],"display_categories":[115,116],"related-coverage":[],"uwmnews-feed":[149],"class_list":["post-160836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","section-engineering","section-science-technology","display_categories-top-story-secondary","display_categories-top-story-section","uwmnews-feed-engineering-applied-science"],"uwm_unpublish_requested":false,"yoast_head":"\nUWM professor wins career grant for work on costly engineering problem<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"William Musinski, UWM assistant professor of mechanical engineering is investigating the issue of metal fatigue \u2013 a problem costing hundreds of billions a year \u2013 by peering deep inside the metal to structures the size of blood cells.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/news\/uwm-professor-wins-career-grant-for-work-on-costly-engineering-problem\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"UWM professor wins career grant for work on costly engineering problem\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"William Musinski, UWM assistant professor of mechanical engineering is investigating the issue of metal fatigue \u2013 a problem costing hundreds of billions a year \u2013 by peering deep inside the metal to structures the size of blood cells.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/news\/uwm-professor-wins-career-grant-for-work-on-costly-engineering-problem\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"UWM REPORT\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-10-07T19:50:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/41\/2026\/10\/20260817_TCF_CEAS_5694.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"750\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"500\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"John G. Schumacher\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@UWMNews\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@UWMNews\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"John G. Schumacher\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/uwm.edu\\\/news\\\/uwm-professor-wins-career-grant-for-work-on-costly-engineering-problem\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/uwm.edu\\\/news\\\/uwm-professor-wins-career-grant-for-work-on-costly-engineering-problem\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"John G. 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