Cover Picture: In‐Situ Synchrotron X‐Ray Microtomography Studies of Microstructure and Damage Evolution in Engineering Materials (Adv. Eng. Mater. 11/2007)

Abstract The cover shows the study of the bulk material flow within the stir zone of friction stir welded auminium alloys with implated Cu and Ti powders. By applying synchrotron radiation based microtomography the simultaneous marker material displacement (Cu and Ti) can be visualized non‐invasively in 3D. More about the usage of in‐situ synchrotron x‐ray microtomography to study microstructure and damage evolution in engineering materials can be read in the review article by A. Pyzalla et al. on page 939. In materials science X‐ray microtomography has evolved as an increasingly utilized technique for characterizing the 3D microstructure of materials. The fundamentals of X‐ray microtomography experimental methods and the reconstruction and data evaluation processes are briefly described. A review of in‐situ synchrotron X‐ray microtomography studies in literature is given. Examples of recent work include in‐situ microtomography investiagtions of metallic foams, in‐situ studies of the sintering of copper particles, and in‐situ investigations of creep damage evolution in composites. Future perspectives of in‐situ X‐ray microtomography studies in materials science are outlined.