Multifunctional materials: engineering applications and processing challenges

Multifunctional materials are designed so as to meet specific requirements through tailored properties. Smart materials can be considered as multifunctional ones that have the ability to react upon an external stimulus, simulating, in this way, the behavior of nature’s materials. Furthermore, the introduction of biomemetics in the material science, allows the designing of materials with similar processes as nature does: building from molecules to complete structures. This paper focuses on the presentation of the various multifunctional materials reported in the literature and the processing means developed.