Learning about how materials change between phases, from solids to liquids to gases, is a hallmark of primary school science class. To the average person. This building block of material science is often thought of in the simplest terms, but what if your home could use the energy involved in these transitions to help passively heat or cool it, just by changing out the molding.

On this episode of Engineer This, Dr. Emily Pentzer, an associate professor in the Departments of Material Science & Engineering and Chemistry, discusses how her research is working to design next generation materials by using simple and scalable techniques.