MAT SCI 104
Science of Engineering Materials
Description: Lecture, three hours; discussion, one hour; outside study, eight hours. Requisites: Chemistry 20A, 20B, 20L, Physics 1A. Corequisite: Physics 1B. General introduction to different types of materials used in engineering designs: metals, ceramics, plastics, and composites, relationship between structure (crystals and microstructure) and properties of technological materials. Illustration of their fundamental differences and their applications in engineering. Letter grading.
Units: 4.0
Units: 4.0
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Most Helpful Review
Fall 2022 - If I could say one thing about this class, it's that it's all memorization. I'm not exactly the strongest student in that regard, so I would say this class wasn't hard to understand but rather hard to memorize all the content for. Professor Banerjee is pretty nice, pretty clear in his lectures, and his slides are super detailed, which is good and bad because you should know basically everything on them. His tests weren't very tricky, as he didn't allow cheat sheets or anything, but they were definitely pretty ruthless with testing any aspect of the slides (facts, drawings, graphs, etc.). I personally felt as though the tests were graded relatively harshly, as there's little partial credit and a lot of emphasis on having the exact answer down. (For example, out of a 30 point problem, I had all the right steps but the wrong numbers in the beginning. He gave max 13/30 points, which I felt was a little unfair, but to each their own.) He curved the average to a B (around a 5% curve?), so I guess you could take my experience as that of the average of the class.
Fall 2022 - If I could say one thing about this class, it's that it's all memorization. I'm not exactly the strongest student in that regard, so I would say this class wasn't hard to understand but rather hard to memorize all the content for. Professor Banerjee is pretty nice, pretty clear in his lectures, and his slides are super detailed, which is good and bad because you should know basically everything on them. His tests weren't very tricky, as he didn't allow cheat sheets or anything, but they were definitely pretty ruthless with testing any aspect of the slides (facts, drawings, graphs, etc.). I personally felt as though the tests were graded relatively harshly, as there's little partial credit and a lot of emphasis on having the exact answer down. (For example, out of a 30 point problem, I had all the right steps but the wrong numbers in the beginning. He gave max 13/30 points, which I felt was a little unfair, but to each their own.) He curved the average to a B (around a 5% curve?), so I guess you could take my experience as that of the average of the class.
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Most Helpful Review
Spring 2020 - 2 Quizzes, 1 Midterm, 1 Final, Weekly homework Quizzes and midterms weren't cumulative, and they aren't too difficult. Overall, there is A LOT of material to cover, so be prepared to do a lot of reading on your own. The lectures were all pretty dry, and I didn't find them too useful. They're basically just reading off a powerpoint. There's a lot of material to read, so the workload is pretty tough. Don't take this class with this professor if you don't have to; it's basically just learning everything by yourself.
Spring 2020 - 2 Quizzes, 1 Midterm, 1 Final, Weekly homework Quizzes and midterms weren't cumulative, and they aren't too difficult. Overall, there is A LOT of material to cover, so be prepared to do a lot of reading on your own. The lectures were all pretty dry, and I didn't find them too useful. They're basically just reading off a powerpoint. There's a lot of material to read, so the workload is pretty tough. Don't take this class with this professor if you don't have to; it's basically just learning everything by yourself.
Most Helpful Review
Good lecturer! He is always enthusiastic about the materials he teaches and brings in cool demos all the time. However, though his lectures give a good overview of the stuff you're supposed to learn, the key to acing the quizzes, midterms ,and finals are in doing the homework. The quizzes and midterms are straightforward and very much like homework problems. Going to class or reviewing his ppts gives you the multiples choice questions. The final was harder, but you get a double-sided cheat sheet. Overall, a good, fair professor.
Good lecturer! He is always enthusiastic about the materials he teaches and brings in cool demos all the time. However, though his lectures give a good overview of the stuff you're supposed to learn, the key to acing the quizzes, midterms ,and finals are in doing the homework. The quizzes and midterms are straightforward and very much like homework problems. Going to class or reviewing his ppts gives you the multiples choice questions. The final was harder, but you get a double-sided cheat sheet. Overall, a good, fair professor.
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Most Helpful Review
Spring 2025 - Professor He is a good professor and a very kind person. This class moves at a blazing pace, and it was common to cover multiple topics and even chapters per lecture, each with minimal depth. Memorization is the emphasis, while methodology took a backseat for the handful of topics that we studied for a longer period. While lectures (not recorded) are mostly just a slideshow and completely optional, I preferred her lectures to sitting and reading through the textbook, though it comes down to personal preference. Would highly recommend attending discussion section; they quickly narrowed the focus of the class onto the important things to study and memorize. The TAs wrote the quizzes, midterm, and final exam, and the review and hints they provided about the structure and questions on the tests were valuable. They also give your tests back during discussion, which I found helpful in studying for the final. Grading structure echoes the emphasis on memorization and is primarily test-based, with 2 Quizzes, Midterm, and Final taking up 90% of the grading scheme, no participation. HW was a breeze, but the scheme reflects its lack of emphasis. Tests weren't too difficult with proper preparation (discussion attendance, textbook questions, flashcards), and class medians hovered around a "B". An extra credit report is also available that can raise your final grade percentage above 100%. Both Prof. He and the TAs really do everything they can to help boost your score while helping you learn the fundamentals of MSE, and I would recommend you take it with her if possible.
Spring 2025 - Professor He is a good professor and a very kind person. This class moves at a blazing pace, and it was common to cover multiple topics and even chapters per lecture, each with minimal depth. Memorization is the emphasis, while methodology took a backseat for the handful of topics that we studied for a longer period. While lectures (not recorded) are mostly just a slideshow and completely optional, I preferred her lectures to sitting and reading through the textbook, though it comes down to personal preference. Would highly recommend attending discussion section; they quickly narrowed the focus of the class onto the important things to study and memorize. The TAs wrote the quizzes, midterm, and final exam, and the review and hints they provided about the structure and questions on the tests were valuable. They also give your tests back during discussion, which I found helpful in studying for the final. Grading structure echoes the emphasis on memorization and is primarily test-based, with 2 Quizzes, Midterm, and Final taking up 90% of the grading scheme, no participation. HW was a breeze, but the scheme reflects its lack of emphasis. Tests weren't too difficult with proper preparation (discussion attendance, textbook questions, flashcards), and class medians hovered around a "B". An extra credit report is also available that can raise your final grade percentage above 100%. Both Prof. He and the TAs really do everything they can to help boost your score while helping you learn the fundamentals of MSE, and I would recommend you take it with her if possible.
Most Helpful Review
Spring 2021 - When I first signed up for this class, I was actually quite scared due to the previous reviews. However, after taking this class, I can confidently say that Dr. Huang definitely deserves a much higher rating than a 2.6, and I definitely found this class quite easy and straightforward. --- This class definitely revolves around the textbook. Slides are based off of the textbook, homework problems are textbook problems, and sometimes, exam problems are ripped straight from the textbook, verbatim. So definitely know the textbook material; grind problems out, check your answers with Slader, and you're good. Homework is definitely on the level of exams. If you can ace the homework, you can definitely ace the exams. That said, there are definitely conceptual questions you need to know; you can't math your way out of this class. --- Dr. Huang's lecture slides are really good, and same for the slides that the TAs give out. I personally found them to be very comprehensive, and useful for exams. If it's not on the slides, it's not going to be tested. Even better, Dr. Huang releases slides before lectures, so you won't have to write stuff down at 90 miles per hour. Dr. Huang's lectures may be dry, but they definitely cover what'll be on the test. She also throws in some cool videos that explain concepts well. That said, she refuses to record lectures. --- The course material is quite interesting, and the exams and homework are definitely fair. Exam averages were 75 in my year, and Dr. Huang said that she'd set the average grade to a B+. Let's see if that ends up being the case.
Spring 2021 - When I first signed up for this class, I was actually quite scared due to the previous reviews. However, after taking this class, I can confidently say that Dr. Huang definitely deserves a much higher rating than a 2.6, and I definitely found this class quite easy and straightforward. --- This class definitely revolves around the textbook. Slides are based off of the textbook, homework problems are textbook problems, and sometimes, exam problems are ripped straight from the textbook, verbatim. So definitely know the textbook material; grind problems out, check your answers with Slader, and you're good. Homework is definitely on the level of exams. If you can ace the homework, you can definitely ace the exams. That said, there are definitely conceptual questions you need to know; you can't math your way out of this class. --- Dr. Huang's lecture slides are really good, and same for the slides that the TAs give out. I personally found them to be very comprehensive, and useful for exams. If it's not on the slides, it's not going to be tested. Even better, Dr. Huang releases slides before lectures, so you won't have to write stuff down at 90 miles per hour. Dr. Huang's lectures may be dry, but they definitely cover what'll be on the test. She also throws in some cool videos that explain concepts well. That said, she refuses to record lectures. --- The course material is quite interesting, and the exams and homework are definitely fair. Exam averages were 75 in my year, and Dr. Huang said that she'd set the average grade to a B+. Let's see if that ends up being the case.
Most Helpful Review
Spring 2023 - I feel like mat sci 104 is a class that just suffers from covering too much material at a surface level, which made the class quite boring with mostly memorization. However, Kakoulli was super nice and generous with grading and even made the final no-harm, which relieved a lot of stress near the end of the quarter. Also, even though she mostly read off the slides in lecture I found the slides to be pretty informative.
Spring 2023 - I feel like mat sci 104 is a class that just suffers from covering too much material at a surface level, which made the class quite boring with mostly memorization. However, Kakoulli was super nice and generous with grading and even made the final no-harm, which relieved a lot of stress near the end of the quarter. Also, even though she mostly read off the slides in lecture I found the slides to be pretty informative.
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