The main objective of this Marie Curie RISE action is to improve and exchange interdisciplinary knowledge of materials design by modelling, materials synthesis, characterization, and materials processing for permanent magnet development to provide a critical Rare Earth free permanent magnet to the industry. Permanent magnets are indispensable for many commercial and military applications. Major commercial applications include the electric, electronic and automobile industries, communications, information technologies and automatic control engineering. Development and improvement of new technologies based on permanent magnets requires the joint effort of a multidisciplinary researcher collective, involving the expertise of participants on different disciplines including physics, chemistry, materials science and engineering.  The consortium undertakes an integrated effort (via knowledge transfer) to provide the fundamental innovations and breakthroughs needed to fabricate new phases and microstructures required for advanced permanent magnets without the use of critical materials.

A comprehensive experimental screening of the predicted phases has been carried out by several techniques: combinatorial sputtering, and non-equilibrium techniques, such as melt spinning or mechanical alloying.  The influence of the microstructure and temperature on the coercivity and maximum energy product were theoretically studied. Promising candidate phases for rare-earth free permanent magnets were studied with respect to interfaces and grain boundaries.
The microstructure of a magnet is essential for developing coercivity. The influence of the microstructure on coercivity, remanence, and energy density product was studied using experimental optimization tools, in order to maximize the coercive field or the energy density product. Structure optimization was performed for possible candidate phases.