通常需要人造材料来确保工程基础设施的寿命和设计性能。这些材料可以由沥青，混凝土，木材或合成复合材料制成。材料工程师设计这些材料以产生工程系统所需的物理，化学和生物学特性。材料工程师使用他们的专业知识来设计沥青路面，这种沥青路面在夏天不会发车，冬天不会开裂，在潮湿的天气中不会剥落或在生物或光化学作用下不会降解。他们使用水泥，石材和化学药品，制造出可在数小时内固化的混凝土或强度比任何零件强五倍的混凝土。他们使用木材和塑料开发可再生，功能强大且具有成本效益的系统，用于商业和工业应用。
Man-made materials are often required to insure longevity and design performance of engineering infrastructure. The materials may be made of asphalt, concrete, timber, or synthetic composites. The materials engineer designs these materials to produce physical, chemical, and biological properties needed for an engineered system. Materials engineers use their expertise to design asphalt pavements that will not rut in summer, crack in winter, spall in wet weather, or degrade biologically or photo-chemically. Using cement, stone, and chemicals, they create concretes that cure in hours or have strengths five time stronger than any of the parts. Using timber and plastics they develop systems that are renewable, functional and cost efficient for commercial and industrial applications.