Exeter is working with research laboratories from around the world to develop new materials and techniques.Functional materials: main focus areas
Invisibility screens for radar, artificial bone, solar panels, computer memories, novel sensors; all rely on functional materials – materials whose properties derive from and are controlled by their underlying design. Functional materials contribute to information and communications technology, transport, healthcare, defence and energy production.
Exeter's research vision is for a multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approach to the understanding and application of functional materials - from fundamentals to manufacture - exploiting world-leading materials knowledge to deliver new concepts, processes and products. Research will focus on three major sub-themes nanoscale materials, structured metamaterials and photonic materials.
The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) commits £200 million a year to its development and last year the Engineering and Physical Research Council spent £56.3 million funding materials research. But in a recent report the DTI identified the lack of interdisciplinary research as an issue that is preventing the UK from fulfilling its potential.
To help the UK play a lead role in developing functional materials, the University is investing heavily in this area as part of its new £80 million science strategy. This involves bringing together research expertise from blue-skies research in Physics to new manufacturing techniques being developed in Engineering.
Professor Ken Evans, Head of the College of Engineering, Mathematics and Physical Sciences comments: “The value of functional materials lies in their enabling capabilities – their economic impact comes from the effects of the devices, products and systems that are made from them. They also provide a fascinating arena for study in which much of the underlying science has yet to be explored. This is a very exciting time for us to be building on this area of our research.”
Centre for Graphene Science
This world-leading research centre, which explores and exploits the properties of the thinnest material in nature, brings together research expertise in graphene science from the Universities of Exeter and Bath.
The two universities won a £5 million Science and Innovation Award from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) to create the Centre of Graphene Science.
A form of carbon, graphene was discovered in 2004 and is the thinnest known conducting material. It is a single layer of graphite which is just one atom thick and has unique mechanical, electrical and optical properties. Scientists believe it could play a major role in the future of computing because it has the potential to speed-up the transfer of information. It can become the basis of a new generation of devices, from ultra-fast transistors to chemical and biological sensors with ultimate (single-molecule) sensitivity. These devices will find a wide range of applications, from nano-electronics to medicine and healthcare.
Find out more about the Centre of Graphene Science.
Photonic materials – taking inspiration from nature
Photonics is a major research specialism of the University of Exeter’s School of Physics. Founded by Professor Roy Sambles in 1983, the team now comprises about 20 research scientists. One of their most exciting areas of research is that of photonics in nature, particularly the iridescence created in certain species of butterfly wings and the super-white Cyphochilus beetle.
Complex surface structures in the butterflies’ wings and the beetles’ shell interact with photons to produce very intense colours without the aid of pigment. This work has potential applications ranging from military camouflage to paint and fashion. Photonics is also the basis of work to create ultra sensitive detection equipment.
Professor Sambles explains: “We are looking at ways of replicating nature’s structures by using novel fabrication techniques, such as additive layer manufacturing, to open up a wide range of possible applications from fabrics to camouflage, dentistry to paper production and even new forms of makeup.”
A ‘smart’ material to create bomb-proof ‘curtains’
Exeter engineers are developing blast curtains made from a ‘smart’ material that could minimize injuries inflicted by a terrorist attack. The team is led by Professor Ken Evans in conjunction with spin-out company Auxetix Ltd, to create special ‘auxetic’ materials that react to pressure by getting fatter rather than thinner to catch glass fragments and debris blown through windows by an explosion.
Bomb blasts cause damage by generating a pressure shockwave, which shatters materials in its path. The majority of those injured in an attack are injured by the flying debris that results. The fibres in conventional fabrics react to this pressure by stretching and tearing as the pressure pulls them taut, which prevents them from catching debris effectively. However, when auxetic materials stretch they show a unique property; they get fatter rather than thinner. This means that under tension a large number of pores open up across the surface of the material allowing the shock wave through, but leaving it intact to catch glass and other debris.
Nanomaterials to provide ‘memories of the future’
Imagine a single CD-sized disk that can store the entire collection of the British Library. Exeter’s engineers and physicists led by Professors David Wright and Rob Hicken are working together to develop new nanoscale materials that could make this a reality.
Engineer Professor David Wright said: “The amount of data generated and stored in the world is ever-increasing, so we need to build the capacity of memory devices and at the same time, for environmental and portability reasons, make them smaller and consume less power. Conventional approaches to data storage such as magnetic hard-disks, DVDs and ‘Flash’ memory sticks are facing difficult technological barriers to further progress. So, Exeter is working with research laboratories from around the world to develop new materials and techniques, such as scanning probe based memories and magnetic random access memories that circumvent the limitations of conventional storage technologies.”
