Details of Grant

EPSRC Reference:

EP/C513037/1

Title:

Portfolio Partnership In Complex Fluids And Complex Flows

Principal Investigator:

Other Investigators:

Phillips, Professor TN	Gethin, Professor DT	Wilks, Professor S
Claypole, Professor T	Webster, Professor MF

Researcher Co-Investigators:

Dr M S Barrow	Professor K Hawkins	Dr PM Williams
Dr R Williams

Project Partners:

Department:

College of Engineering

Organisation:

Swansea University

Scheme:

Portfolio Partnerships PreFEC

Starts:

01 October 2004

Ends:

30 September 2009

Value (£):

3,113,334

EPSRC Research Topic Classifications:

Instrumentation Eng. & Dev.	Multiphase Flow
Rheology

EPSRC Industrial Sector Classifications:

Manufacturing	Chemicals
Healthcare	Pharmaceuticals and Biotechnology

Related Grants:

Panel History:

Summary on Grant Application Form

Our focus is on the little-studied but scientifically vital behaviour of complex fluids in complex flows at the mesa-scale (nominally 50nm to 1 Omicron). Our aim is to combine ground-breaking advances in experimental and theoretical research to address outstanding problems in Engineering and the Lifesciences and to develop new process technologies, sensors, instrumentation, simulation and predictive tools. Having recently reported the first use of an atomic force microscope in mesoscale cavitation studies, we now wish to develop new instruments incorporating electronically- and biomimetically-functionalised probes to conduct groundbreaking rheological and interfacial studies. We also plan to conduct the first NMR spectroscopic studies in the negative pressure regime of any liquid to explore the creation of novel structured products from doubly-metastable (d-m) liquids. We see an opportunity to create devices and sensors by printing electronic polymer inks on flexible films, but to do so we need to study the role of viscoelasticity in geometrically-complex fluid delivery systems, and to better understand (and control) the role of fluid rheology in them. This work, which is intended to establish new techniques for depositing mesa-scale printed features using electronic inks, is related to our plans to create 'smart' polymer films featuring bespoke structural and electronic morphologies and embedded intelligence, for high value applications in membrane separation, microassaying, micro-lithography and micro-rheometry. We also wish to exploit our recent discovery of a novel charge-writing technique in advanced microand nano-lithographic processes involving fluid flows and for nanoscale device fabrication. Moreover, we wish to maintain our international lead in the predictive modelling of membrane separations by eschewing continuum approaches and concentrating on molecular dynamic simulations (MDS) in the description of liquid phase membrane separations, especially nanofiltration, where the controlling events are at near-molecular scales. We also need to develop accurate and stable predictive Computational Fluid Dynamics codes for transient, 3-D viscoelastic flows within complex geometries, and those involving cavitation, free surfaces, fluid-substrate interactions and interactions between colloidal particles within confined spaces. We will also address the urgent need to develop new predictive algorithms for models based on kinetic theory.

Key Findings

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Potential use in non-academic contexts

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Impacts

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Summary
Date Materialised

Sectors submitted by the Researcher

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Project URL:

Further Information:

Organisation Website:

http://www.swan.ac.uk