News
20/4/12: Tungsten Ion Implantation
James Gibson and Dave Armstrong have just returned from the first sucessful tungsten ion and helium ion implantation we have performed at CEA Saclay using the Jannus facility.
12/4/12: New Paper on Tungsten Foils
Xiaoou Yi and Dr David Armstrong have been collaborating with researchers from KIT, Germany, and Plansee, Austria, on characterising thin tungsten foils for use in W/W composites for structural applications in fusion reactor divertors. Their new paper which explains some of the interesting mechanical properties of such thin foils can be found here.
26/03/12: Nuclear Materials Short Course: second time around
The first one-week nuclear materials course proved highly popular, and many of those attending suggested we run another such course in a year's time. We have now fixed the dates for the course as 3-7 September 2012. More details here; registration is now open.
26/03/12: Chris Hardie at UCSB and CAES
Chris spent some days at UCSB, discussing work with Bob Odette and group, before driving (!) to Idaho Falls to start work our first neutron-irradiated materials. He is at CAES, Idaho Falls, this week, making FIB-machined micro-cantilevers in Fe-6%Cr alloys irradiated at INL, and supplied to us by Bob Odette. Image shows Chris' first (and smallest planned!) cantilevers.
14/02/12: Dave Armstrong and Steve Roberts at UCSB
Dave and Steve were at a three-day meeting at the University of California, Santa Barbara, on "Challenges in Tungsten for Fusion Applications". See here for pictures.
22/01/12: Oxide-dispersion Strengthened Alloys for Nuclear Applications: registration now open.
The MFFP group will be organising a three-day workshop on oxide-dispersion strengthened alloys for nuclear applications, on 24-26 September 2012. This low-cost meeting will be centred on about a dozen keynote lectures (of ~ 1 hour) and will give ample time for discussions centred around the lectures and two substantial poster sessions where "work in progress" will be reported. Registration is now open. For more details see here.
17/01/12: ITER news
Collaborative work on oxide-dispersion strengthened steels, involving Sergio Lozano-Perez (Oxford), Vanessa de Castro (UC3M, Spain) and Emmanuelle Marquis (University of Michigan, USA) is featured in "ITER News".
16/01/12: Group Photo
After one of our Friday morning meetings, I got everyone (well, nearly everyone) together for a photo.
So we now also have a "Group Photos" page.
06/01/12: Bristol-Oxford Nuclear Research Centre in "Materials World"
An article on the launch event: www.iom3.org/news/fission-future?c=574. For more details about the Centre, see www.nrcuk.net/.
10/11/11: New researchers join the project
In October, we welcomed five new doctoral students: James Gibson, Alan Xu, Daniel Thompson, Andrew London and Chris Jones. In November, Phil Edmondson joined us as a postdoctoral researcher in Atom Probe and Electron Microscopy.
8/11/11: Bristol-Oxford Nuclear Research centre launched
The Bristol-Oxford Nuclear Research Centre was officially launched in Bristol on 8 November. The centre will coordinate and provide multi-disciplinary research to support current and future nuclear systems, including fusion. For more details, see www.nrcuk.net/.
28-29/9/11: Nuclear Materials - Ion Implantation as a Neutron Irradiation Analogue
This workshop explored how we can use ion implantation as a "physical model" for neutron irradiation of materials. Keynote speakers addreseed the basic principles, experimental methods and facilities, post-irradiation examination and property evaluation, in-situ methods and the advantages and disadvantages of these techniques.
Further information, including speakers, timetable, is available here..
17/6/11: "I'm a Scientist - Get me out of here!"
Dave Armstrong and James Marrow are fielding school students' questions about science on IASGMOOH! Will the world end in 2011? What's your favourite pizza topping? Will fusion power work, and when? If there is a edge that space stops at what would be on the other side ???
17/6/11: TEM in-situ irradiations at Argonne Natl. Lab.
Martha Briceno, Xiaoou Yi and Mike Jenkins are away to spend a week with Mark Kirk at the IVEM facility at ANL doing some high temperature in-situ ion-irradiations on tungsten and ODS steels.
10/5/11: Rosenheim Conference
David Armstrong and Xiaoou Yi were at the 13th International Workshop on Plasma Facing Components for Fusion Applications and 1st International Conference On Fusion Energy Materials, in Rosenheim Germany, presenting their work on TEM and micro-mechanics in tungsten and tungsten alloys.
8/4/11: Nuclear Materials Short Course
Oxford, 4-8 April 2011
Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves! We had 36 registrants, listening to, and discussing issues with 17 lecturers, over five 9-hour days. We also had a very enjoyable dinner...
25/3/11: Vacancy: Postdoctoral Research Assistant in Atom-probe Tomography of Irradiated Materials
This post is to develop atom-probe tomography, field-ion microscopy, and electron microscopy to study radiation-damaged materials, mainly tungsten alloys and iron-based alloys. As well as researching the effects of radiation damage on the materials involved, the project aims to work on achieving significant improvements in the resolution of the AP techniques.
For further details see here.
11/2/11: New high-temperature nanotester arrives
The first day was the heavy-lifting bit (the vacuum chamber weighs over 200kg!), then the next two days were taken up with assembly and testing. Installation was completed this week, and the first proving tests are now running. More here.
18/1/11: New Postdoctoral appointment: Ed Tarleton
We are very pleased that Ed Tarleton will be joining the project to model the micromechanical testing methods we are using and developing. He will start on July 1st 2011.
11-12/11/2010: 2nd Advisory Group Meeting
A two day meeting to discuss progress and plans with the project's external Advisory Group.
For older news, see here.
