The Inaugural Lecture of Professor Philip Edmondson will take place on Monday 27th February 2023 between 11am and 12pm. This event will take place in Blended Lecture Theatre 2 (2B.020), 2nd Floor, Engineering Building B. A lunch will be held following the lecture from 12pm. This will be held at the Open Plan Seating Area 5A.024A (West Corridor), 5th Floor, Core 2, Engineering Building A.

Please note that this lecture is going to be recorded by the lecture capture service.

A lecture abstract and short biography for Professor Philip Edmondson is provided below:

Lecture Title

How Advanced Characterisation can Further the Development of Nuclear Materials

Lecture Abstract

Nuclear energy offers a zero-carbon emission option as part of a secure and diverse energy mix, helping minimise carbon induced climate change. While current light water reactors have seen little fundamental design changes since their initial deployment, advanced reactor designs across both fission and fusion technologies require the design and development of new materials, that can withstand both higher operating temperatures and significantly higher levels of induced radiation damage.

In this lecture, I will show how near-atomic scale microstructural and elemental characterisation can be used to better understand how neutron irradiation changes both the local microstructure and bulk properties of materials, discussing how this approach can be used to better design materials with desired properties. Two case studies will be given, firstly how tungsten in a fusion reactor responds to neutron irradiation, and the implications for future fusion technologies and secondly, the design and development of iron-chromium-aluminium (FeCrAl) alloys as candidate fuel clad system with enhanced resistance to oxidation. In the case of FeCrAl, the process of developing this experimental alloy through to the alloy being industrially produced, with a test rod inserted into a commercial fission power plant will be discussed.

Biography

Philip Edmondson is the UKAEA Tritium Science & Technology Chair at the University of Manchester. He holds an PhD and MPhys in Physics from the University of Salford, where he investigated damage formed in single ion impacts in silicon. He completed post-doctoral research positions at the Pacific Northwest and Oak Ridge National Laboratories prior to an EPSRC Career Acceleration Fellowship at Oxford University, where he examined microstructural evolution in uranium-based nuclear fuels. He then returned to Oak Ridge National Laboratory as a research scientist, moving to lead the Laboratory’s Radiation Effects and Microstructural Analysis Group (REMAG) and the Low Activation Materials Development and Analysis (LAMDA) Laboratory – a characterisation laboratory dedicated to active materials. His research focuses on the development and application of analytical electron microscopy and atom probe tomography in nanoscale characterisation of defect/damage formation and recovery in irradiated materials, with the behaviour and impact of He and H-isotope gases in solids. He has published ~140 journal articles and previously the Associate Editor for the journal Nuclear Materials and Energy. In 2019-2020 he was also the Chair for the Nuclear & Environmental Technology Division of the American Ceramic Society.

Professor Philip Edmondson's Inaugural Lecture