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Bristol Nuclear Science postgrads train at EDF’s Paris lab

2 May 2018

Two MSc Nuclear Science and Engineering students became the first Bristol postgraduates to undertake a week-long training programme at the Materials Ageing Institute (MAI), EDF Lab Les Renardières, Paris in early 2018.

The students, Rachael Matthews and Tianyi Li, are part of the South West Nuclear Hub, which has a three-year training agreement with the EDF Materials Ageing Institute. Every year, two or more students will be offered the opportunity to go to the MAI for a week to receive high-end nuclear training. This will be delivered by academics and by industrial stakeholders such as EDF or the French Regulatory Authority.

Courses are taught in English, and students attend the course alongside MSc students from the Grenoble’s Institut Nationale de Physique.

Tianyi Li said: “This was a great opportunity to network and to further develop my commercial awareness of the nuclear energy sector. In addition, I am now motivated to learn French as my third language, because I realised how important the role France plays is in the international nuclear sector.”

You can find a longer account of the exchange by Tianyi Li on the South West Nuclear Hub website.

Hing Ip Wong, Director of the MAI, said: “MAI was very proud to welcome for the first time two students from Bristol. The feedback from students and MAI lecturers was excellent. By opening the course to Bristol’s students, we are enriching MAI with high-level participants. I’m looking forward to welcoming the next exchange from Bristol”.

Further information

The Materials Ageing Institute is a utility-oriented research centre founded by EDF in 2008 and co-financed by partners from the USA, Russia, UK, Japan and France. The main purpose of this collaborative effort is to bring together scientific skills and research facilities to address ageing of materials used in electric power plants, and particularly in nuclear power plants.

The South West Nuclear Hub provides a focus for nuclear innovation, research and teaching in the south west of the UK. The Hub incorporates the existing collaboration between the Universities of Bristol and Oxford, the Nuclear Research Centre (NRC).

With a dedicated building, opened in summer 2016 at the University of Bristol, the Hub has introduced a step-change across higher education in the region to accelerate and grow nuclear research and teaching activities. The Hub provides a common location for academia, industry and government to come together to meet the opportunities and challenges facing nuclear energy in the UK.

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