Case studies

Uranium is a highly reactive metal, which readily combines with oxygen, water and hydrogen to form corrosion products which can be extremely pyrophoric (flammable). Detailed studies of uranium corrosion have provided important new understanding that is enabling the safer storage of uranium and uranium-based wastes, therefore preventing potentially disastrous ignition events. The research has facilitated more accurate predictions of the state of legacy uranic wastes at the Sellafield nuclear site, shaping the way that the UK’s biggest nuclear facility is safely recovering and repackaging uranium-containing wastes for prolonged storage at greatly reduced cost and increased safety. The research has also directly influenced a number of programmes and capabilities at the Atomic Weapons Establishment, reducing programme delivery times by up to two years. It has also validated the processes that the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy (CCFE) uses for safely storing tritium on beds of metallic uranium and has directly shaped the design and capability of CCFE’s new £40M H3AT tritium research facility.

We have successfully developed novel robotic techniques to assess radioactive contamination at nuclear sites around the world, safeguarding the lives of emergency personnel and supporting efforts to protect communities and the environment. The deployment of drones with radiation mapping capabilities has underpinned clean-up plans and decommissioning activities at the Chornobyl and Fukushima nuclear disaster sitesand enabled the safe repatriation of evacuated citizens. At Chornobyl, the technology informed the UK and Ukrainian governments’ risk assessment of forest fires in 2020 and, furthermore, improved routine safety monitoring and methodologies at the UK Sellafield nuclear site and Atomic Weapons Establishment high-hazard facilities. The International Atomic Energy Agency used the research team’s expertise to provide international guidance on radiation surveying.

Our research has provided essential knowledge that underpins the safety cases made to the Office for Nuclear Regulation for extensions to the operating lifetime of EDF’s fleet of advanced gas cooled reactors (AGRs). Prolonged exposure to radiation and extreme thermal environments damages reactor materials and can jeopardise the structural integrity of nuclear power plants. Our researchers have employed cutting-edge instrumentation and novel analysis techniques to study the degradation of ex-service materials taken from AGRs. This has yielded transformational insights and critical benchmarking to ensure experiments and modelling within EDF Energy’s research programme are representative and appropriate for describing the ageing behaviour of materials inside their AGRs. UoB research has also greatly informed the industry standard R5 procedure for assessing structural integrity of materials under extreme conditions. Consequently, UoB research has been instrumental in keeping the UK’s fleet of AGRs, which contribute 14% of the UK’s energy supply, operational.

The ability to image rapidly, objects on the nanoscale is crucial for the characterisation of important materials such as thin films, nanoparticles, polymers and biomolecular structures. High-speed atomic force microscopy (AFM) techniques developed at the University of Bristol (UoB), have revolutionised the field of nano-scale imaging by exploiting a super-lubricity effect to enable rapid imaging of large areas of fragile samples. Based on this research, spin-out company Infinitesima, in a collaboration with Zeiss, has developed an essential tool for the repair of photomasks used in the multi-billion-dollar semiconductor industry. Sets of defect-free masks are worth tens of millions of dollars, and most modern integrated circuits are made using photomasks repaired with AFM technology based on Bristol inventions. UoB’s AFM research has led to the creation of three further spin-out companies – Bristol Nano Dynamics, NuNano, Vitamica – who are active in areas as diverse as healthcare and instrument manufacture. All four companies together employ 46.5 FTE staff, have an annual turnover of £3.5M and have attracted £6.8M in investment since 2014.

Research at the Interface Analysis Centre has made innovative analysis products available in a wide range of industries and research fields:

• The design of a novel SEM-Raman instrument has resulted in multi-million pound sales for Renishaw.
• Rolls-Royce has commissioned and used bespoke instruments and non destructive examinations to maintain its competitive advantage and is modifying its technical processes to incorporate these into its standard manufacturing and maintenance procedures.
• Work on Raman probes for cancer detection has influenced innovation support in the NHS.

Two companies have been formed to develop and market computer control and data acquisition and analysis systems conceived in the course of this work.

Our analysis techniques are routinely applied to the investigation of a wide range of acute and chronic issues within the oil and gas sector. These studies range between simply identifying the composition of deposits and residues extracted from gas pipework and boiler systems - for both troubleshooting and health & safety requirements - to comprehensive work programmes targeting solutions to full-scale plant problems.

• We investigate issues affecting cooling water systems, eg pitting corrosion, fouling, deposition, algae growth and microbial proliferation.
• We accept liquid crude oil samples for testing against recognised standards and solid specimens for materials analysis.
• We apply our analysis tools to reservoir rock samples and model compounds.
• We have the background and capability to analyse damaged turbine blades.
• We provide bespoke one- and two-week courses, tailored to your needs, in corrosion science and the analytical approaches used for both laboratory and in-situ measurement of plant component degradation.

In 1928, Indian physicist Chandrasekhara Raman won a Nobel prize for his discovery that light can undergo a weak but perceptible colour change when scattered by matter. The resulting Raman spectrum is characteristic of the chemical bonds involved and can distinguish between such diverse substances as diamond and graphite or cancerous and healthy tissue.

The IAC is involved in several projects to develop miniature Raman probes for industrial and medical applications where other forms of analysis are not possible, eg cancer of the oesophagus, the fastest growing incidence of any cancer in the Western world and frequently associated with chronic heartburn, which may change the structure of the oesophageal wall. The subtle differences in the Raman spectra of cancerous and healthy tissue mean that an early, automated diagnosis of oesophageal cancer is a real possibility.

However, the proportion of light that undergoes Raman scattering is as low as one part in a billion, and the optical equipment needed to collect the light may generate Raman signatures much stronger than those of cancer. It is therefore vital to design miniature probes with multiple filters and lenses as close as possible to the point of analysis to primarily measure only the tissue's signal. Since fibre optics have dimensions similar to those of human hair, the precision required is far greater than that normally achieved by conventional engineering.

In collaboration with Gloucester Royal Hospital (GRH), Renishaw and KeyMed Olympus, the IAC uses semiconductor fabrication facilities within the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering to make probes small enough to fit inside medical endoscopes. Work at GRH has demonstrated that the spectra produced in just 2 seconds can detect cancerous tissue with an accuracy similar to that of trained pathologists looking at biopsies in the laboratory. Work is continuing to make the probe suitable for in-vivo studies so that live trials can begin.

Not everyone has access to safe, clean drinking water; according to the WHO, that number is 1 in 6. Water is contaminated from the influence of both natural and man-made influences, for example, Nepal has contamination from naturally weathered arsenic, whereas many places suffer from poor sanitation, agricultural and industrial waste.

Low Cost Nanocomposites for Next Generation Water Filtration (Sarah Tesh) (PDF, 4,041kB)

Clean water is critical for sustaining human life. But the provision of clean water is increasingly difficult due to pollution, industrialisation and population growth, particularly in the developing world.

However, there is a tiny solution to this enormous problem: nanotechnology. Engineered nanomaterials, such as those being developed at the IAC, could be the key that unlocks a generation of cheaper, faster and better water treatments.

Environmentally-compatible nanoscale materials, such as nanotubes or nanoparticles, prove highly effective at cleaning up polluted groundwater. Introducing these minuscule, water-suspended cleaning agents – far smaller than bacteria at less than 100 nm in size – into polluted aquifers can destroy or immobilise a wide range of toxic pollutants.

Recent ground-breaking work and complementary materials analysis at the IAC has demonstrated how vacuum heat treatments improve the environmental longevity and reactivity of metallic iron nanoparticles for water treatment.

While these iron nanoparticles have yet to be deployed in the UK or the developing world, the IAC, in collaboration with the Nanoscience and Quantum Information (NSQI) centre, aims to spearhead further development of this technology and play an active role in UK commercialisation.

Global cement manufacture accounts for five percent of all the carbon dioxide generated worldwide. Using lime as a replacement for cement significantly reduces this CO₂ due to its lower kilning temperature, which also makes lime an ideal low tech material for the developing world.

The process by which lime sets hard involves a carbonation reaction through which atmospheric CO₂ is absorbed and fixed into limestone, and this “carbon storage” further enhances lime's environmental credentials.

However, in conventional types of cement and concretes other factors such as porosity, humidity and liquid water creep in to limit the rate of reaction and stop the CO₂ getting to where it needs to be - fixed in limestone.

In order to maximise the rate of carbonation, the reaction needs to be understood, and the best location to study it is on the lime crystals themselves by investigating the interfacial reaction at a microstructural level.

IAC researchers, using high magnifications, can see the CO₂ “in real time” as it is converted into limestone in situ. When these surface reactions are understood, then the optimum conditions for carbonation will be within reach.

All that remains it to tailor the porosity to get the reactants in the right place, but as this porosity is in direct proportion to particle size, it can be controlled! By maximising the rate of this reaction, lime can be engineered to set harder and faster, creating a structural material that literally soaks up CO₂.