Aerodynamics and Aeroacoustics Laboratories

Some of the best and most unique wind tunnel facilities in the country, including an Aeroacoustic wind tunnel, a low-turbulence wind tunnel, a pressure-neutral acoustic wind tunnel for propeller research, a high-speed subsonic and supersonic jet facility, and a large 7’x5’ close-circuit wind tunnel.

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Aqueous Geochemistry

Facilities include: two constant temperature rooms, controlled-atmosphere glove box, centrifuges, X-ray diffractometer and many more.

Biogeochemistry

‌The biogeochemistry laboratories house a range of mass spectrometry, chromatography and microbiological instrumentation.

Bristol Aerosols and Colloids Instrument Centre

‌‌‌‌A collection of shared-use instrumentation supporting research in aerosol and colloidal sciences. Its instrumentation is available to users throughout the University of Bristol and to industrial partners.

In addition, BACIC supports users from the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Aerosol Science.

Bristol Automated Synthesis Facility

The SWING Automated Workstation (designed by Chemspeed Technologies) is tasked with automated parallel chemical synthesis and can analyse the majority of reactions employed in modern synthesis.

Up to 32 reactions can be run in parallel in 13 mL glass array reactors, with SWILE technology allowing our SWING platform to gravimetrically pick and dispense solids and powders

Bristol Isotope Geochemistry

‌Facilities include: Neptune, Element, Excimer Laser and Triton mass spectrometers.

Bristol Robotics Laboratory (BRL)

An internationally recognised centre of excellence. More than 3,000 m² of state-of-the-art specialist workshops, wet labs and two flying arenas with multiple 3D motion capture systems. This unique collaboration harnesses the collective strengths of its university partners,the academic community and the best expertise from industry so the UK can lead the world in modern advanced robotics.

Show all;Engineering Maths;Engineering Mathematics;drones; UAVs; Engineering;

Cleanroom

The University of Bristol Cleanroom is available to external users interested in microfabrication and nanofabrication. We offer an initial consultation to determine if we are able to help you achieve your project goals and can proceed by running fabrication processes for customers or facilitating access to our Facility for employees of our partner organisations.

Coldrick Observatory

This impressive six-metre radio telescope on the roof of the school and is used by our Astrophysics researchers to survey our Galaxy for sources of maser emission. Its Cassegrain geometry has been designed to operate between 4.5 GHz and 25 GHz, making it very suitable for studying water masers at 22.235 GHz. ‌

The front-end converts the signals to an intermediate frequency (IF) near 4.2 GHz; the back end is a fully-digital, real-time Fast Fourier Transform Spectromete.

Communications Laboratory

The latest hardware and measurement facilities including an anechoic chamber; analogue (40GHz, two channel) wafer probing facility connected to a 65GHz VNA; computer cluster; RF and wireless instrumentation; ultra high bandwidth, real-time oscilloscope and logic analyser; Medav multi-element wideband channel sounder with full remote MIMO operation and a MIMO test-bed and channel emulation facility.

Composites Manufacturing, Test and Characterisation Facilities

The Faculty's full range of top class facilities include composites-specific equipment for mechanical and high strain rate testing, manufacturing research, visualisation, composite processing and the measurement of process critical properties. In addition to our degree programmes, we also offer composite materials training and consultancy to our industrial partners.

Computing Resources and High Performance Computing

The University hosts Bluecrystal Phase 4, one of the fastest and most advanced supercomputing facilities in the UK, capable of up to 600 trillion calculations per second. The Faculty has several locally-managed distributed memory parallel computer clusters, with larger simulations run on a University central resource. For High Performance Computing, the University also hosts the UK's most powerful academic computer cluster.

Cyber Security Laboratory

The Bristol Cyber Security Group's state-of-the-art large scale testbed provides a realistic environment for our research into cyber-physical systems security. It has been built from the ground up, based on extensive past experience of building ICS security testbeds and input from industry partners.

Digital Manufacturing Laboratory

Founded in response to the drive towards digital across engineering, the Digital Manufacturing Lab hosts multi-disciplinary teams sitting at the cutting-edge of future design and manufacturing technologies, tools, and systems. Crossing the boundaries between design technologies, digital and rapid manufacture, digital twins, data science, robotics, and metrology systems, the DML aims to produce disruptive knowledge and tools for industry and the general public alike. For example,  it hosts one of the UK's few Optomec Aerosol Jet 5X printer.

Dynamics Laboratory and Model Validation Facility (MVF)

The Dynamics laboratory and the Model Validation Facility (MVF) are part of the Faculty's advanced dynamic engineering facilities. Both laboratories have leading cutting-edge measurement and testing technologies. They serve a large group of researchers with a focus on aspects of dynamics, such as composites and nonlinear vibrations of mechanical structures.

Earth Science Collection

The collection houses a unique collection of over 100,000 geological specimens, accessible to scientists, schools and the public (by appointment).

Earthquake Laboratory

The largest earthquake engineering facility in the UK and one of the larger ones in Europe. The main piece of equipment is the six axis shaking table. We welcome enquiries from industrialists interested in our test facilities. Access if offered through a University-owned company: Bristol Earthquake and Engineering Laboratory Limited ("BEELAB").

Electrical Energy Management Facilities

Our electrical and electronic labs and newly-refurbished facilities support research and development in electrical energy management. Examples are the Power Electronics lab, Electrical lab and Electric Drives lab, used to train students in electric vehicle drive trains, energy harvesting, smart grid components, power electronics and machine design.

Electrical Engineering Teaching Laboratories

Bigger and newly refurbished electrical teaching laboratory. Fully kitted out with state of the art equipment.

Contact: dominic.hardman@bristol.ac.uk (Technical Services Manager)

Electron and scanning probe microscopy

‌‌‌‌Our electron and scanning probe microscopy facility allows us to observe elemental composition through use of our suite of scanning electron and trasmission electron microscopes.

All are equipped with digital image capture and energy dispersive X-ray systems, with our two scanning probe microscopes also able to carry out atomic resolution imaging.

Experimental Petrology

‌‌‌‌Facilities include a range of devices capable of reproducing the variable and extreme conditions of pressure and temperature that exist in Earth's interior from the crust to the core.

General Engineering Student Laboratory

An open-plan engineering teaching laboratory for 200 students in one group or multiple simultaneous classes and workshops. The flexible layout increases hands-on teaching and learning opportunities.

Contact: dominic.hardman@bristol.ac.uk (Technical Services Manager)

Geomechanics Laboratories

The geomechanics and geotechnics laboratories are temperature controlled facilities with equipment for research, project work and class teaching in fundamental geomechanics.

Geophysical Equipment

Geophysical Fluid Dynamics

Hackspace

The Hack Space is a fantastic 103m² creative co-working area, designed with our students as a space for hacking, making and crafting. Located on the ground floor of the Merchant Venturers Building,  its ethos is one of experimentation and collaboration. It is a safe space where all engineering students can test new ideas and make mistakes!

Contact: hackspace-info@bristol.ac.uk

High Temperature Centre: Creep Laboratory

A temperature-controlled environment, supporting research on metals operating at high temperature. Tests can be run on metals at temperatures up to a thousand degrees centigrade. Within Mechanical Engineering, this Lab is dedicated to the Solid Mechanics Research Group and exploring the 'in service' life of components and material. Novel esearch conducted in the lab helps the relevant authorities make informed decisions around the life of the UK's nuclear facilities.

Interface Analysis Centre 

The Interface Analysis Centre Facility is the University of Bristol’s core materials characterisation facility, hosting over £12M of equipment for materials research, including scanning electron microscopes, transmission electron microscopes , focused ion beam, X-ray diffraction, X-ray Tomography, high-speed atomic force microscopy, secondary ion mass spectrometry and raman spectroscopy.

The Facility’s academic, research and technical staff are based in the School of Physics, and collectively have decades of experience in the use and development of these techniques, with a number of new technologies created in the department including electron backscatter diffraction, high-speed atomic force microscopy and Raman Spectroscopy. The IAC staff use the equipment in the Facility to characterise a wide range of materials from steels and uranium to graphite, diamond and even paintings! The Facility works extensively with industry and academic researchers within the university and at partner institutions, providing cutting-edge data and analysis to answer fundamental materials challenges.

Mass Spectrometry

‌As well as providing routine mass spectral analysis, the mass spectrometry laboratory is also home to more advanced applications development and non-routine analysis. The facility works closely with the neighbouring NERC Life Sciences Mass Spectrometry Facility.

The facility enables us to look at molecular ions and fragmentation patterns for almost any species including biological samples that were, until a few years ago, impossible to study using these techniques.

Metallurgy Laboratory

The metallurgy lab is used for the forensic analysis of metal, ceramic or composite samples generated during research projects. This often involves microscopic analysis of samples to explain behaviour seen during other tests. Examples include diagnosing the fracture mechanism in carbon-fibre composites and how high-temperature deformation changes the structure of power plant steels.

Microbeam

NanoESCA

‌‌‌‌The NanoESCA Facility hosts a number of electron spectroscopy and microscopy tools for state-of-the-art surface analysis at the nanoscale. Our instruments provide a unique perspective on the surface electronic properties of materials, enabling a detailed understanding of the surface chemistry, electronic structure or work function to be extracted. We are housed in the NSQI Building, which hosts some of the lowest vibration labs in Europe.

National Composites Centre (NCC)

Composites enable everyday lives. Lightweight, strong, smart materials make better, more sustainable products. NCC technologies include Fibre Placement, High Volume Manufacuring, Ultra High Rate Deposition, Ceramic Matrix Composites and Large Scale Resin Impregnation  It has the only two-ring braider in the UK.

Non-destructive Testing Laboratory

The non-destructive testing laboratory supports research into ultrasonics and acoustics. Key areas are phased array imaging, materials characterisation (e.g. nonlinear ultrasound), structural health monitoring,  composites and ultrasonic particle manipulation.

NSQI Low Noise Laboratories (LNL) and Cleanroom

The NSQI centre houses low noise laboratories (LNL), a suite of purpose-built, low-vibration research spaces and among the quietest laboratories in the world. With additional radio frequency and temperature stability measures, they are ideal for experiments where background interference is a barrier to sensitive research. The related Bristol NanoESCA Laboratory is available to industry and the LNL is open to project applications from across the nanoscience and quantum research communities.

Nuclear Magnetic Resonance

The NMR Facilities in the School of Chemistry are some of the best equipped in the UK, with 12 solution-state NMR spectrometers (300-700MHz) used for research and undergraduate teaching, as well as being available for industrial use (see below for our capabilities).

On top of being the first-choice technique for characterisation of new organic compounds, the NMR facilities at Bristol are also used for studying 11B 31P 19F and a wide variety of transition metal nucleii.

Optical Observatory

‌The roof of the school of physics is home to a 25-centrimetre optical telescope housed in its own dome. This multi-touch interface displays microscope video images in real-time and allows the users to intuitively trap and control objects within the microscope using optical traps.

The upgrade has converted the optical observatory to a robotic facility enabling remote operation by observers. The new camera includes a "guider" which uses bright stars in the image to lock the telescope into position so that it does not drift away from the target of the observation over time. The camera also has a filter wheel that will enable the remote observer to take images through different colour filters.

Palaeontology Laboratories

Facilities include equipment to enable the 3D visualisation of computed tomography (CT) data and to perform finite element modelling.

Photonics

The University has excellent facilities for this field of research, including a very well equipped clean room, a focused ion beam etching (FIBE) machine, advanced measurement and experimental kit, state-of-the-art equipment for optical communications testing and measurements, and fundamental research facilities particularly in the Quantum Photonics area.

Quantum Laboratories

Quantum Engineering Technology (QET) Laboratories span the School of Physics and Faculty of Science and Engineering. As a global centre for research, development and entrepreneurship, the labs facilitate an exploration of the fundamental aspects of quantum mechanics.  Having the technology to generate, manipulate and measure single photons and work on the quantum systems that emit these photons will help inform emerging quantum technologies.

Residual Stress Laboratory

A Solid Mechanics/Mechanical Engineering laboratory to measure residual stresses within engineering components and develop and apply novel research tools to interrogate locked-in stresses in components. The Solid Mechanics group's research includes determining residual stresses in high-integrity nuclear welded components and in non-metallic components such as fibre composites for aerospace applications using x-ray diffraction to meaure surface stresses. A FARO arm co-ordinate measuring machine with laser scanner can map and produce 3D models of surfaces and objects from which componets can be reverse engineered. A purpose-built machine can measure residual stress through thickness. The lab is used for research and student projects.

Satellite Laboratory

The lab forms the ground station, or mission control, accepting signals from satellites and the International Space Station via antennae on the roof. It also houses a ‘clean room’ and testbed, where satellites will be built by students and researchers in a contaminant-free environment.

Smart Internet Lab

One of the UK's most renowned Information and Communications Technology (ICT) research centres which addresses grand societal and industrial challenges. Experts in 5G radio/wireless, optical communications and networks fuse research expertise and innovation in areas such as: IoT,  future transport networks, smart cities, machine learning and AI.  An unique combination of end-to-end network design and optimisation that impacts regional, national and global ICT innovations.

Soil-Foundation-Structure Interaction Laboratory (SoFSI)

A state-of-the-art facility for research into the structural-geotechnical boundary. It supports the UKCRIC mission to underpin renewal, sustainment and infrastructure improvement in the UK and beyond.  Primarily supported by the Earthquake and Geotechnical Research Group, SoFSI's size and scale means a wide variety of academic and commercial research could be supported.

South West Nuclear Hub

‌The South West Nuclear Hub houses four National Nuclear User Facilities which belong to the School of Physics. They are tasked with research and development within atomic science in order to devise nuclear energy solutions.

The four facilities are as follows: The Active Nano Mapping Facility (ANM); EXACT (Next Generation Accelerated Characterisation Technologies); FaRMS (Facility for Radioactive Materials Surfaces); and Hot Robotics.

Structures and Materials Testing Laboratories

Our structures facilities allow for testing a variety of structural forms, from large frames to smaller machines for more standard testing. Our laboratories offer heavy and light test facilities, a 100 tonne capacity frame for pilot testing and a large-scale fatigue testing facility. We offer novel testing solutions to Research, Teaching (projects) and Industrial Partners to investigate new materials and methods. All machines are available to Students to use as part of their project work if required.

Visual Information Laboratory

The VI lab's innovative, collaborative and interdisciplinary research results in world-leading technology in the areas of computer vision, image and video communications, content analysis and distributed sensor systems.

Wind Tunnel Laboratory

A key part of the University's aerodynamic and aeroacoustics facilities, the Hele-Shaw laboratory's new Boundary Layer Wind Tunnel with its modular construction was designed for multi-purpose applications. The 30m long wind tunnel has nine axial fans that can be configured for partial or full operation, allowing a steady flow velocity between 2m/s and 35m/s with very low turbulence intensity. At c 18m, the test section is one of the longest in the UK and can produce a boundary layer over 25cm thick. The laboratory also has specialist rigs used to teach fluid mechanics and is used for related research projects.

Worsley Chemical Library

‌The Worsley Chemical Library offers students quiet study and group study spaces; open access PCs; wireless hotspots; and printing and scanning facilities.‌

In terms of the literature available, the library houses recommended course textbooks; past Chemistry exam papers; key databases (SciFinder Scholar, Reaxys, Web of Science, etc.); academic journals online or in hard copy, research monographs; and School of Chemistry theses.

X-ray crystallography

A purpose-built crystallography laboratory houses 3 single crystal diffractometers and one powder diffractometer.

The laboratory also houses a high throughput powder X-ray diffractometer equipped with a linear detector, robotic sample changer and 30 silicon wafer sample holders. This allows powder diffraction data for a sub-milligram quantity of sample to be collected in minutes.