TO ATTEND

Omar ELHAWARY—Recycling of polypropylene in PPE face masks for manufacturing of flaxPP eco-composites

The severe increase in the pollution caused by the discarded face masks during COVID-19 cannot be overstated. This research provides an innovative engineering solution to this issue by recycling polypropylene, the primary plastic found in the facemasks to manufacture eco-composites by reinforcing it with natural flax fibers. Flax fibers were chosen due to their favorable mechanical properties, their abundance in Northern Europe also reducing the carbon footprint of the product. The mechanical properties were analysed using software simulations and mathematical calculations. Based on these results, physical manufacturing is being carried out for further analysis and testing, specifically investigating the interesting vibration damping properties. The research and development of a FlaxPP composite material could help with improving global resource efficiency in consuming plastic products, thus deriving economic growth from environmental recovery as opposed to environmental degradation.

Angus SIBERRY—Radiation through matter, a geometrical understanding of energy deposition

A new mathematical radiation dosimetry model used to simulate principal geometries has been developed. Using recorded stopping data and either explicitly knowing the radionuclides present in a material or determining averages from a detector, this approach can simulate radiation through any material. This unique approach exposes symmetry in simple geometries to reduce complexity and computation load, which in turn allows for modern programming languages to be utilized and results linked to more computationally demanding models (Finite Element Analysis, Monte Carlo Simulators). The reduced complexity of these models does not suffer from increased inaccuracy to similar more complex simulators (MCNP, GEANT4) allowing one to develop and scale complex models, such as spent nuclear fuel dissolution, with relative ease.

Jack GOODMAN—Atomic simulations of bio-adhesives

Bio-adhesives are gaining traction as replacements for contemporary adhesives, particularly in the medical industry. They are attractive on the basis of their biocompatibility and due to concerns about the environmental impacts of contemporary adhesives but are disadvantaged by their typically lower adhesive strengths. This presentation will explain what bio-adhesives are and how they work before presenting the merits of atomic 'molecular dynamics' simulations when applied to the study of bio-adhesives. The necessary ingredients for a successful molecular dynamics simulation, the kind of information it can obtain, and how this information can be scaled up to represent the properties of an adhesive on the macroscale, will be presented.