Centre for Nature Inspired Engineering (CNIE): Addressing Challenges in Sustainability and Scalable Manufacturing

Completed

Not Energy Related
Hydrogen and Fuel Cells(Fuel Cells)

Basic and strategic applied research

BIOLOGICAL AND AGRICULTURAL SCIENCES (Biological Sciences)
PHYSICAL SCIENCES AND MATHEMATICS (Chemistry)
PHYSICAL SCIENCES AND MATHEMATICS (Computer Science and Informatics)
ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY (Chemical Engineering)

Not Cross-cutting

Professor N Titchener-Hooker
Biochemical Engineering
University College London

Professor A.C.W Finkelstein
Computer Science
University College London

Standard

EPSRC

29 November 2013

28 November 2019

72 months

£4,980,773

Bioengineering

London; London

NC : Engineering

Professor N Titchener-Hooker, Biochemical Engineering, University College London
Professor A.C.W Finkelstein, Computer Science, University College London

Dr DG Bracewell, Biochemical Engineering, University College London
Dr D Brett, Chemical Engineering, University College London
Professor R Catlow, Chemistry, University College London
Professor M Coppens, Chemical Engineering, University College London
Professor A Gavriilidis, Chemical Engineering, University College London
Mr SP Hanna, The Bartlett School of Graduate Studies, University College London
Dr P Lettieri, Chemical Engineering, University College London
Professor PF McMillan, Chemistry, University College London
Professor M Miodownik, Mechanical Engineering, University College London
Professor A Penn, Bartlett Sch of Architecture & Planning, University College London
Professor A Pomiankowski, Genetics Evolution and Environmen, University College London
Professor G Sankar, Chemistry, University College London
Professor P Treleaven, Computer Science, University College London
Professor JM Ward, Biochemical Engineering, University College London

Project Contact, Johnson Matthey Plc
Project Contact, Sheffield Forgemasters Engineering Ltd (SFEL)
Project Contact, Maxeler Technologies Ltd
Project Contact, ExxonMobil International Ltd
Project Contact, SABIC (Saudi Basic Industries Corporation), Saudi Arabia
Project Contact, Aedas Architects Ltd
Project Contact, General Electric (GE), USA
Project Contact, Quantachrome Instruments, USA
Project Contact, Dummy Organisation
Project Contact, MATGAS, Spain
Project Contact, Antecy B.V., The Netherlands
Project Contact, Harris Corporation, USA
Project Contact, AFC Energy
Project Contact, Astra Zeneca
Project Contact, Laing O'Rourke plc
Project Contact, GSK
Project Contact, Synfuels China Technology Co. Ltd
Project Contact, Particulate Solid Research Inc. (PSRI), USA

Evolution over the eons has made Nature a treasure trove of clever solutions to sustainability, resilience, and ways to efficiently utilize scarce resources. The Centre for Nature Inspired Engineering will draw lessons from nature to engineer innovative solutions to our grand challenges in energy, water, materials, health, and living space.Rather than imitating nature out of context or succumbing to superficial analogies, research at the Centre will take a decidedly scientific approach to uncover fundamental mechanisms underlying desirable traits, and apply these mechanisms to design and synthesise artificial systems that hereby borrow the traits of the natural model. The Centre will initially focus on three key mechanisms, as they are so prevalent in nature, amenable to practical implementation, and are expected to have transformational impact on urgent issues in sustainability and scalable manufacturing. These mechanisms are: (T1) "Hierarchical Transport Networks": the way nature bridges microscopic to macroscopic length scales in order to preserve the intricate microscopic or cellular function throughout (as in trees, lungs and the circulatory system); (T2) "Force Balancing": the balanced use of fundamental forces, e.g., electrostatic attraction/repulsion and geometrical confinement in microscopic spaces (as in protein channels in cell membranes, which trump artificial membranes in selective, high-permeation separation performance); and (T3) "Dynamic Self-Organisation": the creation of robust, adaptive and self-healing communities thanks to collective cooperation and emergence of complex structures out of much simpler individual components (as in bacterial communities and in biochemical cycles).Such nature-inspired, rather than narrowly biomimetic approach, allows us to marry advanced manufacturing capabilities and access to non-physiological conditions, with nature's versatile mechanisms that have been remarkably little employed in a rational, bespoke manner. High-performance computing and experimentation now allow us to unravel fundamental mechanisms, from the atomic to the macroscopic, in an unprecedented way, providing the required information to transcend empiricism, and guide practical realisations of nature-inspired designs.In first instance, three examples will be developed to validate each of the aforementioned natural mechanisms, and simultaneously apply them to problems of immediate relevance that tie in to the Grand Challenges in energy, water, materials and scalable manufacturing. These are: (1) robust, high-performance fuel cells with greatly reduced amount of precious catalyst, by using a lung-inspired architecture; (2) membranes for water desalination inspired by the mechanism of biological cell membranes; (3) high-performance functional materials, resp. architectural design (cities, buildings), informed by agent-based modelling on bacteria-inspired, resp. human communities, to identify roads to robust, adaptive complex systems. To meet these ambitious goals, the Centre assembles an interdisciplinary team of experts, from chemical and biochemical engineering, to computer science, architecture, materials, chemistry and genetics. The Centre researchers collaborate with, and seek advice from industrial partners from a wide range of industries, which accelerates practical implementation. The Centre has an open, outward looking mentality, inviting broader collaboration beyond the core at UCL. It will devote significant resources to explore the use of the validated nature-inspired mechanisms to other applications, and extend investigation to other natural mechanisms that may inform solutions to problems in sustainability and scalable manufacturing

16/12/13