Centre for Advanced Composite Materials
Our people
As a large multidisciplinary institute, the Centre is comprised by our diverse academic, scientific, technical and administrative staff.
Director |
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Professor Simon Bickerton | Director, Professor in Mechanical Engineering Research areas include: Manufacturing processes for composite materials; exeperimentation, control, and modelling, robust manufacturing, considering material and process variability along with the manufacture of synthetic and natural fibre reinforced plastics. |
Dr Mark Battley | Deputy Director, Senior Lecturer in Engineering Science Involved in analysis and design, testing methods, numerical modelling and non-destructive testing, marine, aeronautical and industrial applications. |
Academic staff | |
Distinguished Professor Debes Bhattacharyya | Professor in Mechanical Engineering Research in natural fibre reinforced polymer composites, graphene materials, coronary stents, waste materials utilisation and flame retardant composites. |
Associate Professor Krishnan Jayaraman | Associate Professor in Mechanical Engineering Areas of research in microstructure/property relationships, fibre-reinforced composites, natural fibre composites and life cycle assessment. |
Associate Professor Piaras Kelly | Associate Professor in Engineering Science Research interests in thermomechanical modelling, mathematical and computational techniques for manufacturing and the fracture and failure of knee prostheses. |
Dr Richard Lin | Senior Lecturer in Mechanical Engineering Research involving machinability, tribological characteristics and recyclability of composites, manufacturing and evaluation of thermoplastic composites. |
Dr Tom Allen | Lecturer in Mechanical Engineering Research areas include: Composites analysis, finite element modelling, hull slamming, liquid composite moulding and natural fibre composites |
Dr Jianyong Jin | Senior Lecturer in Chemical Sciences Research in materials and synthetic chemistry. |
Research associates |
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Dr Velram Mohan |
Research areas include: Applied polymer science and engineering, graphene-based materials and their composites, 3D printing of polymer-graphene hybrid composites and natural fibre fabric-polymer sandwich structures and their adhesion improvement. |
Dr Arcot Somashekar | Research interests include the manufacture, processing and properties of microfibrillar polymer composites, compressive deformation of glass fibre reinforcement. |
Dr Daesung Jung | Research areas include: coating and surface treatment, natural fibre based flame retardant, nanocomposite. |
Dr Nam Kyeun Kim | Research interests in fire retardant natural fibre reinforced composites, fire reaction properties and testing techniques, composites flammability for aircraft interiors and building materials, fire modelling, protein/cellulose fibres and biopolymers. |
Dr Maedah Amirpour | Research in continuum and solid mechanics, mechanics of composite and multifunctional materials (such as Functionally Graded Materials), damage and failure mechanisms, analytical modelling, coupling finite element computational simulation and Digital Image Correlation technique. |
Dr Monireh Fazeli | Research involving manufacturing of 3D woven structures based on carbon fibres, the design of a suitable resin transfer moulding process for impregnation of 3D woven node structures. |
Administrative staff |
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Sheeja Sajan | Research Programme Coordinator |
Graeme Finch | Business Development Manager Experienced at managing R&D teams in the government, corporate and private sectors. Interested in ensuring good alignment between academic research and strategic industry needs with a passion for ensuring commercially successful application of research to benefit the New Zealand industry. |
Technical staff |
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Jos Geurts | Technical Manager Experienced in mechanical properties testing of parts, assemblies, and materials such as composites, thermoplastics, thermosets, elastomers, natural fibres to metals and more. |
Callum Turnbull | Technician Fitting, turning, machining and welding |
Stephen Cawley | Technician Data acquisition, instrumentation and material properties testing |
Andrea Tinone | Technician Polymers processing |
Albina Avzalova | Technician Polymer chemistry |
PhD students |
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Abdolmajid Alipour | Nanocomposites based on Epoxy/Graphene/Natural Fibre |
Effect of Voids and Wrinkles in Curved Carbon Fibre Reinforced Polymer Parts |
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Development and Characterisation of Stretchable Graphitic Composite Sensors |
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Fibre-reinforced Timber for Novel Hybrid Folded Thin-Walled Structures |
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Development of the Direct Wet-Pressing Process to Manufacture Fibre Reinforced Plastic Components |
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Defect Formation in Advanced Composite Structures Produced from Prepreg Materials |
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Günther Höfler |
Stiffness enhancement of Rotationally Moulded Products |
Development of Multifunctional Electronic Devices Based on Natural and Carbon Materials |
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Revitalising Recycled Carbon Fibre for Advanced Composites Part Manufacturing |
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Fatigue behaviour of composites under the influence of local geometric features and realistic manufacturing defects |
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Prediction and characterisation of global structural response of embedded roadway IPT systems subjected to traffic loading |
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Effects of Flame Retardant Additives on Composites Performance |
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Machinability of Natural Fibre Composites |
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Quantifying the Magnitude and Influence of Manufacturing Induced Defects in Advanced Composite Structures Produced using Liquid Moulding |
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Evaluation of multi-functional properties of biochar reinforced composites |
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Understanding and Modelling the Thermo-mechanical Response of FRP Composites |
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Airflow Based Quality Measurements for Semi-finished Textiles |
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Modelling RTM with Braided Structures - From Textile Modelling to Mould Filling Simulations |
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ME students |
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Daniel Kent |
Multi-Objective Optimisation of Carbon Fibre Sailing Yacht Masts |
Hamed Abdoli |
Fast and Efficient Air-based Permeability Evaluation of Reinforcement Textiles and Stacks |
Ryan Calder |
Validation of finite element analysis of aluminium to composite bonded joints in aircraft interiors |