New facility a ‘significant step’ for MICG
Friday, 24 February 2023
MICG’s work to support research in the Midlands has taken a significant step forward, with the launch of a new facility at the University of Leicester.
A Digital Twin Laboratory for advanced ceramics manufacturing was formally opened jointly by Dr Cathryn Hickey, Chief Executive of AMRICC and Programme Director of Midlands Advanced Ceramics for Industrial 4.0, Professor Sarah Davies, Pro Vice Chancellor and Head of College of Science and Engineering and Professor Ljiljana Marjanovic-Halburd, Head of School of Engineering of the University of Leicester.
The Digital Twin Lab is funded by the £18.27million in government funding awarded to MICG through UK Research and Innovation’s flagship Strength in Places Fund (SIPF) to create a world-leading research and development programme.
It has been developed to address an issue which sees a high proportion of technical ceramics currently either rejected at the quality control stage or subjected to excessive post-sintering machining due to the extremely fine margins for error demanded by their high-tech applications.
University of Leicester researchers are considered world leaders for their work on computer modelling of ceramic processing, which aims to boost efficiency in the manufacturing of ceramics through modelling the microstructural and shape evolution.
Research led by Professor Jingzhe Pan of the University’s School of Engineering are developing digital twins for the sintering process used to fabricate technical ceramics, applying computer simulation and in-process measurement of complex manufacturing processes to precisely control the dimensions and properties of ceramic components.
The Digital Twin Lab is open to all UK industrial researchers who wish to study and apply the digital twin technology to their manufacturing process for advanced ceramics. For further information contact Prof Jingzhe Pan jp165@leicester.ac.uk
