Name of School Contact: Dr Timothy Hunter

Email: T.N.Hunter<στο>leeds.ac.uk

Website: http://www.engineering.leeds.ac.uk/chemical/

Degree level: Research postgraduate

Number: 1

Fees: £3,975

Maintenance: £15,500

Funding type: External sponsor

The Institute of Particle Science & Engineering, within the School of Chemical and Process Engineering, University of Leeds, wishes to recruit a highly-motivated individual to undertake an industrially challenging PhD project that is funded by Sellafield Ltd. in support of the EPSRC DISTINCTIVE University Consortium.

Within the UK nuclear industry, there are many and varied legacy waste deposits that are in the form of particulate-in-liquid suspensions located within ponds, silos and tank storage areas. Sellafield is the largest of these sites, and work to process and remove these wastes compromises one of the UKs largest decommissioning challenges. The successful candidate will join a team of multidisciplinary researchers at Leeds currently investigating legacy systems, by extending applied work using specialised acoustic instrumentation to characterise complex flocculated suspensions.

Project Description:

This PhD proposal is focused on exploring the use of an acoustic backscatter system as a remote in situ device to analyse the separation of nuclear wastes undergoing transfer to safe interim storage at Sellafield. The instrumentation has previously been developed as part of a collaboration funded by Innovate UK (formerly the Technology Strategy Board), and this project will fundamentally improve our understanding of how we use measurements of acoustic backscatter strength and speed-of-sound, to determine key suspension properties such as concentration and size. The research will include significant developments to analytical methods currently based upon scattering theory for hard spheres (such as glass or sand) to complex non-spherical particles found in legacy sites. In particular, it will look at analysing flocculated particulates, where fine dispersions are aggregated with charged polymers. These systems will be used as realistic non-active simulants for nuclear wastes, but are also commonly found in water treatment and minerals processing environments. 

This project is part of an ongoing industrial partnership with Sellafield Ltd, and will include a number of onsite engineering trials of the acoustic instrument. Additionally, as part of the DISTINCTIVE University Consortium (compromising Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol, Imperial, UCL, Lancaster, Liverpool, Sheffield, Strathclyde), considerable academic collaboration will also be highly encouraged.

Formal applications for research degree study should be made on-line through the linkwww.leeds.ac.uk/rsa/prospective_students/apply/I_want_to_apply.html . Please state clearly on the funding section of the application form that you wish to be considered for the 'Characterisation of flocculated waste suspensions with acoustic backscatter'. In the research information section please state the name Dr T Hunter.

Minimum Academic Requirements (if English is not your first language, then candidates must also meet the University's English language requirements):

Applications are invited from candidates with or expecting a 2(1) at MEng or Merit at MSc, in a Science or Engineering discipline, such as Chemical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Material Science & Engineering, Chemistry and Physics.