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The X-Lab Extreme, housed at Loughborough University’s Wolfson School of Mechanical, Electrical and Manufacturing Engineering and supported by a £1.1m grant from the Wolfson Foundation, offers capabilities that are only available at a handful of labs worldwide. It will also make the tools publicly accessible to industry partners for the first time, alongside university researchers and students.
On launching the lab, Paul Ramsbottom OBE, Chief Executive of the Wolfson Foundation, said: “Existing materials used in energy, transport and industry continue to be challenged by new environmental pressures and extremes (and not least as the climate changes). There is an urgent need to research, test and develop a new generation of materials which can withstand, and function safely in, extreme environments.
"The new X-Lab Extreme will help to accelerate this vital research in the UK and internationally, and the Wolfson Foundation is delighted to renew our support for the world-leading materials and engineering expertise at Loughborough. I was delighted to visit the new X-Lab Extreme to see the potential of this research and sense the excitement of the researchers.”
Professor Nick Jennings, Vice Chancellor of Loughborough University, also said: "It was a delight to welcome Paul back to campus to celebrate the impact of our long term partnership with the Wolfson Foundation. Advancing innovative research of this kind is a key strategic priority for Loughborough, and I was thrilled that we were able to launch this facility with the Wolfson Foundation's support to help transform materials research in the UK and further afield."
The lab will contain a Gleeble 3800, with specific attachments for cryogenic quenching, ultra-high sustained temperature testing, and laser ultrasonic metrology. This will be a one-of-a-kind facility, unique to the UK and Europe, and will be the first in the world to be open to public access.
The Gleeble system, designed by Dynamic Systems, will offer ultra-high temperature testing for sustained long periods in the range 1800-3000°C, and cryogenic quenching and testing for material properties assessment at ultra-low temperatures. This makes it ideal to test materials used for hydrogen storage and distribution, both in gaseous and liquid forms, space applications and other sectors, including defence and the nuclear industry.
Professor Anish Roy from the Wolfson School of Mechanical, Electrical and Manufacturing Engineering (MEME), and Professor Karen Coopman from the School of Aeronautical, Automotive, Chemical and Materials Engineering (AACME), are co-project leads for the new facility.
Professor Roy said of the new lab: “The X-Lab Extreme puts Loughborough at the frontier of materials science. From fusion reactors to hypersonic vehicles, from hydrogen tanks and pipelines to SMRs, the materials that will define the coming century must survive conditions that today's standard test facilities simply cannot replicate. This laboratory changes that."
The system is capable of exerting up to 20 tonnes of static force, heating specimens at a rate exceeding 10000°C per second, and achieving stroke rates up to 2 metres per second under conditions of vacuum or a controlled atmosphere of choice.
The system can also simulate and provide accurate and reliable test data on almost any thermal and environmental exposure the material sees during its service life and production. In other words, the Gleeble can easily and quickly reproduce thermal and mechanical phenomena of the real-world conditions in order to solve real-life processing problems, enabling Loughborough University and the UK to make huge strides in materials research.
The lab will be available for external researchers and industries from mid-June.
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(R-L: Dr Ahmad Zafari, Dave Green, Phil Owen, Steph White, Prof. Rachel Thomson, Dawn Spencer, Professor Nick Jennings, Professor Karen Coopman, Paul Ramsbottom OBE, Professor Anish Roy, Professor Moataz, Laura Hutchinson, Professor Rajkumar Roy, PhD student Divakar Trivedee, and PhD student Seif Alwahsh)