DPhil Studentship: Miniaturised Fatigue Testing of Materials

Jicheng Gong and Angus J Wilkinson

Fatigue has been a dominant mechanical failure mode across the industrial sectors. To produce more reliable, higher fuel efficiency and smarter components to satisfy the requirements of future  products, it is crucial to have better understanding of fatigue crack initiation (FCI) and short crack growth (SCG) in materials because these early stages of fatigue account for the largest portion of fatigue life and the greatest scatter.

Although FCI and SCG are commonly localised within a small region in a bulk component, leading to the classic needle in haystack problem, we developed a set of novel small-scale fatigue testing technique that utilises FIB and micro-laser to machine small-scale testing pieces and an ultrasonic rig to conduct miniaturised fatigue tests. Small-scale specimens allow FCI and SCG to be confined to a well characterised volume of material. The ultra-fast speed of ultrasonic rig enables a Giga cycle fatigue test in hours in contrast to months or years using conventional approaches.

The ultimate goal of this project is to achieve mechanistic understanding of FCI and SCG in harsh environments and quantify their life time. You will use this new state of the art technique to investigate high cycle FCI and SCG in an array of materials with respect to environments (temperature and gases). Pre-testing, intermittent and post-mortem analysis is to be conducted using advanced characterisation techniques including SEM, EBSD, EDX and FIB. Nanoindentor will be implemented to probe the static micromechanical properties and the intrinsic links to the fatigue performance. To simulate and interpret the experimental results, finite element modelling will be used.

This EPSRC-funded 3.5 year DPhil in Materials DTP studentship will provide course fees and a stipend of at least £17,668 per year (pro-rata for the final six-months).

Applicants with Home or Overseas fees status are eligible to apply. However, applicants with overseas fees status should note our ability to offer a studentship to a candidate with this fee status is restricted by the EPSRC stipulation that no more than 30% of students funded by a specific EPSRC DTP training grant held by an institution may be of overseas fees status. The consequence of this restriction is that overseas applicants for the present studentship will be assessed relative to both (i) all other applicants for this studentship and (ii) all other overseas applicants for the DPhil in Materials programme who are contenders for other EPSRC studentships funded from our 2023 EPSRC DTP Training Grant allocation and who submit an application for the DPhil in Materials programme by 20^th January 2023.  Information on fee status can be found at http://www.ox.ac.uk/admissions/graduate/fees-and-funding/fees-and-other-charges . 

Candidates will be considered in the January 2023 admissions field which has an application deadline of 20 January 2023. 

For informal discussions about the project please contact Dr Jicheng Gong by email to jicheng.gong@materials.ox.ac.uk  .

General enquiries on how to apply can be made by e‑mail to graduate.studies@materials.ox.ac.uk . 

You must complete the standard Oxford University Application for Graduate Studies.

Further information and an electronic copy of the application form can be found at https://www.ox.ac.uk/admissions/graduate/applying-to-oxford .

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