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Senior Project Leader Wins Funding Fellowships for Research

Mon, 30 September, 2019

Senior Project Leader for the Arc Welding Engineering team at TWI, Shaun Smart, has been given a funding award from the ERA Foundation, through the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851.

Currently studying for his PhD, Shaun has worked for TWI for ten years.

Having already gained his BEng (Hons) while working for TWI, Shaun’s Fellowship award provides him with financial support during his studies, while also offering publicity for his project work on the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851’s website.

Shaun’s PhD studies, which are being undertaken with the University of Leicester and the National Structural Integrity Research Centre (NSIRC), a state-of-the-art postgraduate engineering facility established and managed by TWI, concern the boundary conditions of weld metal hydrogen cracking.

Weld metal hydrogen cracking is a process that can occur during metal fabrication and is not yet well understood. His work will expand upon the existing knowledge around weld metal hydrogen cracking as a failure mechanism that is separate to heat affected zone (HAZ) hydrogen cracking in order to define control measures for its avoidance.

The Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 awards 35 postgraduate Fellowships and Scholarships a year, for advanced study and research in science, engineering, the built environment and design. These awards are supplemented by additional Special Awards made to support projects that are consistent with its overall aims. Many of these special support projects are focused on raising awareness of the opportunities presented by science and engineering to the young.

Speaking on his award, Shaun said, “I can continue working while undertaking this research, so the Industrial Fellowship is a great fit for our company and for this research in particular.”

We would like to congratulate Shaun for both his Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 Industrial Fellowship and the associated ERA Foundation Fellowship.

Shaun Smart
Shaun Smart

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