In this project you will experimentally explore how high temperatures and shaking loads caused by hypersonic flight affect aerospace structures. These conditions are encountered by high-speed hypersonic glide vehicles and space re-entry vehicles but are very difficult to design for. You will experimentally recreate these conditions and characterise how aerostructures respond to them.
Aerospace vehicles capable of re-entry from space or hypersonic gliding (i.e. travelling at five or more times the speed of sound in atmosphere), experience challenging thermal and vibrational loading. They can also encounter drastic changes in heat and vibrations depending on the phase of flight. These effects lead to poorly understood structural behaviour, necessitating experimental studies to support the development of hypersonic systems.
Current approaches to testing hypersonic structures typically focus on small material tests for determining properties for design work. There are few facilities globally that can recreate both the temperatures and vibrations encountered by hypersonic vehicles for full components and sub-assemblies. One such facility capable of doing this is situated at the University of Liverpool.
Such facilities are vital for obtaining data regarding how complex structures deform and behave at high temperature, this feeds back understanding to inform the design process of joints and features within structures. The other benefit of these facilities is that they provide a means of obtaining experimental data for validating component and sub-assembly performance as part of the certification process for new hypersonic glide vehicles.
This research project will focus on exploring the behaviour of joints between high-temperature materials. These joints lead to complex buckling behaviour of skin surfaces when heated, which in turn affects how components deform when shaken. The objectives are to:
To support your development during your studies, you will be involved in training at the University of Liverpool as well as training activities organised by the UK Hypersonics Doctoral Training Network. Throughout your degree you will also sit in a diverse research group with other PhD students working on projects related to nuclear energy, aerospace engineering and biomechanics. This will help you develop into a skilled research engineer ready to contribute to the development and testing of structures for the most challenging of environments.
Candidates wishing to apply should complete the University of Liverpool application form to apply for a PhD in Engineering.
Please review our guide on How to apply for a PhD | Postgraduate research | University of Liverpool carefully and complete the online postgraduate research application form to apply for this PhD project.
Please ensure you include the project title and reference number WC001 when applying.
Supervisors:
Dr Will Christian w.j.r.christian@liverpool.ac.uk https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/people/william-christian
Prof Eann Patterson Eann.Patterson@liverpool.ac.uk https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/people/eann-patterson