Materials for Future Economy Workshop Series
Building on the Materials and manufacturing vision 2050: Reimagining materials and manufacturing together, this series of workshops will take a deeper dive into the aspects of Materials for the future economy.
Background
The Materials and manufacturing vision 2050 states:
- Materials, associated processing and new material applications will be the basis for cutting-edge products that reduce emissions, energy consumption and costs for UK manufacturing
- The rapid discovery with broad adoption and efficient processing of advanced and sustainable materials underpin decarbonised economies and have strengthened resilience in supply chains
Why should you attend these workshops?
- Inform Innovate UK about priorities for further work and funding
- Refine the vision to inform future funding competitions
- Network with the community to enable collaboration
- Receive output from the workshop (within 1 week of the event) with the ability to provide further feedback and input
This series of eight workshops will delve into different innovation strands identified in the vision.
Workshops
Here’s what’s scheduled for the event series.
23 January 2024: Develop materials for the hydrogen economy
Vision Statement: The global hydrogen economy is spurred by the discovery of new materials and by the retrofit of legacy gas distribution and transport systems.
30 January 2024: Develop materials and business models to support circularity
Vision Statement: Sustainable materials radically transform the design and use of consumer goods and packaging. All packaging and construction materials are designed to be 100% reused or recycled. Chemicals are mainly produced from non-virgin fossil carbon feedstocks, enabled by new catalytic processes, engineering biology and industrial biotechnology. All plastics are sustainable, and all food packaging is biodegradable or edible.
6 February 2024: Apply light-weight solutions incl. composites
Vision Statement: Novel material applications are rapidly de-risked and adopted. Aerospace leads light-weighting and spins out revolutionary energy-saving materials for cross-sector adoption.
20 February 2024: Apply photonics solutions
Vision Statement: Design engineers are inspired by new possibilities from functional materials that are driven by interconnectivity, automation, and machine learning – the so-called Materials 4.0 era.
27 February 2024: Computational materials (M4.0)
Vision Statement: Materials informatics, including machine learning tools and techniques, and physics-based modelling has improved the discovery and development of new materials. New chemicals and materials innovation will be accelerated through the increased adoption of digital technologies in research organisations.
5 March 2024: (Multi)-functional materials
Vision Statement: Advanced metallurgy, 3D weaving, 2D crystals, nano materials, metamaterials and in-orbit manufacturing are business as usual.
12 March 2024: Advanced sensors for autonomy
Vision Statement: Low-cost sensing technologies and high-tech quantum sensors are fundamental technologies in advanced manufacturing. Smart materials continue to be developed with in-built sensors and the ability to diagnose and repair themselves.
19 March 2024: Novel material processing
Vision Statement: Materials, associated processing and new material applications will be the basis for cutting-edge products that reduce emissions, energy consumption and costs for UK manufacturing.
Agenda format
- 10:00 – Welcome and introduction – present findings from 2050 Vision relevant to the workshop scope
- 10:10 – UK strengths and opportunities, any work already done
- 10:30 – Weaknesses, threats and barriers to sustainable growth
- 10:50 – Identify priorities for innovation intervention – what needs to happen, and who needs to do what, and by when?
- 11:10 – Inform priorities for Innovation Exchange (who are the challenge holders?)
- 11:25 – Provide feedback for refinement of 2050 Vision
- 11:40 – Potential thought leadership pieces and case studies
- 11:50 – Any final comments
- 12:00 – End
We will be using a Mural board to collect input. Please familiarise yourself with this platform prior to joining the workshop.
For any queries, please contact Ajay Kapadia.
Related programme
Resource Efficiency for Materials and Manufacturing (REforMM)
The programme aims for the UK to be a leader in resource efficiency with organisations understanding the environmental, social and economic impact of the full lifecycle and thriving from adoption of resource efficient solutions which are fundamental to UK and global Net Zero ambitions.