There is a growing need to devise methods for stabilisation of active ingredients in liquid and control of their release to the right place at right time, covering a wide range of industrial applications, particularly in the area of small sized molecules. Examples include controlled release of perfumes from fabrics or cosmetic products, delivery of artificial diets to marine fish larvae, bacteriacides in food pipelines, insecticides on soft furnishings or foliage, dyes or inks, adhesives, and drugs in the body. The best way to achieve these objectives is using microcapsules. However, controlling the stability and release of the core chemicals have been proven to be not well understood. In particular, controlling leakage of small molecules is extremely challenging and has not been achieved so far, which has limited the impact and suitability of microcapsules for wide applications. It is proposed to prepare microcapsules having dual shells, which combines the concepts of triggered release (the outer shell may be broken by applied mechanical force) and sustained release (the inner shell with certain permeability). The aim of this project is to formulate and characterise novel double-shell microcapsules with desirable structure and mechanical properties in order to realise stabilisation and controlled delivery of active ingredients made of small molecules, via collaboration between chemical engineering (Professor Z Zhang's group) and chemistry (Professor J Preece and Professor B Vincent, Polymer and Colloid Group in the University Bristol), and between the academic groups and two international companies Appleton Paper Inc., USA, which has three manufacture sites in the UK as a manufacturer of industrial microcapsules and Procter and Gamble, UK (Professor D. York's Technology Breakthrough Group) as an end user of microcapsules.

Most natural systems around us are not in equilibrium. Indeed, closed equilibrium systems with no interaction with their surrounding are a true exception. Currents run through real-world systems, for example: traffic systems, biological transport or charge carriers in electronics. The Earth is constantly exposed to cosmic radiation. Plants, animals and ecosystems grow, individuals die or are born. Man-made structures tend to degrade and decay. The financial infrastructure of the western world is far from being inert to external and intrinsic shocks. In industrial applications there is often a need to control the flow of materials and to change their states, forming stable structures tailored for specific purposes. Understanding hydrodynamic phenomena off-equilibrium is important for e.g ink-jet printing, knowledge of non-equilibrium processes in quantum systems can enhance the performance of modern-day technology such as computer memory elements. Progress in controlling plasmas finally may be an important contribution to energy challenges facing our society. Closely related, such systems often show emergent behaviour, a traffic jam `emerges' from relatively rational behaviour of individual drivers. Large-scale correlation and self-organisation is seen in physical systems, again `emerging' seemingly at random from small-scale interaction of microscopic constituents (electrons, molecules). It is often impossible to predict these macroscopic structures from studying the elements at the micro-scale alone, instead subtle collective mechanisms are at work, and these processes are only poorly understood as yet to say the least. Making progress in this area is a truly challenging enterprise, likely to require up to a decade or so of concerted action by researchers across a variety of disciplines. The network we propose here aims to prepare the UK community to meet this challenge. No discipline alone can address, let alone answer the open questions in non-equilibrium systems or emergence. To a large extent it is not even clear what the right questions are. Our proposal is to use the existing, but scattered expertise in the UK to collectively define what avenues are the most promising, what type of research UK researchers should be focusing on in the next 5-10 years. Non-equilibrium systems considered in this proposal represent diverse fields of science which are often separated by their unique terminology, methodology as well as by different practical applications they may lead to. This is a barrier towards making progress, our network will help to overcome this blockage. At the same time the diversity of the theme and the broad expertise in the UK community are a strength. The breadth of researchers and disciplines in the network will ensure that analogies between very different phenomena will be identified if they are present and that they will be synthesized to aid a more focused approach. This will help to address specific problems, but also to extract general principles that can be exploited in theory and experiment. At the core of our proposal are unifying aspects of the dynamics for systems far from equilibrium such as spontaneous development of structure and patterns, dynamics of large-scale failures and responses to strong driving forces and shocks We propose a portfolio of different networking events: mutual exchanges to initiate collaborations, focused and general meetings and we will run an extensive public outreach programme. Key to our approach are a number of `Synergy Acceleration Sessions', modelled on the EPSRC concept of so-called `Ideas Factories'. These sessions will take participants out of their comfort zones, will guide them to think outside the box and to generate novel ideas, using the full breadth of expertise available. A carefully iterated process will channel and focus these ideas, ultimately leading to a process by which the key challenges and most promising approaches can be found.

This project is an opportunity to harness the synergy between world-leading scientists from four prestigious institutions to create the next generation modelling tools for complex multiphase flows. These flows are central to micro-fluidics, virtually every processing and manufacturing technology, oil-and-gas and nuclear applications, and biomedical applications such as lithotripsy and laser-surgery cavitation. The ability to predict the behaviour of multiphase flows reliably will address a major challenge of tremendous economic, scientific, and societal benefit to the UK. The Programme will achieve this goal by developing a single modelling framework that establishes, for the first time, a transparent linkage between input (models and/or data) and prediction; this will allow systematic error-source identification, and, therefore, directed, optimal, model-driven experimentation, to maximise prediction accuracy. The framework will also feature optimal selection of massively-parallelisable numerical methods, capable of running efficiently on 10^5-10^6 core supercomputers, optimally-adaptive, three-dimensional resolution, and the most sophisticated multi-scale physical models. This framework will offer unprecedented resolution of multi-scale, multiphase phenomena, minimising the reliance on correlations and empiricism. The investigators' synergy, and their long-standing industrial collaborations, will ensure that this Programme will result in a paradigm-shift in multiphase flow research worldwide. We will demonstrate our capabilities in two areas of strategic importance to the UK: by providing insights into novel manufacturing processes, and reliable prediction of multiphase flow regime transitions in the oil-and-gas industry. Our framework will be sufficiently general to address a number of other industrial and environmental global challenges, which we detail herein.

Formulation engineering is concerned with the manufacture and use of microstructured materials, whose usefulness depends on their microstructure. For example, the taste, texture and shine of chocolate depends on the cocoa butter being in the right crystal form - when chocolate is heated and cooled its microstructure changes to the unsightly and less edible 'bloomed' form. Formulated products are widespread, and include foods, pharmaceuticals, paints, catalysts, structured ceramics, thin films, cosmetics, detergents and agrochemicals, with a total value of £180 bn per year. In all of these, material formulation and microstructure control the physical and chemical properties that are essential to the product function. The research issues that affect different industry sectors are common: the need is to understand the processing that results in optimal nano- to micro structure and thus product effect. Products are mostly complex soft materials; structured solids, soft solids or structured liquids, with highly process-dependent properties. The CDT fits into Priority Theme 2 of the EPSRC call: Design and Manufacture of Complex Soft Material Products. The vision for the CDT is to be a world-leading provider of research and training addressing the manufacture of formulated products. The UK is internationally-leading in formulation, with many research and manufacturing sites of national and multinational companies, but the subject is interdisciplinary and thus is not taught in many first degree courses. A CDT is thus needed to support this industry sector and to develop future leaders in formation engineering. The existing CDT in Formulation Engineering has received to date > £6.5 million in industry cash, has graduated >75 students and has 46 currently registered. The CDT has led the field; the new National Formulation Centre at CPI was created in 2016, and we work closely with them. The strategy of the new Centre has been co-created with industry: the CDT will develop interdisciplinary research projects in the sustainable manufacture of the next generation of formulated products, with focus in two areas (i) Manufacturing and Manufacturability of New Materials for New Markets 'M4', generating understanding to create sustainable routes to formulated products, and (ii) 'Towards 4.0rmulation': using modern data handling and manufacturing methods ('Industry 4.0') in formulation. We have more than 25 letters from companies offering studentships and >£9 million of support. The research of the Centre will be carried out in collaboration with a range of industry partners: our strategy is to work with companies that are are world-leading in a number of areas; foods (PepsiCo, Mondelez, Unilever), HPC (P+G, Unilever), fine chemicals (Johnson Matthey, Innospec), pharma (AstraZeneca, Bristol Myers Squibb) and aerospace (Rolls-Royce). This structure maximises the synergy possible through working with non-competing groups. We will carry out at least 50 collaborative projects with industry, most of which will be EngD projects in which students are embedded within industrial companies, and return to the University for training courses. This gives excellent training to the students in industrial research; in addition to carrying out a research project of industrial value, students gain experience of industry, present their work at internal and external meetings and receive training in responsible research methods and in the interdisciplinary science and engineering that underpin this critical industry sector.