We propose a Centre for Doctoral Training in New and Sustainable PV. It will support the transformation of PV in the UK will that will in turn aid the country to achieve its renewal energy obligations, and will generate jobs in the technology sectors as well as local manufacturing and installation. The CDT allows for the distributed nature of PV research in the UK with a multi-centre team of seven partners covering all aspects of PV research from novel materials through new device architectures to PV systems and performance. The PhD projects and training span engineering and physical science expertise in materials and device physics, electronic engineering, physical and synthetic chemistry, operations management and manufacturing. The CDT graduates will be capable of transforming state of the art R&D across the PV technologies and, in so doing, contribute to the production and implementation of improved PV products and systems. All partners are members of the SuperSolar Hub and hence already coordinate integrated PV research and training. Students in the CDT will join a thriving research community. The team has unrivalled access to shared facilities in the best state of the art laboratories in the UK. Our group approach brings together expertise with a breadth and depth for training and research that could not be assembled in any other way. Moreover, the collaboration allows us to cut across the traditional boundaries in PV and enables exciting research vectors to be followed in New and Sustainable PV CDT agenda. International collaborations and formal exchange agreements will emphasise the global aspects of advanced research that are important for the development of a leadership group. The CDT members will interact with related research themes such as photochemical conversion of fuels for energy and other applications, and heating and cooling by solar radiation and will be a proactive member of the UK wide Network of Energy CDTs. Our goal is to train the best researchers with a flexible mindset able to communicate across different disciplines and be leaders in the emerging PV industry for advanced technologies. We will provide the training required for graduates to join the sustainable energy and PV sectors. We will establish a real identity of purpose and commonality in each cohort through a training programme designed to give students an understanding of all aspects of PV, including implications for society and an experience of a commercial environment. Students will be provided with a bespoke curriculum and training programme that exposes them to: (i) underpinning fundamentals across all the relevant disciplines, (ii) current state-of-the-art in knowledge and challenges in scale-up and systems, and (iii) unparalleled opportunities to engage in leading-edge interdisciplinary research projects as part of a national team. We will create a doctoral training environment in which students benefit from leading academic expertise and world-class facilities to develop their knowledge as well as the tools to innovate and create within their selected research theme. The unique cross functional skill-sets that our graduates will have will make them highly valuable to the academic community seeking to address ambitious basic manufacturing research challenges, and to industry, who have an urgent need for appropriately trained scientists and engineers able to support PV technologies within their commercial operations. To allow the students the chance to develop a common sense of purpose, each cohort will attend training events together. Courses will cover fundamental aspects common to all PV technologies and also advanced courses based on the partners' research expertise. There will be industrial and international placements. Coherence across the CDT will be aided by a virtual collaboration medium containing webinars and video lectures and pages where students and staff can collaborate via groups, and online forums.

Ultra-precision machining techniques permit the manufacture of the most high value components. Component complexity continues to develop and researchers are challenged to remove smaller volumes of material in a more precise manner while maintaining work piece integrity. Micro-machining, micro electrical discharge/electrochemical machining and high speed laser processes are now commonly used for micro component manufacture for the microelectronics, biomedical and aerospace industries. Electrolyte Jet Machining (EJM) is a newer process which is yet to be embraced in a meaningful way by these industries. The process itself has several attractive capabilities, such as the ability to process difficult to machine materials with no resulting thermal loading of parts and no induced residual stress. A particularly interesting aspect of the technology is that, with simple modifications, the process may also run in reverse as an additive manufacturing technique to precisely deposit materials. The work to be undertaken here will make use of a custom built MkI prototype EJM tool at the University of Nottingham which was recently completed by the Investigators. As well as being able to perform material surface machining, this has unique capabilities and represents a significant advancement in terms of the state-of-the-art. The investigators have demonstrated a new functionality in terms of computer controlled signal generation which is capable of creating so called 'dial-up-surfaces' or surface manufacture against a specification for surface texture/morphology as opposed to surface roughness alone. Surface texture control within a machining process is notoriously difficult to achieve, commanding a premium price for high value components since surface condition often dictates performance. Typically, micro surface textures are of interest to several groups of researchers outside of engineering. These include biomedical researchers who study cell/surface interaction and aerodynamicists who look to enhance the performance of surfaces interacting with fluid flow. To unlock the full potential of EJM, novel on machine instrumentation must be created. This instrumentation must allow fast, accurate, high precision process data to be collected to support real-time adaptive process control. It should also allow for on-machine surface metrology to be undertaken which is increasingly an essential requirement for successful industrial processes. For EJM to be successfully exploited in both a research environment, and critically as a viable production technology this novel set of process instrumentation must be investigated and then developed to allow accurate and timely metrology to be undertaken on the machine while the process is under way. The instrumentation to be investigated here will be split into two key areas. Firstly, a novel form of in-jet laser interferometer will be designed and optimised for use with EJM. The sensor will provide high speed, high precision process control measurement data. This will allow the material removal rate of the process and the form of the material removal area directly in line with the jet to be measured. In addition a fibre optic arrangement will be included to allow beam delivery. Since stand-off distances are short within EJM this will be possible with a high brightness source (laser) to deliver a spot to the work piece. In addition to the in-jet laser two additional sensors will be deployed to the machine head, external to the jet. These will be custom designed single line coherence scanning interferometer devices, configured for single line based detection (to allow increased acquisition rates). These techniques will allow the collection of disparate data sets in real-time which will be manipulated through control algorithms to perform online processing and adaptive machining. This represents a step change in the viability of this process for the production of complex and high value parts.

The vision of the Hub is to create ground-breaking embedded metrology and universal metrology informatics systems to be applied across the manufacturing value chain. This encompasses a paradigm shift in measurement technologies, embedded sensors/instrumentation and metrology solutions. A unified approach to creating new, scientifically-validated measurement technologies in manufacturing will lead to critical underpinning solutions to stimulate significant growth in the UK's productivity and facilitate future factories. Global manufacturing is evolving through disruptive technologies towards a goal of autonomous production, with manufacturing value-chains increasingly digitised. Future factories must be faster, more responsive and closer to customers as manufacturing is driven towards mass customisation of lower-cost products on demand. Metrology is crucial in underpinning quality, productivity and efficiency gains under these new manufacturing paradigms. The Advanced Metrology Hub brings together a multi-disciplinary team from Huddersfield with spokes at Loughborough, Bath and Sheffield universities, with fundamental support from NPL. Expertise in Engineering, Mathematics, Physics and Computer Science will address the grand challenges in advanced metrology and the Hub's vision through two key research themes and parallel platform activities: Theme I - Embedded Metrology will build sound technological foundations by bridging four formidable gaps in process- and component-embedded metrology. This covers: physical limits on the depth of field; high dynamic range measurement; real-time dynamic data acquisition in optical sensor/instruments; and robust, adaptive, scalable models for real-time control systems using sensor networks with different physical properties under time-discontinuous conditions. Theme II - Metrology Data analytics will create a smart knowledge system to unify metrology language, understanding, and usage between design, production and verification for geometrical products manufacturing; Establishment of data analytics systems to extract maximal information from measurement data going beyond state-of-the-art for optimisation of the manufacturing process to include system validation and product monitoring. Platform research activities will underpin the Hub's vision and core research programmes, stimulate new areas of research and support the progression of fundamental and early-stage research towards deployment and impact activities over the Hub's lifetime. In the early stage of the Hub, the core research programme will focus on four categories (Next generation of surface metrology; Metrology technologies and applications; In-process metrology and Machine-tool and large volume metrology) to meet UK industry's strategic agenda and facilitate their new products. The resulting pervasive embedding and integration of manufacturing metrology by the Hub will have far reaching implications for UK manufacturing as maximum improvements in product quality, minimization of waste/rework, and minimum lead-times will ultimately deliver direct productivity benefits and improved competitiveness. These benefits will be achieved by significantly reducing (by 50% to 75%) verification cost across a wide swathe of manufacture sectors (e.g. aerospace, automotive, electronics, energy, medical devices, optics, precision engineering) where the current cost of verification is high (up to 20% of total costs) and where product quality and performance is critical.

We propose a Centre for Doctoral Training in New and Sustainable PV. It will support the transformation of PV in the UK will that will in turn aid the country to achieve its renewal energy obligations, and will generate jobs in the technology sectors as well as local manufacturing and installation. The CDT allows for the distributed nature of PV research in the UK with a multi-centre team of seven partners covering all aspects of PV research from novel materials through new device architectures to PV systems and performance. The PhD projects and training span engineering and physical science expertise in materials and device physics, electronic engineering, physical and synthetic chemistry, operations management and manufacturing. The CDT graduates will be capable of transforming state of the art R&D across the PV technologies and, in so doing, contribute to the production and implementation of improved PV products and systems. All partners are members of the SuperSolar Hub and hence already coordinate integrated PV research and training. Students in the CDT will join a thriving research community. The team has unrivalled access to shared facilities in the best state of the art laboratories in the UK. Our group approach brings together expertise with a breadth and depth for training and research that could not be assembled in any other way. Moreover, the collaboration allows us to cut across the traditional boundaries in PV and enables exciting research vectors to be followed in New and Sustainable PV CDT agenda. International collaborations and formal exchange agreements will emphasise the global aspects of advanced research that are important for the development of a leadership group. The CDT members will interact with related research themes such as photochemical conversion of fuels for energy and other applications, and heating and cooling by solar radiation and will be a proactive member of the UK wide Network of Energy CDTs. Our goal is to train the best researchers with a flexible mindset able to communicate across different disciplines and be leaders in the emerging PV industry for advanced technologies. We will provide the training required for graduates to join the sustainable energy and PV sectors. We will establish a real identity of purpose and commonality in each cohort through a training programme designed to give students an understanding of all aspects of PV, including implications for society and an experience of a commercial environment. Students will be provided with a bespoke curriculum and training programme that exposes them to: (i) underpinning fundamentals across all the relevant disciplines, (ii) current state-of-the-art in knowledge and challenges in scale-up and systems, and (iii) unparalleled opportunities to engage in leading-edge interdisciplinary research projects as part of a national team. We will create a doctoral training environment in which students benefit from leading academic expertise and world-class facilities to develop their knowledge as well as the tools to innovate and create within their selected research theme. The unique cross functional skill-sets that our graduates will have will make them highly valuable to the academic community seeking to address ambitious basic manufacturing research challenges, and to industry, who have an urgent need for appropriately trained scientists and engineers able to support PV technologies within their commercial operations. To allow the students the chance to develop a common sense of purpose, each cohort will attend training events together. Courses will cover fundamental aspects common to all PV technologies and also advanced courses based on the partners' research expertise. There will be industrial and international placements. Coherence across the CDT will be aided by a virtual collaboration medium containing webinars and video lectures and pages where students and staff can collaborate via groups, and online forums.

This fellowship proposal is a three year extension of the current EPSRC manufacturing fellowship: Controlling Geometrical Variability of Products for Manufacturing (EP/I033424/1). The current fellowship is exploring the mathematical fundaments for the decomposition of geometry (i.e. size, shape and texture) and creating ground-breaking technology to control geometrical variability in manufactured products. The approach links fundamental geometrical mathematics direct to key component's design, manufacturing and verification from different industrial sectors (i.e. aerospace, optics, healthcare and catapult centres). In this case, the different types of geometrical decompositions specified geometrical surface requirements (spectrum, morphological and segmentation decompositions). The fellowship extension proposal will take the research results from the current fellowship and use them as a stepping stone for more advanced fundamental research in new areas within the manufacturing value chain. The research work is broken down to four aspects: 1. Different aspects of the manufacturing process leave different multi-scalar geometrical features, in a surface, at different scales (i.e. size, shape and texture). By decomposing these different signature features, information regarding different manufacturing aspects can be gained enabling characterisation and control of different aspects of the manufacturing process. 2. Sensor network provide information in the form of an irregular image, like a cubist painting, with different views, and times, of the environment all combined together. Decomposition of this information will provide access to features, and their relationships enabling an agile dynamic predictive model to be self-aware of its environment enabling mathematical foundations for bio-inspired feedback control loops from sensor networks to be developed. 3. Smart autonomous manufacturing will require access to the huge amassed manufacturing knowledge-base (National and International Standards, Materials data-sheets, etc.). Create the foundations of decomposition of information structures for the automatic creation of smart information systems that are machine readable and to apply this result to develop the full rigorous mathematical foundations for the manufacturing value chain. 4. Using the EPSRC Future HUB in Advanced Metrology (EP/P006930/1) as leverage, disseminate the results from the above to solve real industrial problems to demonstrate the advantage of using fundamental decomposition theory, as developed in the previous manufacturing fellowship and this extension, over traditional approaches.