FSE PhD President's Doctoral Scholarship: Sensing Circular Cities: Testing Low-Carbon Construction Materials through Urban Living Labs

The University of Manchester; Manchester; On-site; GBP 21,000 - 25,000; Full time

Job summary

The University of Manchester invites applications for a 4-year PhD studentship, open to Home (UK) and international applicants. The successful candidate will receive a stipend at the UKRI minimum rate (£21,805 per year) plus £1,000 per annum enhancement, and a research training support grant up to £20,000 for the full programme.

The project will develop a multiscale

Responsibilities

• Develop/identify cementitious systems incorporating recycled construction materials or industrial by-products to lower emissions or store carbon.
• Quantify reaction mechanisms, microstructure, mechanical performance, carbon uptake and resistance to deterioration processes in the lab.
• Instrumented specimens and demonstrator components will combine sensors with non-destructive evaluation to monitor strain, temperature, moisture, cracking and material condition under mechanical loading and environmental exposure.

Job description

This 4-year PhD studentship is open to both Home (UK) and international applicants. The successful candidate will receive an annual stipend at the UKRI minimum rate (currently £21,805 per year) plus £1,000/annum enhancement, and a research training support grant of up to £20,000 for the full 4-year programme.This project is in competition for funding with other projects. Usually, the projects that receives the best applicants will be successful.

Cities need construction materials that reduce embodied carbon and make better use of waste, yet adoption is constrained by uncertainty about long-term performance and by a lack of evidence about where these innovations should be deployed.This PhD will develop a multiscale "material-to-map" framework that connects laboratory characterisation and structural sensing with AI-enabled spatial planning.It will establish not only whether low-carbon materials work, but also where their deployment could deliver the greatest carbon, infrastructure and social value.

Under the supervision of our interdisciplinary team, the student will first develop/identify cementitious systems incorporating recycled construction materials or industrial by-products and capable of lowering emissions or storing carbon(i.e. the supervision team will propose feasible options). Laboratory research will quantify reaction mechanisms, microstructure, mechanical performance, carbon uptake and resistance to relevant deterioration processes.

Instrumented specimens and demonstrator components will combine embedded or surface-mounted sensors with non-destructive evaluation to monitor strain, temperature, moisture, cracking and changes in material condition under mechanical loading and representative environmental exposure.

For further details see here.

ThisprojectisexpectedtostartinSeptember2027.

£21,805 annual stipend. Please see advert for further details.