Research projects

We conduct a number of research projects, arranged around three topics:
  • Fundamental research: Nucleation–based solidification research including the structure of liquid metal, mechanisms of heterogeneous nucleation and the generic approach for enhancing and controlling nucleation through both physical and chemical methods.
  • Technology development: Innovative generic technologies for nucleation control including techniques for liquid metal treatment, techniques for enhancing nucleation on both endogenous and exogenous solid particles through both physical and chemical methods, and applications of developed techniques for nucleation control to the existing shape casting and continuous casting processes.
  • Industrial applications: BCAST undertakes proprietary applied research with individual industrial partners to exploit fundamental research and generic technological development to support the metal casting industry in implementing innovative processing technologies and new products.

Current Projects

BCAST always promotes collaborations among individual academics, industry, and international partners. We are proud of our researchers who are carrying out world leading high quality fundamental and applied research. All our researchers are actively engaged in a number of projects.  

1. UKRI Interdisciplinary Centre for Circular Metals

PI: Prof Zhongyun Fan

CircularMetal programme aims to accelerate the transition from the current largely take-make-waste linear economy to full metal circulation by 2050 and make UK the first country to realise that. We have assembled a truly interdisciplinary academic team with a wide range of academic expertise, and a strong industrial consortium involving the full metal supply chain.

  • Macro-economic analysis of metal flow is conducted to identify circularity gaps within the metals industry, and to develop pathways, policies, and regulations to bridge them.
  • Principles for circular product design, circular business models, and circular supply chain strategies are developed to facilitate the transition to full metal circulation.
  • Research efforts focus on the development of circular alloys and circular manufacturing technologies to enable the transition to full metal circulation.
  • Active engagement with the wider academic and industrial communities, policymakers, and the general public is undertaken to maximize the impact of full metal circulation.

CircularMetal provides the necessary capabilities and pathways to eliminate the need for metal extraction. The estimated cumulative economic contribution to the UK could surpass £100 billion in the next decade. The metallurgical, business, economics and circular economy research communities will all benefit from the development of this programme.

2. STEP Aluminium

PI: Prof. Zhongyun Fan

The STEP Al programme aims to enhance the strategic research partnership between Constellium and BCAST, focusing on a co-created fundamental research programme. The objectives include developing high-performance Al-alloys for automotive applications with improved strength, ductility, crashworthiness, and thermal conductivity. The initiative also seeks to develop a novel melt-conditioned direct chill casting process so that it can produce STEP alloy billets with refined grain size, understand precipitation mechanisms at the atomic level, study solute-dislocation-precipitate interactions during thermomechanical processing of Al alloys, establish relationships between the amount of stored dislocations and simple deformation modes, and develop novel component forming technologies. Additionally, the program aims to develop an integrated approach to component design through holistic integration of alloy chemistry, component manufacturing processes and component service conditions, bridge the gap between fundamental research and engineering applications, and foster collaboration between academia and business.

3. Aluminium Intensive Vehicle Enclosures (ALIVE) 

PI: Prof Geoffrey Scamans

The project aims to take another major step with disruptive high strength aluminium alloys and their processing and joining technologies, enabling new enclosure design concepts for the manufacture of both vehicle integration structures and battery enclosures for a new generation of lightweight hybrid and electric vehicles for the UK market, that will have a major impact on the UK government’s carbon reduction targets for the UK vehicle fleet. The project will establish a UK based manufacturing facility for world leading cost-efficient structural aluminium battery enclosures providing an on-shore resource for BEV and PHEV component manufacture, with the manufacturing concept capable of providing efficient transportation of parts for export assembly.

The project focuses on novel enclosure architectures that will provide scalable design and manufacturing concepts utilising agile multi-platform cells on the same production equipment, engineered to meet variable volume demands, while providing a kit of parts for local assembly and export options. Also, the project will design, develop, assemble and extensively test aluminium intensive prototype enclosures and full-scale demonstrator enclosures for BMW and Volvo electric vehicles, forming an integrated pathway to UK battery pack production by providing the light weight enclosures aligned to current and future battery module technologies and power densities. 

4. Circular and Constant Aluminium (CirConAl)

PI: Prof Geoffrey Scamans

This collaborative partnership between Brunel University London, operating through BCAST, and Constellium aims to develop low carbon aluminium extruded alloys for structural electric vehicle applications. Under the leadership of Constellium, the project seeks to maximize the use of post-consumer scrap in a new generation of high-strength alloys that emit less than two tons of CO2 per ton of aluminium produced. CirConAl is part of joint government and industry support for projects to build an end-to-end supply chain for zero-emissions vehicles in the UK. By designing, developing, prototyping, and testing aluminium automotive components at scale, the project is expected to demonstrate that high-strength alloys with high recycled content can meet or exceed OEM requirements, such as strength, crushability, durability, and other performance criteria. Together, the partners would also develop scrap sorting technologies to ensure that valuable metal is recycled into new automotive solutions rather than downcycled, preserving its value and contributing to a circular economy. 

5. Dispersion Strengthened Magnesium Alloys - Solidification of Nanocolloids

PI: Prof Hari Nadendla

The project aims to develop high strength, cost effective dispersion strengthened magnesium (DSM) alloys. It also investigates the criteria for the stability of nanocolloids, solidification behaviour and establishes process maps suitable for manufacturing DSM alloys using practical casting processes. Technologically, the DSM alloys represent a step change in the manufacturing technology to produce lightweight automotive components. If certain Al and steel are replaced with DSM alloys, the expected weight saving would be significant. In the longer term, it will lead to a significant reduction in CO2 emissions and offer sizable fuel savings. The industrial partners, comprising a materials supplier, component producers, alloy designer and an end user are an added value and help to accelerate the knowledge transfer activity from academia to industry.

6. Aluminium alloy design strategy for sustainable manufacturing

PI: Prof Hari Nadendla

The goal of this project is to help accelerate the process of design and development of Al alloys for sustainable manufacturing. Currently, the approach to developing new alloys involves selecting a standardised alloy and then modifying its composition through trial and error based on research insights and experience. This is a costly and time-consuming process that can take years to yield an alloy with the desired properties.

The approach entails the development of physical and empirical models to analyse and rank thousands of potential alloy compositions simultaneously across a range of performance metrics. This optimisation tool operated by industrial partner allows for more efficient and effective identification of new alloy compositions that meet specific performance requirements. In this project, the focus is on the design and development of (i) a high-performance, cost-effective aluminum alloy for additive manufacturing, (ii) a high-pressure die-cast alloy with higher thermal conductivity comparable to the 6xxx series alloy, and (iii) an end-of-life scrap-tolerant high-pressure die-cast alloy.

7. Made Smarter Innovation - Materials Made Smarter Research Centre

PI: Prof Hamid Assadi

The Materials Made Smarter Centre has been co-created by Academia and Industry as a response to the pressing need to revolutionise the way we manufacture and value materials in our economy. The UK's ability to manufacture advanced materials underpins our ambitions to move towards cleaner growth and a more resource efficient economy. Innovation towards a net zero-carbon economy needs new materials with enhanced properties, performance and functionality and new processing technologies, with enhanced manufacturing capability, to make and deliver economic and societal benefit to the UK. However, significant technological challenges must still be overcome before we can benefit fully from the transformative technical and environmental benefits that new materials and manufacturing processes may bring. Our capacity to monitor and control material properties both during manufacture and through into service affect our ability to deliver a tailored and guaranteed performance that is 'right-first-time' and limit capacity to manage materials as assets through their lifetime. This reduces materials to the status of a commodity - a status which is both undeserved and unsustainable. Future materials intensive manufacturing needs to add greater value to the materials we use, be that through reduction of environmental impact, extension of product life or via enhanced functionality. Digitalisation of the materials thread will help to enhance their value by developing the tools and means to certify, monitor and control materials in-process and in-service improving productivity and stimulating new business models.

The project’s vision is to put the UK's materials intensive manufacturing industries at the forefront of the UK's technological advancement and green recovery from the dual impacts of COVID and rapid environmental change. It will entail the development of advanced digital technologies and tools to enable the verification, validation, certification and traceability of materials manufacturing and work with partners to address the challenges of digital adoption. Digitisation of the materials thread will drive productivity improvements in materials intensive industries, realise new business models and change the way we value and use materials.

8. Performance-driven design of aluminum alloys for additive manufacturing (PAAM)

PI: Prof Dmitry Eskin

The synergetic approach in this project is three-fold and aims to (a) develop a new class of hierarchically structured Al-based alloys with fine-tuned structures and compositions at both the nano- and micro-scale, which satisfy the requirements for cracking resistance, structure uniformity, reduced residual stresses and porosity, enabling a unique combination of properties and dimensional precision for AM; (b) test and optimise their performance upon AM using in situ and ex situ high precision characterisation methods; (c) validate the approach by manufacturing AM test parts with enhanced product quality and, hence, with improved properties and performance. Combining these three advances, we will deliver a new class of high-quality AM materials with lightweight, uniform structure and properties, high rigidity, thermal stability, and designed functionality; combining the best processing features of existing diverse alloy groups.

While addressing the challenges of AM through dedicated material development, this proposal has a strong and credible pathway to impact other manufacturing processes, e.g. casting and powder metallurgy using the same alloy design paradigm.  

9. Fabrication of lightweight aluminium metal matrix composites and validation in green vehicles (FLAMINGo)

PI: Dr Brian McKay

This project aims to develop a group of integrated technologies that will enable the uptake and use of Aluminium Metal Matrix Composites (Al-MMCs) in electric vehicles. This will involve advancements in technologies such as mechanochemical alloying and mixing, manufacturing methods such as Green Sand Casting, Low-Pressure Die Casting, Extrusion and Welding, as well as in topology optimisation and recycling processes. In order to boost EV market adoption, it is important that innovative technological solutions are provided that will lift existing technical barriers and will lead to both improved efficiency and increase range. To reach these goals the project will target the following development steps at the prototype and full scale:

  • The production of nanoparticles concentrated masterbatches of Al-MMC, in order to insure a complete dispersion of the nanoparticles in the Al.
  • Casting of Al-MMC components by inoculating the Al melt, and homogenising the distribution.
  • Production of smaller components (e.g. brackets and connectors) by Low Pressure Die Casting and larger components, like subframes, by Green Sand Casting to demonstrate the broader feasibility and applicability of Al-MMCs.
  • Extrusion of cast billets for making profiles for the body frame.
  • Identification of the welding techniques (e.g. TIG, GTAW and RSW) suitable for joining Al-MMC components, and assessment of the application.
  • Use of these components for substitution of steels and aluminium parts in electric vehicles, validation of components estimated service life and installation on vehicles.
  • Practices to recycle the Al-MMC components.

10. Fundamental study of the TiB2 –α Al nucleation process

PI: Prof Zhongyun Fan

The collaborative project between MQP and the Brunel Centre for Advanced Solidification Technology (BCAST) at Brunel University of London focuses on better understanding the mechanism of nucleation within the aluminum melt with the aim of improving the efficiency of grain refiners. Grain refinement during the casting of engineering alloys is common practice in the metal casting industry, providing casthouses with a fine and equiaxed grain structure and significantly reduced casting defects for improved engineering perfor­mance. High efficiency grain refiners are important for preventing common defects, such as pin holes in thin sheet and foil for food and medical packaging applica­tions, black-line defects in litho plate, and tears in bever­age cans. It is also important for ensuring excellent sur­face quality and the extrudability of billet for automotive extrusions, such as trims and rails on SUVs and high gloss surfaces for luxury and sports cars.