Facilities
We have a wide range of high quality facilities for research. We continue to invest in and enhance these to support cutting-edge work carried out here.
Well-equipped, purpose-built laboratories provide excellent facilities for teaching and research.
A 24-hour library provides access to modern collections; over 13,000 electronic books, 11,000 journals, research databases, 450 PCs and 45 laptop docking points. E-lounges and communal areas offer additional PCs. WiFi is available throughout.
We also have a huge array of research equipment and facilities which supports our groundbreaking research.
Microscopy and analysis suite
We provide microscopy and analysis equipment and expertise to support research. A range of instruments are available including electron microscopes, confocal laser scanning, high content, raman and scanning probe microscopes and flow cytometers.
Chemical characterisation and analysis facility
The chemical characterisation and analysis facility combines cutting-edge analytical equipment with extensive in-house expertise to provide a comprehensive chemical characterisation service for the commercial sector.
The advanced transmission testing facility
Engineers in the Powertrain and Vehicle Research Centre are working on a project that will help reduce the size and cost of the drilling systems used to reach oil reserves found as deep as 6 miles (9.5 kilometres) underground.
These advanced drilling systems allow for more efficient drilling; making it more economical to extract oil from hard to reach reservoirs.
The project is being funded by InterSyn Technologies from Houston, TX, which has proprietary rights to the Milner Continually Variable Transmission (MCVT) developed by UK based inventor Peter Milner before he died.
Using a plasma reactor to coat a number of materials including fabrics and plastics with anti-bacterial compounds
An interdisciplinary research team from the departments of Chemistry and Biology and Biochemistry are part of a €3 million Europe-wide research collaboration to pioneer research into safer, more effective anti-bacterial plastics and coatings that can be used in items such as food packaging, medical devices to wound dressings, and nappies.
The Bath team has developed a range of new compounds which have been shown to be highly effective against common hospital bacterial infections such as MRSA and are safer than existing anti-bacterials based on silver nanoparticles.
Early work by the Bath team has made new compounds containing zinc, copper and silver which have been effective against common hospital bacteria but are non-toxic to human cell growth.
The treatment uses microwaves to kill tumour cells with very few side effects
A technique that uses microwaves to destroy liver tumours, based on technology pioneered by physicists at Bath, has treated more than 100 patients in the UK and is now being used worldwide.
Most patients with liver cancer are deemed inoperable but with the development of this microwave equipment, thousands of patients could be offered curative treatment.
Around the world, one million people a year die of primary liver cancer, with a further million dying from secondary liver cancer where the cancer has spread from other tumour sites.
The technology resulted from ongoing research in the Department of Physics into the use of microwaves in medical therapy, starting with Microwave Enometrial Ablation, a treatment for women with heavy menstrual periods.
This research has led to the development and production of a microwave generator and probe to treat cancer tumours, now being manufactured by Acculis Ltd, UK.
RepRap in action
The RepRap Project is an initiative aimed at creating a largely self-replicating machine which can be used for rapid prototyping and manufacturing. A rapid prototyper is a 3D printer that is able to fabricate three dimensional artifacts from a computer-based model. Project authors describe 'self-replication', understood as the ability to reproduce the components necessary to build another version of itself, as one of the goals for the project, which is part of the research of the Biomimetics and Natural Technologies Group.
Ultrasonic C-scan system
The ultrasonic C-scan system is used to scan materials for microscopic cracks, and has a 2.5 x 1.2m scan area. The Department of Mechanical Engineering also has structural modelling software; 10-2000 kN fatigue and static testing machines; three 1.5m Airbus autoclaves (100psi; 250°C); a clean room and hot presses; a tool machining workshop; cutting and polishing equipment; a multi - channel modal analyser; a Limess VIC3D High Speed Digital Image Correlation system; a Limess Real Time Strain Sensing system (RTSS); a Limess shearography system; four thermographic inspection systems; and acoustography facilities.
LabVIEW control environment implementing in-house developed on-line control system for the selective oxidation Taylor flow membrane rig
A range of specialised experimental apparatus is available in the Department of Chemical Engineering: high pressure oxidation/combustion tube facility (240 bar); air injection (LTO process) for production of in situ displacement gases (N2, CO2); air injection (HTO process / in-situ combustion) for IOR from heavy, medium and light oil reservoirs; reservoir simulation - horizontal well processes; autoclaves (20, 50, 300 bar), in-situ FTIR catalyst characterisation rig, DRIFT & ATR FTIR cells, bioreactors and membrane bioreactors (2 - 25 litres) for fermentation, biocatalysis or environmental applications, some with membranes for recycle, porous tube re-circulation reactor, Taylor flow membrane reactor etc.
Composites Autoclave
The autoclave is used for testing the effects of high temperatures and pressures on composite materials used in the aerospace industry.
Industrial autoclaves are pressure vessels with full-diameter fast-opening doors, used to process parts and materials which require exposure to elevated temperatures whilst under pressure. The manufacture of high performance components from advanced composites often requires autoclave processing.
Eidetics Model 1520 Water Tunnel
The Aerospace Engineering Research Centre has several facilities and modern instrumentation. Main facilities include a water tunnel (38 cm x 51 cm), two wind tunnels (larger one with a cross-section of 2.1 m x 1.5 m), autoclave (3 x 1.5 m) for composite structures, purpose-built rotating flow rigs, and high performance computing facilities.
Chassis Dynamometer
The Chassis Dynamometer performs industry standard (New European Driving Cycle, etc) and custom-designed test sequences; provides access to techniques developed within our ongoing research programmes; a full report and electronic data delivery; outstanding test-to-test repeatability; access to ECU diagnostic and calibration tools; and variable time delay emissions measurement to enhanced accuracy.
It is part of the facilities available at the Powertrain and Vehicle Research Centre.
Research equipment and facilities available at the University of Bath
