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RESEARCH, TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER and REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT
beach management
The University’s Coastal Research Group at the University is the largest such grouping in Europe and brings scientific knowledge to bear on real-life problems and to conducts research that contributes to environmentally sustainable development.
A three-year project undertaken in collaboration with Donegal County Council as part of the European Demonstration Programme in Coastal Zone Management has resulted in the launch of the book Rural beach management: a good practice guide. The book was launched by Mary Coughlin, Junior Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht at an official ceremony in Narin, County Donegal.
| Safer heart
operations Professor Jim McLaughlin, Dr Paul Maguire and Dr Stephen Morley were awarded £350,000 grant in the area of Filtered Cathodic Vacuum Arc. This is the first system of its kind Europe. This technology enables scientists to down ultra-thin, hard diamond, biomedically inert coatings on medical devices for use inside the body such heart valves, sensors and catheters, removing the risk of infection rejection by the host. This project is funded the joint research council’s equipment initiative and in particular EPSRC and DHFETE. Seagate (Irl) Ltd have also contributed significantly to the funding.
Divided society |
at the surface
A research grant from the Industrial Research and Technology Unit enabled the University’s surface scientists to explore new ways of changing the surface qualities and properties of materials, including plastics, metals and textiles.
The research team, led by Professor Norman Brown, is developing a new technology that will cut production costs in the textile and polymer industries by superseding today’s much more expensive vacuum-based plasma processing options.
“A plasma is an incandescent energy rich gas - it’s most commonly encountered as the inside of a fluorescent tube. The gas glows because of the energy being dissipated through it,” explained Professor Brown.
“Subjecting a material to a particular plasma treatment can radically alter its surface qualities – for example, making textiles or papers more resistant to soiling or wetting, more generally, for improving adhesion, or simply making a material easier to clean. Normally, if you run a plasma process in air at atmospheric pressure, the plasma will get hot. The material you’re trying to treat may then melt or burn. Our new system does not get hot. so you get all the benefits of the reactive nature of the plasma, without any of the damage potential. The engineering is much simpler and less expensive.”
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