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Commercialisation: Through government grants, institutional and private investors, a medical devices company (Vascular Flow Technologies) was founded.
Products: Spiral Laminar Flow™ Vascular Grafts for use in bypass for peripheral arterial disease and vascular access for haemodialysis.
Market / Sales: Spiral Laminar Flow™ Grafts are sold in 18 countries, with over 3000 grafts implanted (<1% estimated market size) and sales in excess of £1million.
Patient Outcomes: Published and presented clinical series show the grafts have increased survival rates leading to reduced re-interventions and reduced amputations.
Since the 1970's the influence of aerodynamics on racing car design has risen substantially, and now in the modern era it is seen as one of the most important factors in producing a race-winning car. Research carried out in the Department of Aeronautics at Imperial College London, into flow control techniques and the development of cutting-edge numerical and experimental methods has allowed specific and significant improvements in the aerodynamic design of Formula One racing cars. This has led to reduced lap times and a more competitive racing environment. These advances have also contributed to improving handling, resulting in a safer racing environment. This research has provided the Formula One industry, which has an estimated annual turnover of $2 billion, with a means to employ engineers who have the key knowledge and insights that allow them to continue to innovate in a tightly controlled engineering environment. The Chief Designer or Chief Aerodynamicist in six out of the twelve 2012 F1 teams have carried out relevant research at Imperial College London.
Using advanced mathematics and numerical modelling we have demonstrated how fundamental understanding of laminar-turbulent transitions in fluid flows can save energy. From 2008 we helped the cleantech company, Maxsys Fuel Systems Ltd, to understand and improve their technology and demonstrate to customers how it can reduce fuel use by 5-8%. Customers including Ford Motor, Dow Chemical and Findus testify to the impact from financial savings and reduced carbon emissions obtained by installing Maxsys products on industrial burners used widely in many industrial sectors including automotive, bulk chemicals and food. In 2010, Selas Heat Technology Company bought the Maxsys brand to invest in this success.
University of Huddersfield research into the optimal design of flow-handling systems has been credited with "transforming" the development strategies and global market sales of an industrial partner. Weir Valves and Control Ltd has enjoyed a 75% saving in design lead time and a 1,800% increase in annual sales - from several thousand before its collaboration to millions in 2013 - through the structured integration of researchers' computational fluid dynamics expertise in its design process. The success of this collaboration, which has been described as an exemplar of a Knowledge Transfer Partnership, has also led to further research contracts.
Multiphase flow research at Imperial has developed bespoke software code, and provided unique data for validation of commercial codes used for oil-and-gas design. This research has enabled global oil companies (e.g. Chevron) to undertake successfully the design of deep-water production systems requiring multi-billion pound capital investments. This research has also allowed SPT Group (now owned by Schlumberger), one of the largest software (OLGA) providers to the oil industry, to maintain their position as market leaders.
Research at GCU led to a novel method for backfilling pipeline tunnels providing the ability to fill tunnels three times more quickly than the traditional method resulting in a cost saving of £1.5M on a single project. This approach is now best practice at Murphy Pipelines Ltd (MPL) and features in current tenders to a value of £30M. The change in fill material lowered the carbon footprint by 5000 tonnes in a CEEQUAL award winning project, in addition, the removable fill material allows the recycling and re-use of tunnels, adding to the assets of the company and reducing costs.
This case study relates to research supported under contract by Statoil AS, one of the world's largest oil and gas companies, and is focused on two major issues of significance to that industry, namely, the mathematical modelling and analysis of (a) hydraulic two-layer gas/liquid flow in pipe lines and (b) wax formation in the interior walls of pipe lines transporting heated oil. These projects arose out of contacts between senior research staff at the Statoil Research Centre and the Nonlinear Waves group in the School of Mathematics. The theoretical research undertaken was designed to complement the major experimental programmes developed at the Statoil Research Centre and was performed in collaboration with scientists there. The work has provided Statoil with a reliable theoretical framework to contextualise and enable comparison with experimental results and to inform the design of future experimental programmes. In the larger context, the research has played a key role in advancing the capability of Statoil to design and implement more economical, energy efficient, and environmentally safe strategies for gas/oil delivery via extended pipeline networks. Statoil have stated that the benefit of access to robust flow models in the North Sea context is rapidly approaching an economic value of many billions of Norwegian kroner.
This impact is the improvement of aircraft engine efficiency by the application of profiled endwalls to turbine blades. The technology was researched by Durham University and exploited by Rolls-Royce by deploying the technology on airframes. Engines with profiled endwalls include the Trent 900 (A380 airframe), Trent 1000 (787 Airframe) and Trent XWB (A350 airframe). This (as of April 2013) totals around 2000 aircraft engine orders with profiled endwall technology applied. A saving of 1750 litres of fuel per flight from Zurich to Singapore was estimated when profiled endwalls are applied. This gives a 4400 kg reduction in carbon dioxide emissions for such a journey with a fuel cost saving of over $1100. In addition to the environmental benefit and the obvious cash savings for airlines an economic benefit for UK industry has arisen as Rolls-Royce is able to sell engines with a reduced fuel burn as well.
Coal fired power stations will be a major element of global power generation for the foreseeable future. Measurement, and hence control, of pulverised fuel flow is a vital technology for the efficient and green operation of coal fired power stations. Balancing fuel delivery and combustion stoichiometry increases boiler efficiency and reduces emissions. Research in this area carried out at Teesside University was adopted by ABB Ltd and led to the commercial development of new powder flow measurement systems (PfMaster technology) installed in power stations around the world. Quantifiable economic benefits of the installations to date amount to >£3.4 M with concomitant environmental benefits of significant reduction in CO2 and NOxemissions and solid waste disposal burdens.
Our research has been key to the development of investor confidence in an emerging UK tidal stream industry. We have contributed to the development and validation of commercial and open- source software for tidal stream system design and our expertise has been instrumental to the successful delivery of major objectives of two national industry-academia marine energy projects commissioned by the Energy Technologies Institute (ETI). Taken together, these outcomes have reduced engineering risks that had been of concern to potential investors. Investor confidence in tidal energy has been increased, as highlighted by Alstom's £65m acquisition of a turbine developer following a key outcome of the ETI ReDAPT project.