Our previous platform grant (PG) was aimed at developing the residual stress and imaging unit to extend our measurement and imaging capability beyond existing time and length scales and to become a world leading centre. This has now been achieved. The international impact of our research was recognised by the award of the most prestigious prize in the HE sector, the Queen's Anniversary Prize for Higher and Further Education (2012-2014) for "New Techniques in X-Ray Imaging of Materials Critical for Power, Transport and Other Key Industries." Further we have just been awarded £18m by HEFCE and £4.2m by EPSRC for capital investment to achieve a step jump in our instrumentation. This PG renewal will enable us to invent new, and develop emerging, techniques to see in 3D events that have never been seen this way before. This will maximise the benefit of the capital investment bringing together X-ray and electron imaging to examine materials behaviour under demanding environments. Many of the instruments will be completely new. The PG will enable us to have a multidisciplinary team of mathematicians, detector experts, instrument developers and applications materials scientists to explore new regimes and undertake new science. For example, normally X-rays pictures are collected in black in white (just like the x-ray radiographs in hospitals). We have developed a detector that can see in 'colour'. This will enable us to 'see' the composition of the objects in our 3D images. Normally X-ray imaging can see different phases but not the grains making up the materials. Recently together with scientists in Denmark and at the European Synchrotron in Grenoble we have developed a method to see the different grains inside a sample non-destructively. Currently this must be done using synchrotron X-rays at large facilities - we will develop a laboratory system capable of this. Finally we have recently been awarded an 5 x EPSRC Centres for Doctoral Training and we will train these PhD students in the imaging techniques we develop through the PG.

The storage of CO2 in deep geological formations is one of the chief technological means of reducing anthropogenic emissions of CO2 to the atmosphere. The process requires capturing CO2 at source (e.g. coal-fired power plants), transporting CO2 to the injection site, and pumping liquefied CO2 into kilometre deep, porous reservoirs that are typically initially saturated in saline water or previously contained oil or gas. Initially, buoyant CO2 tends to rise through the porous reservoir until it is trapped by an impermeable horizon, in the same way that oil or gas has been trapped over millennia. Subsequently, buoyant CO2 may be more securely trapped by dissolving CO2 into water (carbonated water is more dense than non-carbonated water and will sink), or by capillary forces acting to hold the CO2 in the small confines of the pore space. Any risk of buoyant CO2 migrating through the overburden is therefore reduced by these trapping processes. Constraining the rates of dissolution and capillary trapping in realistic geological overburden is a key component of strategies to quantify and reduce the risks of leakage. The UK is geologically well placed to implement offshore CO2 storage, with many potential reservoirs in the North Sea. This proposal will improve our understanding of the risks of leakage through the overburden by quantifying trapping rates in faults and heterogeneous strata typical of the overburden of North Sea reservoirs, and by quantifying our ability to seismically detect any CO2 in the overburden. CO2 is less viscous than water and will finger along more permeable layers. Sedimentary strata exhibit large variations in permeability on all scales that will substantially increase the rates at which CO2 dissolves in the formation waters. The analysis, while general in scope and resultant techniques, is applied to the Goldeneye field, a target for CO2 storage and a candidate for the Government's CCS commercialisation competition. Our approach is to geologically characterise the relevant geological heterogeneity within the overburden, and to map the structure and propensity for fluid flow within faults in that locality. Drill core provides samples of rock (5x20 cm) that can then be interrogated in the laboratory. We will directly image, at conditions typical of the overburden, the rates of fluid flow, dissolution, and capillary trapping both at the scale of individual pores within the rock (microns) and over the length of the core (centimetres). Geochemical analysis of the fluids will allow us to measure in situ dissolution and precipitation rates in our core flooding experiments. In order to determine how rates of flow and trapping may be applied at the scale of the reservoir and overburden the results must be interpreted in light of flow through 1-100 centimetre scale geological heterogeneities and along faults. To assess the impact of heterogeneities on the rates of trapping we will construct simplified models of flow along predominantly layered strata, or along cross-cutting faults, along with laboratory analogue experiments in which we can optically assess trapping rates and thereby provide a firm benchmark for our predictions. Finally, at larger scales, we will image flow up chimney structures in existing CO2 experiments (eg Sleipner in the North Sea) and thus provide quantitative estimates of our ability to seismically resolve leakage pathways in the storage overburden. Our proposal will develop tools needed to geologically characterise the North Sea overburden, provide quantitative estimates of trapping rates in geologically complex overburden and fault complexes, and demonstrate the ability to seismically resolve fluid flow pathways. To date geological CO2 storage has been demonstrated at relatively safe storage sites. This work would greatly expand the potential for geological CO2 storage by quantifying the potential risks associated with leakage in more geologically complex storage sites.

The electrode, and the electrolyte-electrode interface, plays a critical role in the performance of all cells. In Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFCs) the microstructures of the porous composite anode and cathode are particularly critical as they determine the electrochemical, electrical, mechanical and transport properties of the electrode, and of current distribution to/from the electrode/electrolyte interface. Current state of the art SOFC electrodes rely on a largely empirical understanding to establish the electrode microstructure, and its influence on key performance characteristics, including long term durability. But recent work by the proposers has established a new suite of tools and techniques that offer the prospect of moving towards a design led approach to manufacture of improved electrodes, based on our ability to image, model, simulate and fabricate new electrode structures with controlled properties. This proposal seeks to develop and demonstrate this, further improving and validating our analysis and modelling tools, using these design optimum structures, fabricating these using three novel processing techniques established by the proposers, and then measuring device performance to feedback into the design process.

Space is fundamental to physical and perceptual reality, but physical and perceptual space are not the same. Perceptual space is created by the brain and plastically formed by the sensorimotor interactions of our body with physical reality. In the digital future, these two spaces are joined by novel spaces experienced in virtual (VR) and extended (XR) reality as these new technologies massively expand in work, pleasure and social interaction. The first aim of PLACES is to understand how sensorimotor interactions in virtual environments shape perceptual space and how this interacts with virtual (VS) and real (RS) space. Secondly, deep and improved knowledge of perceptual mechanisms is essential for the future development of VR as a key digital technology for Europe. To work for the people, VR and XR need to be effective, comfortable, transparent and fair. These aims can only be reached by understanding and accounting for perception in a human-centric manner. Based on these premises, the highly interdisciplinary consortium of PLACES pursues five key objectives: to (1) use cutting-edge VR technology to advance scientific knowledge of the mechanisms of sensorimotor perception and plasticity; (2) use our understanding about spatial perception, gaze control and sensorimotor plasticity to advance VR technology and enhance VR applicability; (3) predict action intentions of users in VR and employ these predictions in advanced user interfaces; (4) understand how long-term usage of VR interacts with perceptual and sensorimotor states in real space and in virtual space; and (5) translate research findings into applied fields in vision aids and social telepresence. Reaching these objectives will put the EU on the map as a leader in perception research and its application in VR. PLACES aims for new frontiers in perception science and its applications and for a significant impact on the people of the EU.

Development of materials has underpinned human and societal development for millennia, and such development has accelerated as time has passed. From the discovery of bronze through to wrought iron and then steel and polymers the visible world around has been shaped and built, relying on the intrinsic properties of these materials. In the 20th century a new materials revolution took place leading to the development of materials that are designed for their electronic (e.g. silicon), optical (e.g. glass fibres) or magnetic (e.g. recording media) properties. These materials changed the way we interact with the world and each other through the development of microelectronics (computers), the world wide web (optical fibre communications) and associated technologies. Now, two decades into the 21st century, we need to add more functionality into materials at ever smaller length-scales in order to develop ever more capable technologies with increased energy efficiency and at an acceptable manufacturing cost. In pursuing this ambition, we now find ourselves at the limit of current materials-processing technologies with an often complex interdependence of materials properties (e.g. thermal and electronic). As we approach length scales below 100s of nanometres, we have to harness quantum effects to address the need for devices with a step-change in performance and energy-efficiency, and ultimately for some cases the fundamental limitations of quantum mechanics. In this programme grant we will develop a new approach to delivering material functionalisation based on Nanoscale Advanced Materials Engineering (NAME). This approach will enable the modification of materials through the addition (doping) of single atoms through to many trillions with extreme accuracy (~20 nanometres, less than 1000th the thickness of a human hair). This will allow us to functionalise specifically a material in a highly localised location leaving the remaining material available for modification. For the first time this will offer a new approach to addressing the limitations faced by existing approaches in technology development at these small length scales. We will be able to change independently a material's electronic and thermal properties on the nanoscale, and use the precise doping to deliver enhanced optical functionality in engineered materials. Ambitiously, we aim to use NAME to control material properties which have to date proven difficult to exploit fully (e.g. quantum mechanical spin), and to control states of systems predicted but not yet directly experimentally observed or controlled (e.g. topological surface states). Ultimately, we may provide a viable route to the development of quantum bits (qubits) in materials which are a pre-requisite for the realisation of a quantum computer. Such a technology, albeit long term, is predicted to be the next great technological revolution NAME is a collaborative programme between internationally leading UK researchers from the Universities of Manchester, Leeds and Imperial College London, who together lead the Henry Royce Institute research theme identified as 'Atoms to Devices'. Together they have already established the required substantial infrastructure and state-of-the-art facilities through investment from Royce, the EPSRC and each University partner. The programme grant will provide the resource to assemble the wider team required to deliver the NAME vision, including UK academics, research fellows, and postdoctoral researchers, supported by PhD students funded by the Universities. The programme grant also has significant support from wider academia and industry based both within the UK and internationally.