Profile

I’m originally from Tehran, Iran. Here is a picture of my neighbourhood back in Tehran:D

I moved to the UK 8 years ago to study at the University of Surrey. I currently live in Cambridge, completing my Engineering Doctorate in Micro and Nano Materials and Technologies. I’m currently 25 years old.

Some of my favourite activities are going to the gym, dancing, playing the piano, skiing, and making stuff 🙂 My favourite TV series is FRIENDS, I have lost count on how many times I have watched. I love travelling and learning about other cultures and try new things.

Composite materials are very strong and light-weight, they can be as strong or even stronger than metals. But many industries require holes in the component for joining purposes etc. They usually do that for metals by simply drilling them, but for composites, if you drill them you cut the load-bearing fibres which makes the composite weaker. So if this problem is solved, industries can use more composites and fewer metal components, which will make their products much lighter and also stronger. for example, if the cars and planes are lighter they will use less fuel, which is both economically and environmentally better. So this is where my project comes in.

Fancy version: I work on the perforation of thermoplastic composite materials. Holes are required in most of the components for joining purposes or noise attenuation in the aerospace and automotive industries. Industries use composite materials because they’re very light-weight but also very strong. at the moment the holes can be made by drilling or laser, however, they have their own disadvantages (decreasing the strength of the composite). Hence, I have found a new way of making holes without damaging the integrity of the composite so we can still have a similar strength as if we don’t have any holes in them.

This is the image of the tool I have designed, it can make 100, 2mm diameter holes in composite…

This one is a picture that I take by using the light microscope from the microstructure of my perforated composite (you can see the different layers, and each layer has fibres 🙂 )

Here is a picture of my computer model…

Thermoplastic composites can be heated up which will make them soft (opposite thermoset composites which when you heat them up, they will burn), after they get soft I have designed a rig which would create holes on the composite by displacing the fibres and creating a hole. Then I test the coupons and compare them with the coupons which have been drilled. Results show that perforated composite has a higher strength than the drilled composite. I also use finite element modelling to model the microstructure of the perforated composite and I try to validate my model by using the mechanical testing results. My project has applications in many industries such as aerospace, automotive, and any other industry that needs composite materials with holes on them. The model can also save so much time and money for the industries, so instead of testing the parts in real life, they can use the computer model and see if the results they get are good enough for them.

Simple version: I stab thermoplastic composite materials when they are hot (400°C) and make holes on them by pushing the fibres away, then I test them to prove that my technique is better than drilling, then I take that information and put it in a computer model program to show that the model also agrees with me 😀

I love my job because everyday can be different so I don’t get bored. I either spend my days in the lab trying to come up with ideas to improve the quality of my perforations or trying to understand why my computer model doesn’t work 😀 as a researcher I spend a lot of time learning about related topics and see if I can use those on my project. Also, I spend time on writing reports, article papers (no guarantee that they will get accepted :)), conference papers, networking, and etc.

I’m also a STEM ambassador and at least every couple of months I’ll go to different schools to do some STEM activities, i.e. Chocolate Welding!  kids love it. Sometimes school children come to our work (TWI) and we build and program robots with them.

I would love to help the schools which don’t have the necessary or sufficient pieces of equipment for their students to carry out STEM activities. Sometimes it’s easy to forget about other people, there are many bright children all over the world who might not have access to necessary things that can help them to see all the options they have for their future careers. I know £500 is not enough to help all of them, but it’s good to start from somewhere.