2014-2015
Using smartphones to manage ongoing health conditions
Contact: Dr. Neal Lathia, Computer Lab Ongoing health conditions are generally managed via intermittent visits to doctors, which works well for detecting gradual changes, but will not pick up rapid change. Similarly, these visits cannot detect changes to a person’s behaviour which may make them at higher risk of either relapsing and developing a new…
Investigating the market for a low-cost handheld gas chromatography system
Contact: Dr. Sohab Sarfraz & Dr. Vasant Kumar, Materials Science & Metallurgy The research team has developed a new low cost micro thermal conductivity sensor that provides significant advantages compared with existing detectors. It provides means to develop highly miniaturized gas chromatography system which give fewer false readings compared to other systems. The team is…
Developing local production of fuels for rural communities
Contact: Dr. Erwin Reisner, Department of Chemistry Mentor: Lara Allen, Centre for Global Equality In poor rural regions in developing countries energy costs are significantly higher than in developed countries. Energy is harder to obtain, and in off grid areas as much as a third of household income may be spent on fuel costs for…
Recycling lead from used lead-acid batteries
Contact: Dr. R Vasant Kumar, Department of Materials Science Mentor: Dr. Carlos Ludlow, EnVal Ltd. For over 1.2 billion people, the main electricity grid is unlikely to be available in the foreseeable future. Instead they must rely on innovative combinations of top-down and bottom-up solutions to generate power. Regions commonly located in poor rural areas…
Investigating cost effective methods for testing water quality in the
Contact: Hajime Shinohara, Mike Coto, Winton Programme for the Physics of Sustainability Mentor: Keith Virgo, VillageWays Access to clean drinking water even in the 21st century is still an urgent requirement in many parts of the world, with approximately 2,000 people dying everyday due to water related diseases. The UN’s new set of Sustainable Development…
Developing the first diagnostic test for neurodegenerative diseases before the
Contact: Professor David Klenerman FRS, Dr. Steven F. Lee, Dr. Mathew H. Horrocks, Chemistry Diagnosis of neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s Disease and Alzheimer’s Disease can only be done definitively by post-mortem analysis of the brain. Since the brain compensates for damage, clinical symptoms will typically only appear when as much as 70% of the brain…
Finding the best market for protein-based microcapsules
Contact: Dr. Tuomas Knowles, Xizhou Liu, Chemistry The research team led by Dr Knowles has developed substantial expertise in understanding and controlling the structures formed by functional protein molecules, enabling them to create nanoscale filaments and complete microcapsules formed solely from proteins. While microcapsules are already used widely in a range of applications, from cosmetics…
Commercialising a new approach to nanoscale imaging of surfaces
Contact: Dr. David Ward, Physics Mentor: Dr. Julian White The research team at the Cavendish has collaborated closely with Dr. Paul Dastoor’s team in Newcastle, Australia over the past 10 years. As a result, working concept microscopes based on their new technique have been constructed in both Cambridge and Newcastle. The designs are currently being…
Investigating the need for a compact ultra-low-temperature cooler in quantum
Contact: Dr. Malte Grosche, Dr. Michael Sutherland, Physics Mentor: Adrian Swinburne Access to low temperatures close to absolute zero is needed for a range of applications in sensing, for example to cool transition edge detectors in particle physics experiments or infrared detectors in astrophysics, as well as in emerging quantum technologies such as quantum communications…