DrChris Tighe

The core research themes of the group are as follows:

Supercritical fluids:

Focus is currently on the study of environments containing supercritical water (PC = 221 bar, TC = 374 oC) or carbon dioxide (PC = 74 bar, TC = 31 oC):

- Supercritical CO2 found in oil and gas wells and in transport and subsequent sequestration of CO2 deep underground, often together with toxic and/or corrosive contaminants e.g. hydrogen sulphide (H2S) and H2O.

- Supercritical H2O used as a working fluid in the power generation industry: nuclear and super- or ultra-critical power stations burning hydrocarbon-based fuels.

- Supercritical H2O as a reaction medium for oxidation, hydrolysis and/or dehydration e.g. the formation of the oxides and hydroxides of metals from their water-soluble salts.

Reaction engineering & catalysis:

- Development of a patented confined jet, supercritical water reactor (with Darr group, Dept. Chemistry, UCL) for the continuous manufacture of inorganic nanoparticles.

- Chemical synthesis in high pressure environments.

- Fundamental mechanistic studies of catalytic processes.

Design and scale-up methodologies:

- Measurement of transport phenomena in high pressure reacting environments.

- Development of pilot plant and scale-up of confined jet reactor for the continuous production of inorganic nanoparticles (with Darr group, Dept. of Chemistry, UCL).

- Pressure equipment design and fabrication.

Materials performance:

In-situ characterisation of engineering materials in high pressure, high temperature (HPHT) environments, approached from the fundamental perspective of materials science:

- Polymers & composites: thermoplastics, elastomers, thermosets.

- Ceramics, refractories and cements.

- Swelling and plasticisation, viscoelastic properties of polymers.

- Fluid sealing in HPHT environments.

- Chemical reaction and degradation.

- In-situ Raman and FTIR studies.