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ProfessorMatthew Santer

Professor of Aerospace Structures

Department of Aeronautics - Faculty of Engineering

RESEARCH

My group carries out research in a number of fields which are linked by the overarching goal to develop and understand novel ways to achieve adaptive, compliant, and multifunctional materials, structures, and systems. These have wide ranging potential applications, but I have a particular focus on morphing, deployable and adaptive aerospace concepts.

Current research themes directed towards this goal are:

Design optimization — in particular of tightly-coupled, complex, multi-disciplinary (aero-thermo-structural) problems;
Adaptive structures for flow control — exploiting structural compliance to achieve significant drag reductions in aerospace systems;
Materials for adaptive structures — including time-dependence and high-strain behaviour;
Bistability and multistability — incorporating both material and structural effects