Engineering Design for Net Zero

OUR MISSION:

To create new knowledge and capabilities to accelerate the design of next-generation products.

Importance

Achieving Net Zero will require significant changes to sustainable transport and propulsion systems. Engineering design is critical to deliver this transformation, enabling the development of innovative, sustainable solutions that minimize environmental impact while ensuring performance and reliability. Our research is dedicated to advancing design, simulation, and optimisation methods to create products that support a carbon-neutral future. By integrating cutting-edge methodologies with a focus on sustainability, we aim to drive the engineering advancements necessary to meet global Net Zero goals.

RESEARCH FOCUS

Design Methods & Systems

Innovative techniques such as bio-inspired design and data-driven design to create efficient, high-performance engineering solutions.

Design for ‘X’

Tailored simulation and design approaches to tackle specific requirements and challenges, such as ease of manufacture or structural integrity under extreme scenarios

Modelling & Optimisation

Intelligent and efficient multiscale and multiphysics simulation frameworks for design optimisation

Technology Impact Forecasting

Evaluating how emerging technologies reshape product design processes and solutions, enabling forward-thinking strategies for innovation and implementation.

FUNDING PORTFOLIO:

We have led or participated in multiple EPSRC, BBSRC, and ATI-funded projects—including programme grants, fellowships, hubs, and network initiatives—totalling over £45 million in overall project value.

Our current live funding portfolio includes:

Programme grants: RIED (EPRSC, 2021, Lead: QUB, Total value = £7.3M); REMODEL (EPSRC, 2025, Lead: Swansea, QUB value:£1M, Total value = £6.3M)
Prosperity Partnerships: VECTA (EPSRC, 2025, Lead: Edinburgh/RR, QUB value:£1.3M, Total value = £16.5M)
Hubs: Advanced Metrology Hub (EPSRC, 2024, Lead: Huddersfield, QUB Value = £560k, Total value = £24.3M)
Individual Fellowships: DECIDE for Net Zero (EPSRC, 2024, Lead: QUB, Total value = £1.9M)
Network Plus: Digital Design Network Plus (EPSRC, 2025, Lead: QUB, Total value = £1.7M), RiSC+ (BBSRC, 2024, Lead: QUB, Total value = £6.4M)
ATI projects: TARGET-H2 (2024, QUB value = £560k), TARGET-H2 (2025, QUB value = £500k), Digital Design Transformation (2025, QUB value = £2.2M),
UKRI: Project STARLITE (2025, £250k) - developing MEMS sensors for aviation, space and biomedical applications
Commercially funded research with BVI Medical: Project VELVET (2025, £720k) - understanding the complex fluid dynamics during eye surgery to improve engineering designs and surgical outcomes
In addition, at any time, we have multiple industry awards and have 10-20 active industry-funded PhDs.

Overview

In partnership with leading UK companies (e.g. Rolls-Royce), we are developing design & computational modelling capabilities to support mechanical excellence, enabling early, rapid and ‘in context’ structural design. We lead a £7.4m EPSRC UK-wide consortium, Re-Imagining Engineering Design: Growing Radical Cyber-Physical-Socio Phenotypes. Our goal is to transform design engineering through interoperable cyber-physical-social services.

The team includes an EPSRC Fellowship, which is investigating novel ways of understanding constraints in Engineering Design. The Fellowship project (£1.9m), entitled “Dealing with Evolving Constraints in Design Systems for Net Zero (DECIDE for Net Zero) is focused on net zero flight.

The team ensures the pull-through of their lower TRL research by working on multiple industry and ATI-funded projects. For example, technology and concepts emerging from RIED are being used in the ATI projects Digital Design Transformation and Target-H2 to investigate concepts for next-generation flight and propulsion. This ensures their research spans TRLs 1-6.

The Design team is championing digital design in the UK and leads the EPSRC Digital Design Network Plus. The network is bringing together researchers and industry experts around a sequence of challenges to help accelerate the drive towards digital design. It explores how we can do things better, faster, and with less.

RIED

Re-Imagining Design Engineering.

The fundamental goal of this proposal is to Re-Imagine Design Engineering so that new ideas and concepts are generated rapidly, and where both the product and its associated manufacturing system (including its supply chain and people) are designed concurrently and fully tailored to each other. Taking inspiration from nature RIED is a concept generator that can very rapidly create a range of concepts for complex engineering structures such as aircraft wings.

Key People: