Dr Winifred Obande - University of Edinburgh

Research Fellowships 2025

Engineers have made significant strides in developing lightweight materials by bonding high-strength, ultralight carbon fibres with polymer resins to create advanced composites. This has enabled us to replace metals in structural applications at a fraction of the weight, revolutionising the aerospace, automotive, and renewable energy sectors. The prospects for carbon fibres will continue to evolve as more industries adopt them. To fully unlock this potential, we must address the critical energy and environmental challenges posed by high disposal rates – 48 kilotonnes annually, or 30% of our production capacity. We must prioritise resource efficiency to drive sustainability in the composites industry. Current recycling methods convert long, continuous fibres into shorter, randomly oriented ones, reducing their performance and value. Fibre alignment advances enable some recovery. Our reliance on single-purpose alignment fluids leads to high energy consumption, with 206 watt-hours per gram (97% of the total process energy) used for pumping and drying to prevent fibre surface contamination from residual fluid.

At current rates, aligning 48 kilotonnes of fibre waste consumes enough energy to power 2,827 UK households. Current alignment fluids can only achieve high degrees of alignment at low areal weights (<60 grams per square metre) and throughputs (<100 metres per hour). Dr Obande will address this by developing a new fluid that can yield higher areal-weight aligned fibre products. Aligned fibres will be fixed in place by rapidly solidifying the fluid into a coating, eliminating the energy-intensive drying step. I will develop a scalable alignment system to apply the fluid, with targeted optimisation efforts to achieve a balance between alignment, throughput and energy demand. A scalable fibre surface treatment method will also be developed to address issues with waste fibre surface quality. 
 
Through this Fellowship, Dr Obande will drive the development of sustainable, lightweight materials, taking pivotal steps toward global leadership in the field.

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