Functional Polymers and Nanocomposites

Our research is focused on the structure and functionalities of polymer-based nanocomposites, which cover chemistry synthesis and morphology control, interface characterisation, and manufacturing of polymer-based nanocomposites at large scale.

The relationships of ‘structure-properties-processing’ of thermoplastic and elastomeric nanocomposites are the main research interest. The multifunctional nanocomposites with high electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, mechanical properties, biodegradability or recyclability are emerging technologies in structural composites, energy storage systems and packaging.

News

• Webinar - Elastomers for Sustainable Energy Related Applications (1) (2), 28 April 2021
• Smart dielectric elastomers for self-healing soft robots, 27 April 2021

• Supporting a low carbon economy by sustainable rubber manufacturing

• Women in Energy
• Congratulations to Chris Ellingford, has been successfully selected as one of 300 invited participants in the Global Young Scientists Summit (GYSS) in Singapore, January 2020, and one of five nominations from the University of Warwick to attend the Summit.
• Talk on 'self-healing dielectric elastomer actuators' at PPS2019 conference at University of Bradford, UK, 17-19 July 2019.
• Host a senior delegation from China Energy https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/wmg/mediacentre/news/newsitem?id=8a17841a6bb243f2016bbc8033b9361f&tag=Nanocomposites
• Invited talk on 'Electromechanical properties of intrinsically tuned dielectric elastomers' at Silicone Elastomers and Thermoplastic Elastomers World Summits, Milan, Italy, from 27 – 28 November 2018.

• Chris Ellingford and Yutao Zhou presented posters on Energy storage Materials at Jaguar Land Rover and WMG Catapult Energy Storage Technology Conference, September 20, 2018.
  
•  
• Invitation Plenary Lecture, 'Long Life, High Sustainability through New (Nano) Materials'. SLIM 2015, Special Edition of the Shelf Life International Meeting, 21-23 October 2015, Vimercate (Milan), Italy.
• Best Poster Award at Major International Conference - Ilke Uysal Unalan a visiting PhD student, who spent the last year working on under the supervision of Dr Chaoying Wan in the International Institute for Nanocomposites Manufacturing (IINM) in WMG has won the Best Poster Award at the 8th ECNP International Conference on Nanostructured Polymers and Nanocomposites held in Dresden, Germany recently. The work, a collaboration with Dr Stefano Farris of the University of Milan, Italy describes the research ongoing in to the use of graphene in biopolymer nanocomposites for packaging and coating applications.
• Co-chaired 1st UK-China Symposium on Polymer Nanocomposites,
  1-3 December, 2014, IINM, WMG, University of Warwick
• Co-chaired 2nd China-UK Symposium on Polymer Nanocomposites, 27-30 Oct, 2015, Shanghai, China

 

Academic Staff
Dr Chaoying Wan

0000-0002-1079-5885

Google Scholar

Research

Team members

Publications