At SMASH (Sustainable Materials at Sheffield), our mission is to drive new advances in the development of materials and processes for sustainable infrastructure, environmental remediation, waste management, and clean energy. This will enable industry to meet the needs of our society both sustainably and cost-effectively, improving the well-being of our society and environment.

The development of better, cheaper, and more sustainable materials is often impeded by a lack of understanding of the fundamental interactions occurring which dictate material performance, and a lack of understanding of processes and systems required to promote resource efficiency, reuse, and upcycling. Examples include materials for sustainable infrastructure, safe disposal of radioactive waste, pollutant recovery and energy production.

Improved design and optimisation of these requires insight into the fundamental interactions underpinning physical property development, including reaction mechanisms and kinetics, surface chemistry, and phase and structural evolution occurring during material synthesis, processing and use, as well as a sector-wide understanding of resource production and consumption, decarbonisation strategies, and cross-sector interactions affecting this.

We use cutting-edge characterisation and modelling approaches to determine the fundamental interactions occurring during material synthesis, processing and use, and to identify and match waste and resource flows and identify new decarbonisation strategies. We use this knowledge to design novel materials and processes to build a sustainable future, and promote a circular economy.