PhD Opportunities
Read about the varied and exciting opportunities to study a PhD in the School of Engineering.
Academic staff across the School of Engineering are always working on a wide variety of research projects, and you can become part of this groundbreaking work by studying a PhD with us.
The projects below are not an exhaustive list. It may be possible to co-create a project with an academic. If you are interested in this please contact the relevant academic directly. You can find a list of the research groups and staff aligned to each group on our Engineering Research page.
Please check back on these pages regularly as new opportunities will be added as they become available.
PhD opportunities
Limited funded home studentship opportunities available for 2025/2026 entry: Each award will include 100% fees and a minimum tax-free annual living allowance of £20,780 (2025/26 UKRI rate). Additional project costs will also be provided for consumables, travel, etc. For further information please contact: soe.pgr@newcastle.ac.uk
Chemical Engineering
- Development of a novel biocomposite-integrated thin film reactor for the intensification of biosolar energy-driven gas clean-up processing - Prof. Kamelia Boodhoo
- Investigation of hydrogen embrittlement of steels for the hydrogen transport energy future - Dr Alasdair Charles
- Bioelectronic materials - Prof. Mark Geoghegan
- Using particle simulations to optimise battery structures - Dr Colin Hare
- Converting CO2 into Useful Products using Non-thermal Plasmas - Prof. Adam Harvey
- Techno-economic assessment of renewable hydrogen production via chemical-looping reforming of biogas - Dr Wenting Hu
- New Nuclear, the solution to Net Zero? - Miss Sharon Joyce
- Intensified thermal management of electronic devices - Dr Richard Law
- FunPrint: Recipes for Functional 3D Printable resins for heat transfer - Dr Jonathan McDonough
- Direct air capture of carbon dioxide; new materials and processes - Dr Greg Mutch
- Advanced biomaterials for future-proof pharmaceutical formulations - Dr Katarina Novakovic
- High Entropy Alloys - Dr Adrian Oila
- Innovative direct air capture and utilisation system for the production of renewable fuel - Dr Eni Oko
- Developing a Suite of Models for Integrated Dynamic Simulation of Chemical Process Plant (Digital Twins) - Dr Christopher O'Malley
- Scaling up next generation immortal catalysts for the chemical industry - Dr Evangelos Papaioannou
- Development of mixed ionic-electronic oxide ceramics for energy conversion and storage devices - Dr Stevin Pramana
- Integrating 2D Materials into 1D Systems for Wearable Applications - Dr Shayan Seyedin
- Graphene composites from recycling lithium-ion batteries - Prof. Lidija Siller
- Technoeconomic and environmental investigation of novel pathways to recover metals from lithium ion batteries - Dr Sharon Velasquez Orta
- Mobile gasification unit for pharmaceutical waste - Dr Marija Vicevic
- Stoichiometric and kinetic modelling of multiple chemical reactions from labratory data - Dr Mark Willis
- Real-time optimisation control of batch processes - Dr Jie Zhang
- Miniaturized fluidized bed bioreactor for bioprocessing - Dr Vladimir Zivkovic
- Understanding the impacy of ordering and modulation in energy conversion oxide ceramics - Dr Stevin Pramana
- Novel Hydrogen Energy Materials - Dr Adrian Oila
- Ceramic 3D printing for reactor engineering - Dr Jonathan McDonough
- Biochar-amended soil for resilient agriculture, soil health and climate change mitigation - an integrated assessment - Dr Anjali Jayakumar
- Hydrogen generation from wastewater, solid waste, treatment - Dr Sharon Velasquez-Orta
- Next-generation Lateral Flow Assays for Cardiovascular Disease Diagnosis - Dr Jake McClements
- 3D Printed Thermal Energy Stores - Dr Richard Law
- Photocatalytic Conversion of Carbon Dioxide to Renewable Chemicals and Fuels - Dr Fernando Russo-Abegao
- Understanding the changing nature of electrolyser catalysts - Prof. Marc Secanell
- Fuel cells for life – Developing computational tools for assessing fuel cell degradation - Prof. Marc Secanell
- Energy dense supercapacitors using novel electrode materials - Dr Shayan Seyedin
Civil and Geospatial Engineering
- Modelling urban development to satisfy the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) - Prof. Stuart Barr
- Alignment consistency, forward visibility and road safety on undesigned roads - Mr Roger Bird
- Concrete under fire - Dr Colin Davie
- Modelling Community Resilience to Natural Hazards using an Agent-Based Approach - Dr Sarah Dunn
- The Concrete Jungle: what impact is creeping urbanisation having on flood risk and sewer overflows? - Dr Alistair Ford
- New early warning and forecasting systems for unprecedented rainstorms - Prof. Hayley Fowler
- Achieving Material Efficiency in Modern Floor Design based on Human Acceptability - Dr Haoyu Huang
- The intersection between industrialised construction, digitilisation and automation: evaluating successes, failures, and everything in between - Prof. Mohamad Kassem
- Nature-based solution to mitigate subsidence hazards - Dr Bruna Lopes
- Autonomous reality capture: from 3D data acquisition to digital twin creation - Prof. Jonathan Mills
- Enhanced particle characterisation technique to enable zero-emission solutions - Dr Sadegh Nadimi Shahraki
- Optimzing plant microbiome for pollution control - Dr Lucia Rodriguez Freire
- Investigation of thermal properties of soils for offshore wind power cable design - Dr Mohamed Rouainia
- Energy-SuDS: The potential of urban Green Infrastructure for decarbonising heating and cooling - Dr Ross Stirling
- Biological self-healing for advanced and sustainable masonry materials - Dr Magdalini Theodoridou
- Monitoring the Impact of Green Infrastructure using Citizen Science in Urban and Rural Catchments - Dr Claire Walsh
- Quantifying the impacts and consequences of future climate, super-events - Prof. Sean Wilkinson
- Development of Cognitive Digital Twin for Predictive Maintenance of Building Facilities - Dr Xiang Xie
- Modelling Human-Structure Dynamic Interaction on Lightweight Structures - Dr Sigong Zhang
- International supply chain resilience to climate change - Prof. Richard Dawson
- Resilient Levees: The impact of changing climate on the performance of UK Flood Embankments - Dr Ross Stirling
- Water quality monitory and forecasting through integration of geopsatial and remotely sensed data - Dr Maria-Valasia Peppa
- New design methodologies for open pit mines of reduced carbon footprint for the extraction of green economy metals - Prof. Stefano Utili
- Future-Proofing Urban Water Supply: Antifragile Design for Flood Resilience - Dr Manuel Herrera
- Weighing the Antarctic Ice Sheet: using GNSS observations of solid Earth deformation to understand contributions to sea level change - Prof. Peter Clarke
- An agent-based cellular automata model for analysing climate change risks to rapidly growing cities - Prof. Stuart Barr
- Integrated Food and Water Planning for the Blue Nile Basin - Prof. Anna Murgatroyd
- A generative AI flood vulnerability model for a changing world - Prof. Richard Dawson
- Integrating BIM and Drone for Automated Inspection of Utility Tunnels - Dr Xiang Xie
- Accessible and resilient transport systems for a net-zero transition - Dr Craig Robson
- Adaptation strategies, environmental impacts, raw materials and costs of infrastructure systems - Prof. Oliver Heidrich
Electrical and Electronic Engineering
- Integrating Electrical Machines into Wave Energy Converters - Dr Nick Baker
- Enabling intermittent computing for the Internet of Things (IoT) - Dr Domenico Balsamo
- Tree-partitioning to prevent cascading wide-area blackouts - Prof. Janusz Bialek
- Next-Generation Spiking Neural Networks Architectures and Machine Learning Algorithms - Prof. Daniel Coca
- Modular, Reconfigurable and Adaptive Power Converters for Future Electric Vehicles Charging Infrastructure - Dr Mohamed Dahidah
- Biomedical Neuroprosthetics - Prof. Patrick Degenaar
- A data-driven uncertainty-aware investment planning model in low-inertia power systems under security constraints - Dr Shahab Dehghan
- Self-Optimised Power Converters for Grid-Scale Battery Energy Storage Systems - Dr Mohammed Elgendy
- Unified Control of Hybrid Energy Smart Grids using Graph Theory, Automata and Multi Agent Systems - Prof. Damian Giaouris
- Design of Non-Binary Error-Correcting Codes for Free-Space Optical Communications - Dr Martin Johnston
- Error-control coding in DNA sequences - Dr Stephane Le Goff
- Low energy passive acoustic detection of marine mammals - Prof. Jeff Neasham
- Silicon Carbide MOSFETs - Prof. Anthony O'Neill
- Advanced cooling techniques for photovoltaic systems - Prof. Volker Pickert
- Segmented Outer Rotor Synchronous Reluctance Generator with Integrated Electronics for Renewable Generation - Dr Andrew Smith
- AIoT based structural health monitoring and diagnostics - Prof. Gui Yan Tian
- Modelling of High Frequency Power Circuits - Prof. Nicholas Wright
- Explainable AI for Digital Healthcare - Dr Jingjing Zhang
- Bionic Vision - Prof. Patrick Degenaar
- Federated Multi-task Learning under Dynamic Sensor Networks for Edge-enabled Sleep Management - Dr Jingjing Zhang
Mechanical Engineering and Marine Technology
- Investigation of convective and conjugate heat transfer for different jet configurations using Direct Numerical Simulations - Dr Umair Ahmed
- Thermodiffusively-unstable lean premixed hydrogen flames - Dr Andy Aspden
- Predicting whipping induced failure in a cyclic progressive collapse analysis of ship structures - Dr Simon Benson
- Antibacterial scaffolds - Dr Oana Bretcanu
- Numerical investigation of conjugate heat transfer during interaction of high-Hydrogen content flames with cooled walls using Direct Numerical Simulations - Prof. Nilanjan Chakraborty
- Engineering theraputic immune-biomaterials for tissue engineering applications - Dr Ana Ferreira-Duarte
- Sensorimotor Augmentation through Supernumerary Robotics Limbs - Prof. Domenico Formica
- Surface Acoustic Wave Sensors - Dr Barry Gallacher
- Human factors for digital transport operations - Dr David Golightly
- Real-time prediction of in-service ship seakeeping - Dr Maryam Haroutunian
- Autonomous Mobile Robots - Dr John Hedley
- AI-based Rigid-Flexible Coupled Dynamic Performance Analysis of Floating Offshore Wind Turbines - Prof. Zhiqiang Hu
- 3D Vibration Assisted Micro Machining of Sculptured Surfaces on Hard-to-machine Materials - Dr Dehong Huo
- Aeroelasticity of wind turbines under extreme weather condition - Dr Mohsen Lahooti
- Development of bioinks to bioprinit an in vitro model of the gut mucosa - Dr Priscila Melo
- Microgrids in Maritime Applications - Dr Rosemary Norman
- A systems approach to urban mobility: The role of micro-mobility in achieving net zero - Prof. Roberto Palacin
- Phenomenological Modelling of Nature-Inspired Energy Extraction - Dr Narakorn Srinil
- A new shipbuilding strategy - Dr Paul Stott
- Design and Operation of Autonomous Wind Powered Ships - Dr David Trodden
- Risk and Consequence Analysis of CO2 Transportation - Dr Benjamin Wetenhall
- Project CHLOE: Sustainable energy reduction through innovative aerodynamic flow control in the Cloud - Dr Richard Whalley
- Investigation the gut immune response in IBD related to mucus integrity and permeability using microfluidics - Dr Priscila Melo
- Prediction of dynamic behaviour of lightweight alloys in extreme conditions for sustainable mobility - Dr Yuan Xu
- DEPTHS: Data-driven Evaluation of Pollutant Dispersion in Urban Areas by Detached Eddy Simulation and Experiment - Dr Amir Fard