Professor Philippa A.S Reed MA, PhD, FIMMM, CEng, FHEA
Professor of Structural Materials, Head of Mechanical Engineering Department
Professor Philippa A.S. Reed is Professor of Structural Materials within Engineering and Physical Sciences at the University of Southampton.
Philippa Reed graduated with a BA (Hons) in Materials Science and Metallurgy from Cambridge University in 1985, where she also obtained her Ph.D. on brittle failure in nuclear pressure vessel steels sponsored by Rolls Royce and Associates. Subsequent post-doctoral research at Cambridge investigated fatigue failure of aerospace turbine disc materials and was supported by Rolls Royce and DRA Aerospace, Farnborough. She then spent six months at Oxford University as a SERC Postdoctoral Research Fellow before joining the Department of Engineering Materials in 1992 as a lecturer. She was elected to the Structural Materials Peer Review College of EPSRC in 1997, gaining CEng status in 1998, a Senior Lectureship in 1999, a Readership in 2002, Professorial status in 2006 and was elected a Fellow of the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining in 2009. She is currently Head of the Mechanical Engineering Academic Unit and Director of the EngD in Transport and the Environment.
Her research interests centre on investigating micromechanisms of failure in engine materials, power generation turbine materials, hybrid pressure vessels and welds. This includes application of adaptive numerical modelling approaches to failure and manufacturing problems; data mining and materials data conservation; assessment and modelling of anomalous crack growth behaviour in a range of materials systems/architectures. A particular focus is the effects of external service conditions such as temperature, environment (e.g. oxidation and hydrogen embrittlement) and complex loading on failure processes. These interests are reflected in her recent and ongoing research collaborations with E.ON, Loughborough University, Imperial College, Rolls Royce, dstl, Alstom, TWI and Luxfer Gas Cylinders.