Plenary speakers Day 2

‘The Wonderful World of Titanium Alloys in Aero-Engines’

Kate Fox obtained her first degree in Materials Science at Birmingham University and continued there to study for a PhD investigating Titanium SiC metal matrix composites.  After completing her PhD she worked at an automotive component  research centre for three years and then joined Rolls-Royce in Derby in 1997 working in the Materials Function.  She has stayed in a Materials role, working on aero-engine safety-critical components (titanium discs and blisks) and becoming a Technical Specialist in this field.  Kate has also recently been appointed as Associate Fellow in Light Alloys.

Kate has been an Industrial supervisor for a number of Eng D and PhD students, a role she very much enjoys.  She values working with students and academic staff to enhance understanding of materials behaviour and has co-authored many conference and journal publications on various aspects of titanium alloys. 

Kate is a Chartered Engineer and Fellow of IOM3 and was awarded the Harvey Flower prize for work on Titanium alloys in 2019 by IOM3.  She is also an elected representative for the Midlands region for the Advisory Council of IOM3 and a committee member for the East Midlands Metallurgical Society.  She is an active STEM ambassador.  Her interests include understanding the relationship of microstructure and crystallographic texture to mechanical properties, influence of thermomechanical processing of microstructure/texture, cold dwell fatigue in titanium alloys, influence of machining, shot peening and other surface enhancements on residual stress, mechanical behaviour, modelling approaches to predicting mechanical properties and effects of material processing on mechanical behaviour. 

‌Peace Onawumi is a technical lead in the field of Digital Machining at the University of Sheffield Advanced Manufacturing Research Center (AMRC) with 5 years’ experience in machining dynamics. Peace obtained her master’s degree in Aeronautical Engineering at the University of Salford in 2008. She completed her PhD in mechanical and manufacturing engineering from the University of Loughborough in 2019, researching ultrasonically assisted machining processes in aerospace stacks.

Following her doctoral study, she became a project engineer in machining dynamics where she was involved with developing models, researching and optimising machining processes to save cost by getting processes first time right using virtual processes. She recently completed a KTP project with industrial partner (Seco Tools) as a research associate where she developed an on-machine broaching system for developing mechanistics and dynamic models to predict the process while adapting and implementing these developed processes directly into the industry.        

She is a Chartered Engineer who specializes in machining modelling, simulation and optimisation, control systems, process monitoring and the development of automated systems in understanding the dynamics of machine tools and aerospace structures for digital machining.