I am a lecturer in Aerospace and Mechanical, where my main areas of research are in bulk, SMART and Sustainable Materials, surface degradation and smart technologies, 3D printing and innovative design. I have successfully delivered, since arriving in SETU Carlow, on Research projects worth a combined total of approximately €2m.

I have worked with companies who engaged in preliminary research and who subsequently requested of me to undertake further research. I have delivered large and small projects in the IT, Construction, and academic arenas. I have developed academic programmes, implemented Training Courses as part of an ISO 9000 initiative, and supported global teams during extensive IT network upgrades.

Beyond the opportunities within SETU, I have and am collaborating with a wide range of national and international institutes, such as DIT, DCU, MTU, TU Delft, Uni. Do Aveiro, as I believe that this develops strength, and depth, in projects and research, whilst concomitantly promoting excellence and challenging pre-conceived concepts. This is evidenced by my 5+ years of an ever-widening network of collaborators across the UK, Europe, and further afield.

In 2020 I additionally won HCI funding (approximately €3.1m) to develop 2 Level 9 engineering programmes, and infrastructural development funding of approximately €0.55m since 2017 to develop a modern materials test facility, all at SETU Carlow. I was also active in delivering Athena Swan to SETU and have participated in a number of COST Actions and the CIRCULÉIRE programme.

My active research portfolio are in the areas of Smart & Advanced Materials, Advanced Manufacturing, Electrochemistry, and Surface Engineering/Degradation Phenomena, and their application in Applied Research and the development of Smart Materials and Renewable Energy (wind, marine) devices. I am a member of a number of national projects, including the SEAI-funded SPOTBlade and a number of large Enterprise Ireland IPP projects. I am also developing a research team to investigate the application of micro-texturing and smart coatings as SMART technologies for antifouling, and thermal energy control technologies.

I actively supervise postgraduate students, in fields such as bioplastics. and electrochemistry - extremely novel Al-deposition project, in collaboration with the Universities of Leicester, Loughborough, and Newcastle. I am also committed to continued supervision of the Defence Forces Masters programmes, through which I have to-date graduated a number of students.

I am a lecturer in the Aerospace & Mechanical Department at SETU Carlow, with a commitment to the development of advanced materials education in the South-East region. To this end I have been highly successful in HCI Pillar 1 (€360k) & Pillar 3 (€2.7m) awards in 2020, and in procuring substantial funding to purchase a range of state-of-the-art equipment from internal (€100k President’s Vote) and external (Enterprise Ireland Capital Call) sources (total: €750k since 2017). I also involved with the Level 6 Certificate in Manufacturing and Design Engineering.