Daniel Clarke was chosen for his lively and enthusiastic presentation of his work and his future research plans. Daniel was researching into honeycombs which are a class of cellular solids widely used in engineering. Normally they are used as hexagonal, triangular or square cells in ‘periodic’ arrays with lateral symmetry. However, Daniel was researching into ‘aperiodic’ tiling which offer rotational symmetry and more opportunities to increase the mechanical properties of the honeycombs. Daniel had used three D printing of ‘aperiodic’ and ‘periodic’ tiles from plastic materials to test out these properties but now with the Bursary grant he is to work in collaboration with the University of Birmingham to make his test tiles of titanium.
This year’s Bursary is named after Colin Reed, a long-standing member of AOUG, who had been an Executive Representative for the South, and then later the Local Contact for the Oxford area. Colin organised monthly face to face events around Oxfordshire for many years and never missed a Research Award Ceremony, a Foundation Lecture, or an AGM and Social Weekend. Daniel’s work will have obvious benefits within real-live situations, and we look forward to hearing Daniel’s updates when he presents the AOUG Foundation Lecture in October 2025.