Dr Bai Cui of the Department of Materials Science & Engineering at the University of Illinois, has received the 2012 Professor Sir Richard Brook Prize for the Best Ceramics PhD in the UK.

The prize is sponsored by Morgan Ceramics and organized by the Centre for Advanced Structural Ceramics (CASC) at Imperial College London. It was presented to Dr Cui at Morgan Technical Ceramics site in Woodridge, New Jersey, for his study on Microstructural Evolution and Oxidation Behaviour of Spark Plasma Sintered MAX Ceramics, undertaken while at Imperial College London.

As well as a certificate and engraved glass award, Dr Cui received a cheque for £1,000. Dr Cui holds a PhD from Imperial College London, a BEng and MEng from Tsinghua University and is currently a Postdoctorate Research Associate at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Commenting on Dr Cui’s PhD, the external examiner noted: “The experiments undertaken in this work were without doubt challenging. The analysis of the results is comprehensive and brings new understanding to this important topic area. Overall, the standard of the work presented is excellent.”

Andrew Hosty commented: “As a global leader in ceramics, we have been delighted to sponsor the Brook Prize for a second year and offer our hearty congratulations to Dr Cui for his pioneering academic study. It is this type of work which is driving forward new uses for ceramics and ceramic-based materials across an ever broader range of industry sectors.”

Dr Cui added: “It is a great honour to receive this award which is among the most prestigious in the field of ceramics research and development. Ceramics have a unique set of properties which suits them to a very wide range of applications and I look forward to continuing my research in this area of materials science.”

Source: Morgan Ceramics