# How the UK Metamaterials Network supports scientific and commercial innovation

An episode of [Physics World Weekly Podcast](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1400686733), 5 Dec 2024, 28 min.

Audio: https://media.blubrry.com/physicsworldweeklypodcast/content.blubrry.com/physicsworldweeklypodcast/PWWeekly5Dec2024UKMetamaterialsNetwork.mp3

Network leads Alastair Hibbins and Claire Dancer are our podcast guests

## Transcript

[0:07] Hello, and welcome to the Physics World Weekly
[0:10] podcast.
[0:11] This episode explores the science and commercial
[0:15] applications
[0:16] of metamaterials.
[0:18] These are artificial materials that can be engineered
[0:22] to have useful properties.
[0:24] Properties that are sometimes
[0:26] not available
[0:28] in nature.
[0:29] Our guests today are Alastair Hibbins
[0:33] at the University of Exeter
[0:35] and Claire Danzer at the University of Warwick.
[0:39] And they both lead the UK
[0:42] metamaterials
[0:43] network.
[0:44] Here they are in conversation
[0:46] with Physics World's Matin Durrani.
[0:56] This week on the Physics World weekly podcast,
[0:58] we're joined by Alastair Hibbins from the University
[1:00] of Exeter and Claire Danseur from the University
[1:03] of Warwick, who are 2 joint leads of
[1:06] the UK
[1:07] Metamaterials
[1:08] Network.
[1:09] So these are artificial three d structures made
[1:11] up of repeated units,
[1:13] that can give you all sorts of properties
[1:14] you wouldn't get with normal materials.
[1:17] And, Alastair and Claire are are going to
[1:19] try to help realize the potential of these
[1:21] materials. So welcome to both of you to
[1:24] the podcast.
[1:25] Hello. Thank you. Hello.
[1:27] So let's start with the basics. So, metamaterials.
[1:30] So I kind of gave a bit of
[1:31] an explanation about what they are. And,
[1:35] Alastair, do you want to remind listeners about
[1:38] what's what exactly
[1:39] are metamaterials? I'm sure you can do a
[1:41] better job than than me in that very
[1:43] short, attempt.
[1:45] Yeah. So if you if you want to
[1:47] describe what a metamaterial is in really just
[1:49] one sentence, it's it's adding functionality
[1:52] through structure.
[1:54] And this is definitely not a brand new
[1:57] concept.
[1:58] We've we've we're benefiting nowadays from a lot
[2:01] of the advances in the physics and the
[2:03] manufacturing behind it. But metamaterials have you know,
[2:06] the Romans were were looking into metamaterials
[2:09] with the and the Egyptians with the the
[2:11] stained glass windows that we we see in
[2:13] our famous cathedrals.
[2:15] In such material,
[2:16] what you've got is essentially,
[2:19] plasmonic, what we call plasmonic nanoparticles,
[2:22] metal nanoparticles
[2:24] embedded in the glass.
[2:26] And,
[2:27] the property we see, the color,
[2:30] comes down to the size and the shape
[2:32] of those particles. And that really describes what
[2:34] a met material is in quite a concise
[2:35] way. It's dependent, the properties we see or
[2:35] hear,
[2:48] And and this all came to it's all
[2:50] reignited,
[2:52] just before the turn of the century. So
[2:54] in the late nineties,
[2:55] professor Sir John Pendry,
[2:58] who's
[2:59] an IOP honorary fellow as well,
[3:02] He he kind of recrystallized
[3:04] this this idea.
[3:06] He was looking at, artificial materials such as
[3:09] metallic meshes,
[3:10] and those meshes had properties which were really
[3:13] different from the the metal that they were
[3:15] actually naturally comprised of. I know John Pendry
[3:18] has always been on our short list of
[3:19] potential people who might win the Nobel Prize.
[3:21] He's not been lucky yet. But,
[3:23] Claire, from an applications point of view, why
[3:26] are they so exciting? Why are missed materials
[3:29] so exciting?
[3:30] I think metamaterials
[3:32] give us an opportunity really to take
[3:35] materials and material science, that's my background,
[3:38] and materials can do lots of really fantastic
[3:40] things, and take out some of the compromises
[3:42] that we have to make in order to
[3:44] be able to use them. A material has
[3:45] a given set of properties.
[3:48] Metamaterials and metamaterial structuring give us an opportunity
[3:50] to add a new functionality on top of
[3:53] that amazing advanced materials properties that we already
[3:56] have. So you might get a completely new
[3:59] function
[4:00] like coking or these sort of properties that
[4:02] are really, really useful for metamaterial
[4:05] perspectives.
[4:06] Or you might get a function without having
[4:08] a really
[4:09] heavy,
[4:10] constrained, really dense,
[4:13] property of the material that goes with it.
[4:15] So
[4:16] it really gives us those materials without compromising
[4:19] on what they need to be able to
[4:21] do.
[4:22] The applications
[4:23] that we see in in in the network
[4:25] and in the research that's being done by
[4:27] members of the network,
[4:28] a really, really wide range in, and that's
[4:30] a really exciting thing.
[4:32] We define metamaterials
[4:34] in the metamaterials network very broadly,
[4:36] much more broadly than it's been defined before.
[4:40] We think about how we can unite and
[4:43] align research that's being done on similar types
[4:45] of structures,
[4:46] whether they're at really large length scales or
[4:49] really fine length scales. So on the one
[4:51] hand, we might have a mechanical metamaterial that's
[4:54] a structural
[4:55] device that's designed to have really unusual mechanical
[4:58] properties, like bending and flexing in a way
[5:00] that its
[5:01] it bulk constituent materials wouldn't do, or an
[5:04] auxetic material that's made out of honeycomb structures.
[5:06] And that might be on a really large
[5:07] scale. It might be a bridge kind of
[5:09] scale.
[5:10] And we go right through to those nanoscale
[5:12] photonic metamaterials, which are so interesting,
[5:14] interact with light in really, really unusual ways,
[5:17] depending on how we've done that really fine
[5:19] nanostructure.
[5:21] So that leads to all sorts of applications
[5:23] in the end. So we have everything from
[5:26] really exciting innovations in body armor and in
[5:29] protective
[5:30] equipment for sports. So if we have auxetic
[5:32] helmets and protective
[5:34] devices for contact sports like rugby, that would
[5:37] be really exciting to have that custom fit
[5:39] and that customizability,
[5:41] for the person who's going through that.
[5:44] In communications, we can start to use our
[5:46] electromagnetic space much more efficiently.
[5:48] And we've got a lot of demand for
[5:50] communication channels. We need to make sure we're
[5:52] using the frequencies in a discreet and distinct
[5:54] way.
[5:55] We can have,
[5:57] in optical range, we can have artificial color.
[5:59] Very interesting. Our work being done on coloring
[6:03] materials to make different kinds of of glitter
[6:05] and decorative subject the substances.
[6:09] And in acoustics, there's loads of applications.
[6:12] We're all plagued a little bit by road
[6:14] noise and that sort of incidental noise that
[6:16] fills our world. And metafotils can go a
[6:18] long way to absorb some of that acoustic
[6:20] noise and really give us, some interesting,
[6:24] new approaches to do that without using really
[6:26] thick heavy materials that could have really bad,
[6:29] benefit, disadvantages
[6:31] in other ways. But lots and lots of
[6:33] applications are really broad spread
[6:35] of things that people are tackling.
[6:38] And, Claire, my ears pricked up when you
[6:40] mentioned cloaking. That's always the thing people associate
[6:42] with metamaterials. But, Alastair, I mean, have there
[6:45] been
[6:46] concrete
[6:47] commercial applications that have, you know, on the
[6:49] market yet of metamaterials?
[6:52] Yes. Yes. There have been.
[6:54] One example is,
[6:56] an IOP Business Innovation Award winner, actually, called
[6:59] Sonnebex.
[7:00] So as Claire was just saying,
[7:02] they won the prize,
[7:04] you know, 6 years ago now. The metamaterials
[7:07] which can be put up, against the side
[7:09] of roads to reduce road noise,
[7:12] and there are other examples I know they
[7:14] talk a lot about is putting it outside
[7:15] transform power transformers as well to to to
[7:18] to obviously reduce the amount of,
[7:21] that annoying buzz you get from them. But
[7:23] they're not the the only ones. In fact,
[7:24] there is some, you know, some news relatively
[7:27] hot off the press, which is
[7:29] about Metasonics
[7:31] that they produce high quality soundproof panels, again,
[7:34] managing noise.
[7:35] These actually
[7:36] allow ventilator crucially actually for their applications because
[7:39] they're using them for in the built environment
[7:41] for blinds. They manage noise, but also enable
[7:44] ventilation at the same time.
[7:46] And, they've won the one of the 2024
[7:50] IOP Business Awards as well, which is really,
[7:53] really pleasing to hear.
[7:55] You know, I I was just reading that
[7:57] their their their structure,
[8:00] blocks noise like, a 60 millimeter piece of
[8:03] wood does, but it's only a third of
[8:05] the weight and only 25 millimeters thick. So
[8:07] that's what that's really, really impressive.
[8:10] We're also seeing metamaterials talked about by companies
[8:13] such as high high audio quality products from
[8:16] KEF, k e f. They use a metamaterial
[8:19] kind of labyrinth structure as part of the
[8:21] baffle behind the main loudspeaker
[8:23] in in their high end devices.
[8:25] There's a very nice animation of metamaterials on
[8:27] on their website,
[8:29] that obviously listeners might want to go and
[8:31] have a look at if they want to
[8:32] see a metamaterial in action.
[8:34] And recently, there's,
[8:36] a company, a spin out,
[8:38] called Meta Helios,
[8:40] and then what what they're doing is innovating,
[8:43] on chip pixelated cameras, which are hyperspectral,
[8:46] so they they're they're multi wavelength,
[8:49] and they're also polarization
[8:50] sensitive as well. And that's for the space
[8:53] sector and also for the defense sector as
[8:55] well.
[8:57] I guess perhaps the most famous one, unfortunately,
[9:00] not necessarily a UK intervention, is Meta Lens.
[9:04] So these are flat,
[9:06] conformal lenses, which are incredibly useful,
[9:10] in our mobile phone technologies because they enable
[9:14] an amazing optical performance in a very compact
[9:17] device. And
[9:19] they are now you'll find them in Apple
[9:21] Phones and in Samsung Phones, and they're coming
[9:23] to Google Phone, Android Phones as well,
[9:26] particularly using biometric ideas as well and involved
[9:29] in the kind of the face ID technologies.
[9:33] I think, you know, I touched on there
[9:35] that, you know, not all of these companies,
[9:37] of course, are coming from the UK, and
[9:38] it's it's it's
[9:40] it's interesting to hear how well the US
[9:42] is doing compared to us.
[9:44] There are companies such as Kymeta,
[9:47] Lumotive, EchoDyne, and Pivotal Comware,
[9:50] in the in the US who've received huge
[9:53] amount of startup funding and venture funding,
[9:56] and and are now doing really well. So
[9:58] it does show what metamaterials
[10:00] can offer in terms of, making money and
[10:03] selling products. Clameta, for example, making metamaterial based
[10:07] antennas and Lumotive
[10:10] involved in solid state,
[10:12] lidar systems. So these are the lidar systems
[10:14] you use in autonomous vehicles and drones and
[10:17] so on,
[10:18] for ranging, applications.
[10:21] So quite a really wide ranging and impressive,
[10:25] number of applications.
[10:27] And which kind of brings me on to
[10:28] the metamaterials network, which, Claire, I think we've
[10:31] it's been set up deliberately to sort of
[10:33] help encourage this kind of commercialization. So what
[10:36] what are the aims of
[10:37] the metamaterials network?
[10:40] Yeah. So it's it's certainly one of our
[10:42] aims and really important one to make sure
[10:44] that we we,
[10:46] capitalise on all the work that's being done
[10:48] in the UK on metamaterials.
[10:50] The metamaterials network at the moment is a
[10:53] EPSRC network plus. But we had an original
[10:56] award in 2021, so we have been going
[10:58] for a little while now,
[11:00] as a network. You know, we were funded
[11:01] by UKRI
[11:03] and DSTL.
[11:05] And since those early days, through
[11:08] lots of talking, lots of communication between different
[11:11] people from different areas, we've now grown to
[11:13] a community of about 900 numbers,
[11:16] which is made up of people from across
[11:19] the UK and some from abroad, largely dominated
[11:21] by UK academics,
[11:22] some industry, and some overseas academics.
[11:26] And we're really set up to be as
[11:28] as broad as possible in our approach to
[11:30] metamaterials.
[11:31] But to provide that one coherent single source
[11:34] of access to the community. We try and
[11:36] represent the whole community.
[11:37] So that we've got that one call in
[11:39] place to to come to, to help to
[11:41] generate,
[11:43] support for the current generation of academics, the
[11:46] next generation of academics. We want to see
[11:47] more people coming through into this field and
[11:49] seeing it as a good place to work.
[11:51] And also to support that start for commercialization,
[11:55] startups, the industry getting engaged, and government giving
[11:58] us the support to to help us do
[12:00] that beyond our sort of traditional boundaries.
[12:03] So the way the network works is we've
[12:05] got our application areas that we already sort
[12:07] of talked about. We've got,
[12:09] groups who focus on acoustic metamaterials, microwave metamaterials,
[12:13] photonic breath materials.
[12:15] But we've also organised ourselves around 4 key
[12:18] challenge areas.
[12:19] And these challenge areas cross cut across lots
[12:21] of different areas of metamaterials research.
[12:24] And they're in manufacturing,
[12:25] which is one I'm particularly interested in,
[12:28] space and aviation,
[12:29] health and sustainability.
[12:31] One of our really core aims of the
[12:33] meta tools network plus years that we've just
[12:36] started
[12:37] is to try and develop more research programs
[12:39] in these areas so that we're making sure
[12:41] that metamaterials
[12:42] is giving that positive contribution to
[12:45] challengers, which really hit on lots of important
[12:49] national and global priorities, you know. If we're
[12:51] going to start making new materials, new metamaterials,
[12:54] let's make them good for sustainability. Let's make
[12:57] them great for healthcare and space and these
[12:59] really important challenges. And let's make sure we
[13:01] can actually make them. We've got the manufacturing
[13:03] capability and techniques to be able to do
[13:06] that.
[13:07] So
[13:08] that's a really large way in which we
[13:10] work.
[13:11] We use that group of people to try
[13:13] and tackle,
[13:15] that representation
[13:16] to the people who make the decisions,
[13:18] to promote the research and development that we're
[13:21] doing in the UK in meta materials. And
[13:23] meta as we've already mentioned, meta tools
[13:26] is really what came from the UK. It
[13:28] came from a lot of work of John
[13:29] Pendry, and we should we should take advantage
[13:31] of that.
[13:33] We also, as a network plus,
[13:35] are lucky enough to have some funding that
[13:37] we can distribute. So we now have pipeline
[13:39] funding. We've just opened our 1st round, which
[13:42] we can use to help explore
[13:45] a pilot or exploratory project or something that's
[13:48] really pushing the research to a better outcome,
[13:52] that can help develop new areas for the
[13:54] UK,
[13:55] new activities that are strategically important, and start
[13:58] to build some of those larger bids. That
[14:00] really helps us be able to shape the
[14:02] field, shape that research landscape,
[14:04] and help make those arguments for developing things
[14:07] like metrosil's infrastructure, large scale manufacturing, and large
[14:10] scale facilities for testing.
[14:12] So we also have a bit of a
[14:14] remit to look at talent and skills. Like
[14:16] I already said, encouraging new people into the
[14:18] field, making sure we're we're drawing people into
[14:20] this area and have have interest in in
[14:22] working on this, on these, interesting materials.
[14:26] And
[14:27] increasingly, as we move towards commercialization,
[14:30] to
[14:31] develop ways that we can standardize and regulate
[14:34] mass materials. Yeah. We already talked about the
[14:36] definition of mass materials that we think should
[14:38] be fairly broad.
[14:39] It does still need to be quite precise.
[14:41] And,
[14:42] the metamaterials that we produce need to fit
[14:45] those
[14:46] standards and regulation frameworks
[14:48] in order to be supported
[14:49] and move through to market.
[14:52] So we're really all about both supporting
[14:56] the fundamentals,
[14:57] supporting the discovery science, making sure that that's
[15:00] really well represented in the UK where it
[15:02] is so strong.
[15:03] But also then driving that adoption into the
[15:05] wider economy and driving the commercialization,
[15:08] as we go forward.
[15:09] And one of the one of the one
[15:10] of the really big things we've done, of
[15:12] course, is to,
[15:14] crowdsource the the metamaterial definition because it's been
[15:17] a topic of some debate over the last
[15:19] few years.
[15:20] And Claire's put a lot of effort into
[15:22] into working that with with the community. It's
[15:25] a metamaterial is a 3 d structure with
[15:27] a response or function
[15:28] due to collective effects of meta atom elements
[15:32] that is not possible to achieve conventionally
[15:34] with any individual constituent material.
[15:37] And the amount of work that went into
[15:39] defining that and talking with the community and
[15:41] lots of debate about, you know, what should
[15:43] be in, what should be out.
[15:45] But I think we've come up with a
[15:46] really nice definition there that that that that
[15:48] that will be there, is gonna be there
[15:50] for many years to come, which I think
[15:51] is one of our seems a little bit
[15:53] trivial, but it's it's one of our great
[15:55] achievements.
[15:56] It sounds like that definition will be on
[15:58] the school syllabus is one day. I can
[15:59] imagine that being exam question. But in terms
[16:01] of the commercialization,
[16:02] are there any specific challenges,
[16:05] Claire, in commercializing these materials? I can imagine,
[16:09] I can imagine there must be.
[16:11] Yep. There certainly are. I think any commercializing
[16:14] any new idea from science is is always
[16:16] a challenge.
[16:18] And,
[16:19] we're certainly no exception to that.
[16:21] I think one particular issue with met materials
[16:24] is the manufacturing of them.
[16:26] It's I could I could say that's always
[16:29] my interest. It is always my interest. But
[16:31] I think if we are going to have
[16:32] commercial products, we need to make sure we're
[16:34] making metamaterials by ways that can be made
[16:37] in industry, can be made in the suitable
[16:39] volumes, suitable batch sizes.
[16:41] An awful lot of metamaterials
[16:44] in the in the research lab are made
[16:46] by,
[16:47] 3 d printing, by sticking and gluing things
[16:50] together, by manual assembly, which is great because
[16:53] it shows that the physics is there. It
[16:55] proves that we can do something really, really
[16:57] interesting.
[16:57] But that's not how you're gonna make it
[16:59] in fact, this. So we need to go
[17:00] through a stage where we take all this
[17:03] fundamental physics and we need the input from
[17:05] those physicists because we're gonna have to tweak
[17:07] the designs. And
[17:08] design for manufacturer is a very serious concern
[17:11] here. But we need to make sure the
[17:13] designs fit something you can actually make with
[17:15] a scalable technique.
[17:18] We need to go through that stage of
[17:19] building up these these new techniques for manufacturing,
[17:22] which I think is a really exciting stage
[17:24] to be at, to be fair. So, it's
[17:25] a good thing.
[17:27] So that's all about
[17:28] infrastructure and scale up. So, in order to
[17:31] realize that, we need to make sure that
[17:32] we've got funding in place to be able
[17:34] to fund those large investments.
[17:36] We need large scale infrastructure, not just lab
[17:38] scale infrastructure, to be able to realize that
[17:41] scale up, activity.
[17:43] And of course, we need, you know, talented
[17:45] skilled workers to be able to do that
[17:47] work and run those things through,
[17:49] who might well need to be
[17:51] people who are already working in manufacturing industries
[17:53] and related industries,
[17:55] and make sure we develop the talent that's
[17:57] needed to make sure that this this happens.
[18:00] I already mentioned regulation and standardization.
[18:02] It's a really important thing to make sure
[18:04] it comes through. And it's also a question
[18:06] of intellectual property.
[18:08] And how do we manage that intellectual property
[18:10] relationship when things have been coming through collaborative
[18:13] research?
[18:14] If we make too many barriers for companies
[18:16] wanting to work on, things that were originated
[18:19] in universities, then they're gonna give up and
[18:20] not bother trying. So, making sure we've got
[18:23] those those relationships right,
[18:25] those agreements right, and get the funding in
[18:28] place will help us with with overcoming those
[18:30] commercialization
[18:32] barriers, I think. And now, Alastair, I'm hoping
[18:34] you're gonna get your,
[18:36] dare I say, your metamaterial crystal ball out,
[18:39] if such a thing exists and kind of
[18:41] can you sort of paint a picture of
[18:42] where metamaterials will be, let's say, a decade
[18:44] from now? Is there one, you know, burgeoning
[18:47] area that, you know, you know, will transform
[18:50] life over the next 10 years? I think
[18:53] if we're gonna really achieve what we what
[18:55] MET materials the potential of MET MET materials
[18:58] and what we do in the academic community,
[18:59] if we're really gonna exploit that fully,
[19:02] then in 10 years' time, what would have
[19:04] happened is that we would have, and this
[19:06] is a big ambition, we would have been
[19:07] funded as a national program in the same
[19:09] similar kind of way to quantum technology and
[19:12] and so on. Because
[19:14] if if we've done that, then we can
[19:16] we can relax and and and understand that,
[19:18] you know, the true value of metamaterials would
[19:20] have been appreciated.
[19:23] You know,
[19:24] defense has often been one of the the
[19:26] leaders in in funding metamaterials because of the
[19:29] the ways that it helps communications and and
[19:32] and and so on.
[19:33] But
[19:34] we we want to see that the the
[19:36] broader
[19:37] industry community
[19:38] adopts metamaterials in a much bigger way. And
[19:41] as materials without boundaries,
[19:43] we want to see metamaterials embedded in everyday
[19:46] devices.
[19:47] You know, what they do is offering they
[19:49] offer game changing control of essentially just the
[19:52] way that energy and
[19:54] information
[19:55] interacts with the world around us.
[19:57] I know Claire's mentioned some of the examples
[20:00] already, but that can be a huge range
[20:02] of things. I mean, what so those big
[20:04] those big areas that we really hope to
[20:05] see metamaterials in could be in health and
[20:08] things like artificial limbs
[20:10] or in medical imaging for for diagnosis.
[20:14] In energy, you know, there's a such a
[20:16] huge challenge over reducing the use of rare
[20:18] earth and critical minerals. Metamaterials can provide alternatives
[20:21] there as well as lower carbon alternatives, of
[20:24] course.
[20:25] And in space and aerospace, we need incredibly
[20:28] lightweight but really strong materials, blast resistant materials
[20:31] for satellites and so on, satellite communications.
[20:34] And we need to develop more capacity to
[20:36] send information around the world.
[20:39] So we're really looking. We're really hoping that
[20:41] metamaterials are gonna
[20:42] unlock the potential for societal and economic impact.
[20:45] And as we said before,
[20:48] and one of our big desires is that
[20:50] we we as physicists and material scientists, we
[20:53] we still want to do the the the
[20:54] work that we love,
[20:56] but we need to be showing that there's
[20:58] a huge impact to society and the economy
[21:01] from what meta materials offer. So it's so
[21:03] important to us that we see that take
[21:05] up over the next few years. I mean,
[21:07] that brings us nicely onto the Pathfinder project,
[21:09] which you're working on with the Institute of
[21:11] Physics.
[21:13] Alastair, do you wanna tell us about that
[21:14] project and what that what that hopes to
[21:16] do?
[21:18] Yeah. Well, the IOP is, as I'm sure
[21:21] you know, has a long history of shaping
[21:23] the debate on some of the most important
[21:25] physics topics to the UK and Ireland,
[21:28] and the community
[21:29] involved,
[21:30] often,
[21:32] you know, really trying to embed and influence
[21:34] and and drive impact.
[21:36] And what this means is,
[21:39] the IOP are looking to develop an ongoing
[21:40] program of of high impact projects, and and
[21:43] those are,
[21:44] at the moment, they're they're being informed by
[21:46] the community priorities.
[21:48] So, actually, it's the first time that the
[21:51] IOP has run an open process to kind
[21:53] of, understand what those priorities are.
[21:56] The IOP's first impact projects,
[21:59] involve the, 2,500,000,000
[22:01] pound National Quantum Technology Strategy
[22:04] and also the 1,000,000,000 pound National Semiconductor Strategy.
[22:08] The first phase of the IP is green
[22:09] economy project,
[22:11] and articulated
[22:12] the, you know, physics's key role in in
[22:14] in the energy transition.
[22:17] So as so at the moment, what we're
[22:19] working with and collaborating with IOP on our
[22:22] project is is the commercialization
[22:24] and exploitation of natural materials for applications
[22:27] across ICT, sustainability,
[22:29] health, defense, and security.
[22:31] So it's it's, you know, not not not
[22:33] a not a small problem at all to
[22:35] to try to to take forward. But that
[22:37] that's that's that's the project that we're working
[22:39] on, in collaboration with the IOP at the
[22:42] moment.
[22:43] Brilliant. And before we go, Claire, you're gonna
[22:45] tell us about, the showcase event that you've
[22:47] got coming up on 6th December. So what's
[22:50] what's that about? And what's what's it gonna
[22:52] do?
[22:54] So this is actually our 3rd industry showcase.
[22:57] We run this as an annual event,
[22:59] for the last 3 years.
[23:01] And it's always been called met materials in
[23:03] the real world in an attempt to,
[23:06] really drive the idea that met materials do
[23:08] have applications in the real world, and lots
[23:10] of them.
[23:11] So previously, we've organized
[23:13] these showcases at NPL, out in Teddington. And
[23:16] we went to the VRAG Centre For Materials
[23:18] Research in Leeds last year. This year, we've
[23:20] decided to, partly because of the Pathfinder project,
[23:23] we've decided to organise the industry showcase in
[23:25] collaboration with the Institute of Physics. And we'll
[23:27] be at the IOP HQ on the 6th
[23:29] December
[23:31] for our event. We're gathering lots of non
[23:34] academics for this one.
[23:36] While we're primarily an academics
[23:38] network, we want lots of people there who
[23:40] aren't academics. So we normally aim for at
[23:42] least 50% of attendees not being academics.
[23:45] And we're going to have a panel discussion
[23:48] to talk to people from industry and policy
[23:50] backgrounds about what the barriers to commercialization are.
[23:53] You know, I've told you what I think
[23:54] they are. I want to hear from them
[23:56] as well, what those barriers are and how
[23:58] we might overcome them.
[24:00] We're going to have various demonstrators of methods
[24:02] or technologies,
[24:03] and lots of short snappy presentations from academics
[24:07] and industrialists
[24:08] who are going to talk to us about
[24:09] their new innovations
[24:10] and the challenges that they're trying to to,
[24:13] overcome.
[24:14] So we're really seeking to generate new collaborations
[24:17] that we can then drive forward for support
[24:19] in whatever mechanism that is. That could be
[24:21] our pump priming. It could be another way,
[24:23] to to generate those collaborations.
[24:26] And, of course, we're going to be presenting
[24:28] our initial findings from our Impact Project Pathfinder
[24:31] project with the IOP
[24:33] and looking for the community engagement that we
[24:35] need to drive that forwards in the coming
[24:38] year as we move forward to to really
[24:40] drive towards that mass materials commercialization.
[24:43] We're going to need to bring people along
[24:44] for the ride. So we'll be reporting on
[24:46] some of the facts and figures that we've
[24:48] been gathering
[24:49] as part of our our impact pathfinder work.
[24:52] We've really been trying to find evidence and
[24:54] understand what the current landscape is, both in
[24:57] metamaterials in the UK and elsewhere,
[24:59] and then really drive that, promotion of these
[25:02] messages
[25:03] and make sure that we're really taking advantage
[25:05] of them in the year to come. And
[25:07] we've really engaged with some new sectors as
[25:09] well. I think it's worth highlighting as well
[25:11] at this point, as part of this huge
[25:14] response we've had to the, registration for the
[25:16] event this year. And I think that's, you
[25:18] know, Bowdoin making a very exciting year ahead
[25:21] for the Metamaterials
[25:22] Network in in 2025,
[25:25] obviously, working with the IOP on on the
[25:27] in the Impact project.
[25:29] So we're we're gonna be continue working across
[25:31] our challenge areas and in and involving as
[25:34] many new sectors as we can to really
[25:37] drive down into the depths of metamaterial work
[25:40] across the UK.
[25:42] And we're, you know, and one of the
[25:44] big things that is likely to happen in
[25:46] the next few months is we're likely to
[25:47] hit a1000
[25:49] members of of our of our of our
[25:50] network.
[25:51] So, we obviously welcome anyone to to come
[25:54] along to the event. Let us know via
[25:56] the website.
[25:58] But we'll run a 2020
[26:00] 25 event as well, so there's that to
[26:01] look forward to. But we will have a
[26:03] little celebration when we hit that a thousand
[26:05] marker on our our membership list as well.
[26:07] And, of course, you can sign up
[26:09] via, the website, which is, metamaterials.network.
[26:13] Very good. And, well, let's hope this time
[26:15] year, we who knows? We might be celebrating
[26:17] John Pendry winning a Nobel Prize because that's
[26:19] always been on our Physics World shortlist of
[26:22] people who might win. It didn't he didn't
[26:23] win this year, but let's see.
[26:25] So thanks very much, Alastair.
[26:27] Thanks, Claire. Brilliant to, have you on the
[26:30] podcast, and good luck with the events. Thank
[26:32] you.
[26:40] That was Claire Danzer
[26:42] and Alastair Hibbins
[26:44] in conversation
[26:45] with Physics World's Mateen Durrani.
[26:48] Thanks to all 3 for a fascinating conversation
[26:52] about metamaterials.
[26:53] And a special thanks to our producer, Fred
[26:56] Ailes.
[26:57] We'll be back again next week when we
[27:00] will unveil the physics world top 10 breakthroughs
[27:04] of 2024.
[27:06] See you then.

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