Personal statement

Tiziana obtained her BEng (with Hons) in Materials Science and Engineering from the Politecnico di Torino (Italy) in 2003 and subsequently completed her PhD in Surface Engineering at The University of Nottingham. Here, she evaluated the capability of the cold spray technology for the deposition of titanium and nickel-based superalloys, and compared these with HVOF (high velocity oxy-fuel) sprayed coatings. Along with using standard characterisation techniques (e.g., SEM, EDX, XRD), she was the department principal operator of the in-flight particle diagnostic system for temperature and velocity measurements of high speed particles and the laser diffractometer for measuring the particle size distribution of the feedstock powders. Her PhD project led TWI to install the first commercial cold spray facility in the UK, where she joined in 2007. As a senior project manager, she provided technical expertise on cutting-edge coating technologies and contributed to establishing the cold spray technology internationally and building an extensive customer network within industry sectors such as aerospace, power generation, biomedical, defence and automotive. In 2014, she re-joined The University of Nottingham to work on a project funded by a major UK aerospace company. This entailed a thorough investigation of novel technologies to replace hexavalent-chrome coatings for tribologically aggressive environments and comply with the REACh regulation. She has been involved with the Sheffield Branch of The Welding Institute, where she has been Honorary Secretary (2008-2011), Chairman (2012-2013) and President (2014-2015).