Strathclyde Centre for Doctoral Training in Space Manufacturing (NMIS-Strathclyde)

External Financial support- NMIS:  187 K
Internal support (Strathclyde): 140 K 
MAE: 35K per student under MAE supervision 

First cohort of students started on Oct 1st 2025 (Lewis Traquair, Nicole Gainska, Kenneth Johnston, Alper Cakir).

Focus and Vision: The CDT in Manufacturing for Space, in collaboration with industry and sector organizations, will cultivate and sustain the future talent pipeline essential to supporting the rapid expansion of the UK’s space manufacturing industry. Serving as a hub of creativity for the manufacturing sector, the CDT will empower future leaders to drive innovation, inspire cultural transformation, and contribute to a thriving and dynamic community.

Demand from business/government/third sector: The UK space sector is a rapidly growing industry, contributing £7 billion in GVA and supporting £370 billion in GDP through satellite services. Scotland alone generates £880 million GVA, achieving a 12% sustained annual growth. With the global space economy forecast to reach $1 trillion by 2040, the UK has a significant opportunity to expand its sovereign capabilities, increase international market share, and drive economic growth. However, this success hinges on a skilled workforce capable of meeting the demands of a cutting-edge manufacturing supply chain.

The Centre’s establishment is both timely and strategic, coinciding with the UK government’s ambitious space goals, as highlighted by the reconstitution of the National Space Council [1], the National Space Strategy [2], the publication of the UKRI-STFC-driven position paper “Why Space? The Opportunity for Material Science and Innovation” [3], and significant financial commitments, such as the £160 million satellite fund. Despite its achievements, the UK space sector faces a critical skills shortage. Surveys reveal that over half of businesses report deficiencies in their workforce, particularly in technical and postgraduate-level expertise [4,5]. The CDT directly addresses this gap, aligning with the Strathclyde University’s focus (the place of “useful learning”) on meeting user needs and ensuring a sustainable future for the space manufacturing industry.

Key research areas: The proposed research themes encompass the full lifecycle of the space manufacturing ecosystem, focusing on Advanced Manufacturing, ISRU, Assembly, and Performance and Maintenance, with cross-disciplinary integration in areas like visualization, simulation, automation, sensors, and systems engineering.

“Advanced Manufacturing” emphasizes the design of next-generation components and materials tailored for extreme space environments and dual terrestrial applications. Research initiatives may involve designing materials and components for controlled disintegration during re-entry, developing location-specific composites for lightweight yet robust structures, and leveraging microgravity to create materials with exceptional properties. Indeed, “Microgravity” offers an unparalleled environment for achieving better material formation, enabling the development of innovative materials with superior properties for a wide range of applications, spanning the inorganic, organic, and even the biology realm ("living" materials). Special attention will be paid to cutting-edge research areas such as metal-matrix composites, semiconductor fabrication, self-assembly, protein crystallization, tissue engineering, and 2D/3D/4D printing technologies. These topics, in turn, connect to other important challenges. The limited space and weight allowances aboard spacecraft add logistical challenges to designing industrially relevant setups. Engineers must optimize for compactness and efficiency while ensuring that the equipment can perform its intended function. In turn, this leads to a conflict with the opposite need of scaling up such processes. Many materials experiments in microgravity are currently conducted on a small scale. Scaling these experiments to explore larger, more industrially relevant processes will be a critical challenge for future research and development activities. This requires improvements in the infrastructure for transporting materials, managing resources, and operating larger experimental setups in space.

ISRU: Another important key subject driving the CDT will be the so-called in-situ-resource-utilization (ISRU) strategy, that is, the idea of using materials found on other planetary bodies, such as the Moon or Mars, to support missions, reduce reliance on Earth-based resources, and lower the costs of space exploration. Developing materials and processes that can function in space and utilize extraterrestrial resources is currently regarded as a crucial factor for future space missions.

Sustainable space manufacturing: this theme addresses the adoption of sustainable manufacturing methods as well as sustainable materials in the manufacturing of space systems. This includes research on trade-offs between sustainability and performance as well as the investigation of novel materials and production techniques (e.g., 3D printing) that could enable more sustainable manufacturing.

“Performance” and “Maintenance” will focus on extending the operational lifespan of space systems, improving their reliability, and reducing waste through innovative repair and recycling technologies. Projects might explore recycling space debris for feedstock, designing self-healing and self-diagnostic materials, and dynamically optimizing system performance based on real-time data.
Together, these themes represent a transformative approach to space manufacturing, combining cutting-edge research with practical applications. By addressing pressing challenges like sustainability, efficiency, and resilience, this initiative aims to shape the future of space exploration and its benefits for Earth.

References
[1] Size & Health of the UK Space Industry 2022, www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-size-and-health-of-the-uk-space-industry-2022
[2] A Strategy for Space in Scotland, 2021, https://spacescotland.org/resources/
[3] “Why Space? The Opportunity for Material Science and Innovation”, a publication of UKRI-STFC and the Satellite Applications Catapult, Editors: M. Lappa. I. Hamerton, P.C.E. Roberts, A. Kao, M. Domingos, H. Soorghali. P. Carvil, ISBN: 9781914241680, pp. 14-21, https://sa.catapult.org.uk/why-space-the-opportunity-for-material-science-and-innovation/
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[4] Space Sector Skills Survey 2023 https://survey.spaceskills.org/
[5] How and Why People Join the Space Sector, https://spaceskills.org/census-routes#capability-developing-skills-and-experience.

Financial support has been provided by NMIS-AFRC: 187 K (confirmed on 15/10/2025 by Dorothy Evans and Ciara McAvoy)