Summer studentship news

Earlier this year, the Plastic Waste Innovation Hub announced that a number of summer studentships were available for UCL students to carry out research into any aspect of the plastic waste problem. We received many thoughtful proposals from a number of different disciplines, from Mechanical Engineering to Chemistry, Sustainable Resources, and Architecture.

The results of this research are now ready to be shared. Please find a short title for each project below, as well as the option to download a summary document that describes each one in more detail. If you'd like any further information, then do please contact us.

We’d like to thank the students for their commitment to the issue of plastic waste, and for building on the research of the Hub.

An investigation into the effect of waste plastic on biofuel yields obtained from biomass – Armin Javanshir

Using ATR-FTIR and Raman spectroscopy to identify River Thames plastics – Desmond Tweneboa and Deeqa Awil

Sustainable routes to bio-derived monomers for polymer synthesis – Joseph Broomfield

An investigation into whether bacteria present in soil containing plastic waste could develop enzymes able to digest polyethylene terephthalate (PET) – Julia Linke

A comparison between the thermochemical conversions of plastic particles in fluidised bed reactors – Stefano Iannello

Closing the loop on plastics in the UK: Opportunities and challenges – Wan-Ting Hsu

Identification of novel PET degrading enzymes – Dingquan Yu