Prof. Andrew Bell, University of Leeds.

Although piezoelectricity was discovered over a hundred years ago, perhaps surprisingly, there continues to be progress in both our understanding of the phenomenon and in the development of new materials. In this presentation we firstly discuss some recent insights into the fundamental mechanisms of piezoelectricity and see how these apply to a relatively new family of materials based on BiFeO3. Extensive compositional modification of this material led to the founding a new spin-out company, and provides some interesting anecdotes about the process of exploiting academic research. Finally we examine the impact that legislation has had on the direction of piezoelectric research in the last 20 years and ask whether a deeper understanding of the legal and social issues by researchers would have led to different outcomes?

For more information on attending this talk:  http://talks.cam.ac.uk/show/index/98965