Research Associate, Fracture and Shock Physics Group, Department of Physics, University of Cambridge

Dr Chris Braithwaite is a Research Associate in the Fracture and Shock Physics Group in the Department of Physics at the University of Cambridge. Prior to taking up his current position Dr Braithwaite completed his MSci and PhD here at Cambridge.

His PhD consisted of a study of the shock properties of various geological materials. This research was sponsored by De Beers and Rio Tinto as part of the hybrid stress blasting model (HSBM) programme. Other projects that he has been involved in, mainly as a post-doctoral researcher, include: a study of the response of compressed nickel and aluminium powders at a variety of strain rates; determination of the shock Hugoniot and spall strength of two different epoxies at both ambient temperature and -50 degrees C; a re-calibration of the large scale gap test to a pressure scale (using ROWANEX 3601 as the donor charge); and investigating the fragmentation of compressed metal powders.