Study level
PhD
Background
The availability of safe rooms as a safe storage or a last resort survival option helps reduce bushfire-related life and property losses. The external building materials play a vital role in the safety of the safe rooms, and their behaviour under bushfire exposure has not been investigated adequately. These materials undergo different internal reactions, phase changes and explosive spalling under thermal shock, leading to premature failure of the buildings, and thus research on materials is important to ensure safety.
Research Activities
The students will conduct both small-scale and large-scale bushfire experiments to understand the behaviour of materials and conduct tests to identify their temperature-dependent thermophysical properties. They will then continue to develop fire dynamics models of the building components and safe rooms exposed to bushfire conditions to determine the bushfire resistance.
Outcomes
The expected outcomes of the research are resilience and safety of buildings and lives in bushfire-prone areas
Skills and Experience
Candidate should be familiar with fire dynamics and structural engineering. Experience with computational fluid dynamics modelling is desirable.
