Professor Jingzhe Pan

I am Jingzhe Pan, a Professor in Mechanics of Materials, specialising in (a) manufacturing of advanced ceramics and (b) design of biodegradable medical implants.

Currently I hold over £2 million research grants as PIs from the UKRI and UK industry on developing digital twins for advanced ceramics manufacturing. My research interests include developing and applying computer models to predict the behaviour of ceramics at elevated temperatures and that of polymers inside the human body. I am a Fellow of Institute of Materials Minerals and Mining (IoM3), being awarded the 2018 Verulam Medal and Prize by the IoM3 in recognition of my contribution to advanced ceramics.

I am the UK Dean of Dalian Leicester Institute (DLI), which was jointly established in 2017 by the University of Leicester and Dalian University of Technology. DLI has 1200 students studying in three undergraduate degree programmes based in DUT China. 

Moved to England from China in 1990, I have continuously pursued teaching and research in UK universities including the University of Liverpool, Cambridge, Surrey and, since 2006 Leicester. Over this period I developed new degree programmes, set up cross-school research themes and managed teaching and research at School and College levels (College Director of Research, Deputy/Interim Head of School, Programme Director and etc.). 

My research focuses on two different materials, advanced ceramics and biodegradable polymers, with a common strategy of developing computational tools to understand and predict their behaviours.

For advanced ceramics my team has developed multiscale models for sintering of advanced ceramics including (a) constitutive laws for finite element prediction of sintering deformation of ceramic part, (b) variational models for microstructural evolution of ceramic part during sintering and (c) atomistic models for sintering of nanoparticles. These works have been supported by the EPSRC. Currently I hold a £1.9 million UKRI grant on developing and applying digital twin of sintering in the UK ceramic industry as part of a £18.3 million MICG consortium funded by the UKRI Strength in Places Fund.  

For biodegradable polymers my team was the first in the world to develop a mathematical theory for polymer degradation that considers the full interplay between hydrolysis reaction, oligomer diffusion, crystallisation enhanced by polymer chain cleavage and any imbedded drugs. The differential equations have been implemented in finite element design of bioresorbable implants. 

Selected top 10 publications 

Biomaterials 

Ying Wang, Jingzhe Pan, Xiaoxiao Han, Csaba Sinka and Lifeng Ding (2008), A phenomenological model for the degradation of biodegradable polymers, Biomaterials, 29, 3393-3401.

Xiaoxiao Han and Jingzhe Pan (2009), A model for simultaneous degradation and crystallisation in biodegradable polymers, Biomaterials, 30, 423-430.

Jingzhe Pan, Xiaoxiao Han, Wenjuan Niu and Ruth Cameron (2011), A model for biodegradation of composite materials made of polyesters and tricalcium phosphates, Biomaterials, 32, 2248-2255.

WJ Niu and Jingzhe Pan (2020), A Model of Polymer Degradation and Erosion for Finite Element Analysis of Bioresorbable Implants, Journal of the Mechanical Behaviour of Biomedical Materials, 112, 104022. 

Book, Modelling Degradation of Bioresorbable Polymeric Medical Devices, edited by Jingzhe Pan, Woodhead Publishing Ltd, Cambridge, UK. 2014.

Advanced Ceramics

Ran He, Venkat Ghantasala, Peter Polak, Baber Saleem, Jingzhe Pan, Physics-Based Neural Network as Constitutive Law for Finite Element Analysis of Sintering, Ceramics International, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ceramint.2024.02.333

Jingzhe Pan and Alan Cocks, (1994) A constitutive model for stage-2 sintering of fine grained materials - I. grain-boundaries act as perfect sources and sinks for vacancies, Acta Materialia, 42, 1215-1222.

Jingzhe Pan, ACF Cocks, S Kucherenko (1997), Finite element formulation of coupled grain-boundary and surface diffusion with grain-boundary migration, Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series A, 453, 2161-2184

Jingzhe Pan, H Le, S Kucherenko, and JA Yeomans, (1998) A Model for the Sintering of Spherical Particles of Different Sizes, Acta Materialia, 46, 4671-4690.

Lifeng Ding, Ruslan Davidchalk, Jingzhe Pan (2009), A molecular dynamics study of sintering of nano-particles, Computational Materials Science. 45, 247-256.

Candidates are welcome to apply for studying PhD degree under my supervision on the following research topics:

Application of deep machine learning in material processing - you will learn and develop artificial intelligence techniques such as transfer deep machine learning to optimise material processing in order to enhance material performance under extreme conditions.

Development of digital twin for manufacturing processes - you will learn and develop digital twining techniques such as Bayesian interference to reduce wastage and improve efficiency in modern digital manufacturing process.

Virtual design of medical implants - you will learn and develop modern numerical methods such as the finite element method and Monte Carlo simulations to resolve challenging issues such as eliminating rare events that are critical to the long-term safety of any medical implants. 

I have taught on various undergraduate and postgraduate degree programmes in mechanical and aerospace engineering as well as short courses on advanced ceramics. The modules I taught include Solid Mechanics, Structural Dynamics, Finite Element Method, Elasticity and Plasticity Theories, Mechanics of Composite Materials and Sintering Theory of Advanced Ceramics. I have also taught a module on Leadership and Motivation Theories to undergraduate students.

I developed a new BSc programme of Technological Entrepreneurship as its funding director in a UK university. I have chaired various exam panels and boards and am an external examiner for the University of Nottingham. I am a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

Digital twin of ceramics manufacturing

Major efficiency leap possible in sintering