YCN representative - Japan

Theresa Davey

YCN representative for the Japanese Ceramic Society

Assistant professor in the Fracture and Reliability Research Institute within the School of Engineering at Tohoku University

theresa@tohoku.ac.jp

Theresa Davey is an assistant professor in the Fracture and Reliability Research Institute within the School of Engineering at Tohoku University, Japan. She previously obtained her PhD and worked as a postdoctoral research associate in the Department of Materials at Imperial College London, UK.

Her research focus is using physical insights from theoretical calculations and simulations to assist materials design, using multi-scale techniques from atomistic density functional theory (DFT) to the macro-scale CALPHAD approach. In particular, she is interested in improving the thermodynamic descriptions of point defects and short- and long-range ordering in alloys and ceramic materials. She has published results in Physical Review B, Calphad, RSC Advances, International Journal of Ceramic Engineering and Science, and Materials.

Her PhD research considered point defects in the ultra-high temperature ceramic zirconium carbide, and lead to the development of a method to incorporate certain defect related properties, such as defect formation energies, in a CALPHAD description directly. She was awarded a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Grant-in-Aid for Early Career Scientists in 2019 and again in 2021 to further explore the modelling of structural defects and their short-range ordering in thermodynamic databases.

Her other current research involves developing prototype first-principles-only thermodynamic databases for magnetic alloy systems (primarily Ni-based), using a modified-CALPHAD approach and directly using insights from other theoretical techniques such as the cluster variation method. She is also working on developing Cr/Zr-based cladding for accident tolerant nuclear fuels using an approach based on atomistic modelling and diffusion kinetics. She has a strong interest in computational materials design using materials informatics, and has developed a method for efficiently guiding phase diagram investigations using sequential learning and uncertainty quantification.

She is also undertaking discipline-based educational research, in particular regarding individual-centred education methods to improve equitable access to education. She has published results in Education Sciences, and has been an invited speaker on this topic at ICMAT and MRS conferences. She is passionate about equality, equity, and representation in the STEM field, and is involved with diversity efforts in several professional societies. She has been invited to speak about developing professional skills related to diverse environments at the American Ceramic Society’s Winter Workshop and in a European Ceramic Society’s Young Ceramists Network webinar, and well as being invited to record a Ceramic Tech Chat podcast on this theme.