Contact Dr Adriana Encinas-Oropesa

Areas of expertise

  • Design, Strategy & Innovation
  • Product and Service Design
  • Structures and Materials

Background

Dr. Adriana Encinas-Oropesa is a Lecturer in Design and Materials at the Centre of Design Engineering.

Adriana's research area has been triggered by her passion to underpin design and materials systems with a sustainability agenda. She combines her Industrial Design background, with her Materials Science expertise to investigate processes and products to increase resource efficiency and develop new knowledge, methods, and systems. This research is based on understanding the effect of various operating environments on materials' product life and their interconnection as a part of peoples' everyday life.

Adriana holds an Industrial Design BSc from the Universidad Autonoma de Guadalajara, Mexico; an MSc in Industrial and Product Design from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain and a Ph.D. in Advanced Materials from Cranfield University.

Working closely with Industry, Adriana has over 15 years of experience evaluating the performance and degradation of materials at Cranfield. She has over 40 technical publications and has also contributed to the development of new British Standards for materials testing.

Fellowship from the UK Higher Education Academy (HEA) and Fellow of The Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA) Adriana is also a member of the Mexican National System for Researchers CONACyT (SNI).

Research opportunities

I am keen to supervise students investigating materials and product design, methods, and processes involving design-led research, innovation, and enterprise, from conceptualization to proof-of-concept evaluation. Topics of interest include; human-centered materials development, sustainable materials and technologies, circular economy, circular-driven materials, and waste/ resource efficiency for materials and products.

Current activities

Adriana is MSc. Programme Director for the Jiangsu University Cranfield Tech Futures Graduate Institute (JSU CU), a strategic collaboration between Jiangsu University (China) and Cranfield. This role involves the leadership and management of the Joint Institute academic programs including Environmental Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and Engineering Management, as well as developing new courses, encouraging innovation in teaching and assessment along with mentoring colleagues.

Adriana is the module leader of the User-centred Design module that is part of the Design Thinking course in the Centre for Design Engineering.

Clients

Unilever UK

Rolls-Royce plc (UK, Germany, and Canada)

MTU Engines (Germany)

Cool Milk ltd (UK)

National Council of Science and Technology CONACyT (Mexico)

Autonomous University of State of Mexico (UAEM)

Engineering and Physical Science Research Council (EPSRC)

Innovate UK

EU Framework Programmes (EU)

European Coal and Steel Community (EU)

Siemens Energy Inc (USA, Germany)

Alstom Power (UK)

Porvair Filtration (UK)

Publications

Articles In Journals

Conference Papers

Books