The effect of aluminium on twinning in binary alpha-titanium

The deformation mechanisms of binary Ti–Al model alloys (0–13.1 at.% Aluminium) have been investigated with respect to the twinning activity using in-situ loading in combination with neutron diffraction as well as detailed post mortem electron backscatter diffraction analysis. A consistent starting grain size and texture was generated for all alloys promoting tensile twinning during compression testing. Long-wavelength neutron diffraction and selected area diffraction transmission electron microscopy analysis were carried out to detect evidence of Aluminium ordering and Ti3Al formation.It was found that raising the Aluminium content in Titanium does first slightly enhance twinning, with {10View the MathML source2} tensile twinning being by far the dominant type, while the critical residual intergranular strains for twin initiation decreases. This suggests that either the lowering of stacking fault energy by Aluminium or its solute solution strengthening effect are important factors. At around 7 at.% Aluminium a turning point in twinning activity was noticed and a further increase in Aluminium did result in a dramatic loss of twinning activity particularly when the material had been exposed to an additional low temperature age. The dramatic decrease of twinning activity is strongly correlated with increasing evidence of short range ordering and also early signs of Ti3Al-formation in case of the highest Aluminium content. In addition, electron backscatter diffraction analysis revealed that the formation of Aluminium ordered zones do severely hinder growth of twin boundaries

ADVANCE-1: An adapted collaborative benchmarking approach in centre-based lung cancer care

The majority of research within lung cancer is focused on prevention, diagnosis and treatment rather than examining infrastructure or processes of lung cancer centres. Benchmarking is a systematic method for documenting and comparing processes, functions or performance of organisations against the best in the world. ADVANCE-1 is a European Respiratory Society funded pilot study with the main aim of creating a benchmarking tool that can easily document and reflect the structure and process within a lung cancer centre and its associated registry. By doing this we can then compare centres and generate best practice learning points from each centre in order to learn from each other. The ADVANCE-1 study group was constituted by two ERS fellowship-holders and senior lung cancer specialists from the two participating lung cancer services in Glasgow, Scotland, and Berlin, Germany. The study design and benchmarking tools were reviewed externally. Once the benchmarking tools were created, prospective testing was undertaken in the two participating centres in order to allow comparison to ascertain best practice in a so called ‘collaborative benchmarking approach’. We were then able to create personalised learning points for each centre. The next phase of the project will be to expand the benchmarking across several European centres in the ADANCE-2 project