Cranfield Defence and Security at the UK Defence Academy will host the 6th Symposium on Ordnance Munitions and Explosives (OME) between the 27th and 28th of July, 2010 at the Defence Academy of the United Kingdom in Shrivenham. The Symposium, which is being held in conjunction with the MOD’s Defence Ordnance Safety Group will this year focus on research into energetic materials and explosives ordnance.
The effectiveness of Weapons systems is highly dependent on the energetic materials that they contain. Despite the maturity of energetic materials technology there are still many challenges ahead. Securing improvements in performance needs to be matched by improvements in safety, reductions in environmental impact, long and predictable life, cost effective production and security of supply. Each of these factors relies to a greater or lesser extent on having an understanding of parameters and characteristics of energetics science and technology. The purpose of energetics materials research is to generate that fundamental understanding to provide the foundations for future product development and to enable the MOD and industry to be intelligent customers of energetics technology.
This symposium of energetics research will provide visibility of some of the research activity being conducted in the UK and wider afield. It will refer to the place of this research in the MOD Defence Industrial Strategy and Defence Technology Plan.
The symposium will be attended by scientists and engineers working on energetics science and technology, by acquisition and logistics staff who acquire and manage defence capability, by members of the armed forces staff who will bring the service perspective and by industry who design and manufacture munitions and associated equipment.