Dr Orifici is an academic within the Aerospace Engineering and Aviation Discipline in the School of Engineering. He is responsible for teaching in aerospace structures and design, where he has received numerous awards for outstanding teaching and been recognised for his leadership in engineering education.

Dr Orifici’s research covers aerospace structures, fibre-reinforced composite materials and armour applications. A focus of his research is detailed study of damage mechanisms in materials and structures, and linking these to high fidelity computational models. In aerospace structures his work has led to innovations in analysing postbuckling structures and aircraft repair, and bio-inspired concepts for novel composite laminates and metal-composite joints. In defence materials he supervises research projects developing new understanding and advanced material models for ballistic and blast applications.